Possession

"Papa, wake up! Open your eyes!!" she cried wholeheartedly in front of the lying corpse. "Mama, look at him!! Wake him up!! He will wake up. Please wake him up," she turned towards her mother, who looked almost lifeless, showing her state of stupor.

"Papa! My papa! Don't leave me alone. What will I do without you?" Her eyes were red, and her whole form was shaking with her sobs.

The whole room was filled with her desperate pleas and cries. Last night, she had dinner with her father, and in the morning, he was no more. He died due to a heart attack. The reason for his heart attack was the constant stress and hypertension, which increased the blood pressure and eventually led to myocardial infarction.

"It's time for the funeral," her cousin, Daniyal, spoke from behind, which made her cling to his father's dