. . .

. . .

~

"So do you believe in part of the Scripture and reject the rest?" (Qur'an 2:85)

~

Zoya picks at the food Mumtaz has laid out on the breakfast table, lost in thought.

Once, she and Haroun had been talking about divine predestination. Zoya had argued that if everything was predestined, what role did free will play in a person's life?

Haroun had chuckled and told her she'd be surprised by how many people asked that question. And she was surprised. People doubted faith as she did?

Apparently, yes. And very frequently. It's the essence of being human, Haroun had said. The test is how you will let these thoughts affect your faith.

Zoya had probably not passed her test, then. She was constantly hanging onto faith by a thread, threatened by any doubt that entered her mind. The thread of her faith would have easily been clipped off many times had it not been for Haroun. He always tried his best to explain things to her and clear her doubts, even if she wasn't always entirely satisfied.

She recalls the conversation the two of them had afterwards. Haroun had explained that while God had prewritten everything, He had also given humans the ability to make choices that would set them on the path they had been destined to tread. Zoya had argued that it wasn't really choosing if they were to tread that path anyway, but Haroun had shaken his head and given her an example.

He had said that the starting point and the ending point of two destinations would always remain constant, but there were various ways in which the end destination could be accessed. He had said that getting from home to work would lead her from one constant to another constant, but the journey in between would consist of multiple routes and exits on the highway. Giving her various options to choose from to reach the same destination at the end.

So Zoya had asked him something that had been haunting her. She had asked this while trying to remain as guarded and secretive as possible because he still hadn't known of her major lie.

She had said, "So do you think I was written for you or that I made a choice and forced myself to be written for you?"

Haroun had looked up at her then, black eyes effervescent. She had practically heard the thumping of his heart. "Zoya, you were always written for me. No matter which way it happened, the destination for marriage was always you."

And as Zoya sits at the breakfast table pondering over these memories, she thinks of the choices she has made that have led her to God. She had adamantly refused Him for so long, but at the end of the day He still circled her back around to Him. At the end of the day — despite all her rebelliousness and her stubbornness to refuse Him — she had ended up helplessly staggering back to Him.

And He had been waiting for her. Because He knew these were the choices she would eventually make.

A small smile makes its way onto her face. The first real one since Haroun left. And who brought it on her face? Who managed to haul her out of the depths of her despair and set her on track again?

The same One she had constantly and wrongfully blamed for putting her through all her suffering. The same One she had been running from all along. The same One she had denied and adamantly refused over and over again.

God.

. . .

When Zoya knocks on the door of the next person on her list, she has half a mind to make a run for it. But the thought occurs to her too late because the chain lifts on the other side of the door and it creaks open.

There she stands. Sumaiya Akhtar. Bags under her eyes and a few scars along the right side of her face.

Zoya takes one look at her and sighs deeply, disturbed. The ache pierces deeper into her chest.

Sumaiya's eyes widen when she sees her. She stands there unsurely, one hand rising instinctively to her chest. Footsteps approach from inside the house and suddenly an older woman stands in front of Zoya. She looks taken aback at Zoya's appearance before hard, angry lines settle into the planes of her face.

The woman — who must be Sumaiya's mother — yells at Zoya. A lot. Tells Zoya she has no right to show up to their doorstep. Tells Zoya she has some audacity even showing her face. This means her mother knows of everything that went down — of all the lies and deceit and the mess her daughter was caught up in between Zaki Ahmed and Zoya Zameer.

Zoya takes it all with a quiet mouth and a bent head. When the anger and the ruckus die down, she quietly says, "Can I please come in?"

The woman stares at her in bafflement. She gestures around angrily and repeats that Zoya has some audacity showing up and asking for entrance as if this is "tumhari phupphi ka ghar."

Behind the woman, Sumaiya stands quietly. But she must see something on Zoya's face because she places a hand on her mother's shoulder. The older woman turns to her daughter, and Sumaiya gestures shakily to allow Zoya to enter.

Reluctantly, Sumaiya's mother does as she is told, but the anger never leaves her face. She retreats upstairs, murmuring harsh words.

When Zoya is settled in the living room, she turns to Sumaiya and opens her mouth. Before she can say anything, however, Sumaiya beats her to it.

"You look . . . awful."

Zoya laughs mirthlessly. "I could say the same thing to you."

"What happened?"

Zoya shakes her head. "Never mind that." She observes Sumaiya carefully, noticing how each breath of hers comes out shallow and careful, requiring much effort. "How are you?"

At this question, Sumaiya's eyebrows rise in surprise. "Um . . . I'm okay?" Pause. "How about you?"

Zoya shrugs. "I wanted to come see you."

"Okay," Sumaiya says slowly, as if waiting for Zoya to explain.

"I — " Zoya stops, sighs, rubs her temples. "I wanted to say sorry to you."

Sumaiya's brows furrow.

"What . . . happened to you" — what I did to you — "was highly unjust. And it happened because I was . . . too bloodthirsty. Too vengeful. And I didn't even give a damn that your life was possibly on the line." Zoya tries to rub soothing circles on her temples the way Haroun used to, but it provides only a small level of comfort. "You warned me. You told me that Zaki Ahmed would make you pay and he would do it without giving a damn about your life. But I didn't listen to you." Clear distress seeps through her tone. Zoya thinks that all she has been feeling lately is distress. Distress, worry, regret. A torturous, never ending cycle.

Sumaiya is quiet.

"I'm . . . " Zoya turns to look at her. "I'm so sorry."

She remains quiet for a few moments before turning back to Zoya. "Ms. Zoya — "

"Just Zoya. Please."

"Okay, Zoya . . . I wanted to tell you that I'm sorry, too."

Zoya is unable to conceal her shock. Sumaiya nods. "I've been wanting to apologize to you. I was trying to build the courage." Zoya intakes a sharp breath at these words. Suddenly, she feels as this is a duplicate of the conversation between her and Haroun. Of her crying and telling him she was trying to build the courage to expose her lie.

Sumaiya's voice breaks her out of her thoughts. "Boht zyaati ki mene Zameer k saath. Please, please forgive me for it." She shifts a bit and flinches when the movement hurts her ribs. Zoya watches her with woeful eyes, unable to shake the voice in her head whispering that Sumaiya's condition is Zoya's fault. "I've learned the hard way that there is always another choice to make."

Zoya laughs bitterly. "So have I."

"I wanted to ask . . . " Sumaiya hesitates. "I've been seeing you all over the news. About how you haven't left your house in weeks. And that everyone in Zameer is in an uproar but you're . . . nowhere to be found. What . . . happened, if I may ask?"

Zoya catches her head in her hands. "I realized all my mistakes is what happened. I broke a good man's heart."

"I never got to congratulate you on your marriage." There is an awkward silence. "But right now, you and Haroun . . . " Sumaiya trails off.

"He . . . he left."

Sumaiya sucks in a sharp breath, wincing suddenly when the action pierces her chest. "Oh, no. What happened?"

"I lied to him," Zoya repeats the line she is becoming tortuously accustomed to. "Majorly. He couldn't handle being so . . . defrauded."

Moments of tense silence pass before a warm hand comes down to clasp Zoya's. Zoya flinches and looks up with a start. Sumaiya is watching her with that familiar pity in her eyes, and all Zoya wants is to bury herself deeper into the mound of quicksand she is trapped in.

"There's always another choice," Sumaiya says in an incredibly sad voice. "And we've both learned that the hard way."

The two of them sit there for a few silent moments, hands clasped in one another. Then Zoya says once more, "I'm really sorry. You have no idea how sorry I am."

Sumaiya shakes her head. "I've had some of my own time to reflect." She breathes out a shallow sigh, a deep indent appearing in her forehead. "I shouldn't have made the choices I did."

"And neither should have I," Zoya replies, thinking of how humans tend to think lessons are learned only from those they look up to. And yet here she is, learning a great deal while sitting next to somebody who harmed her company.

Silence again for a few moments.

"God's plan . . . " Sumaiya murmurs. " . . . is perfect in every way. Perfect plan, perfect execution, perfect timing, perfect everything. Who would have thought we would be sitting together like this one day?" She raises their clasped hands. "I guess we both had lessons to learn."

Zoya thinks of the wariness she still feels around God, the wrongs she still has to make right. She laughs sadly. "I'm not sure I've fully learned mine."

Sumaiya shifts, wincing at the movement. As Zoya watches her struggle with the simple act of breathing and moving even after about seven months of her car accident, the guilt spreads wider in her heart. Especially when Sumaiya says, "You are here. And that makes all the difference in the world." This response awes Zoya. How is Sumaiya able to comfort Zoya after what Zoya has done to her? It would have been more appropriate for her to react like her mother, but it seems to Zoya that everybody harbors this goodness except for her.

Nevertheless, Zoya smiles tentatively at her words.

"Besides, if lessons were meant to be learned all at once and never again, Allah wouldn't have given us entire lifetimes to witness lessons and eventually fix our mistakes. But He has. So while knowing His decrees and His knowledge of all that we do, we choose what to do with the time He's given us."

There it is again. The element of choice. The emphasis on free will.

Zoya thinks she finally understands what Haroun had tried explaining to her about predestination and free will coinciding.

She may be standing in the midst of a battlefield, a war cry rising up her throat. She may feel as if she is being rained with debris and hardships. She may feel trapped and suffocated.

But the key to winning the battle is wielding her weapon and shield. The key is guarding herself against all odds while simultaneously knowing some One has her back and is aware of every action she will take.

The key to winning every battle is trusting God and knowing that despite the outcome of the battle being predestined by a Sovereign above, the weapon needed to win is still enclosed in her very fist.

. . .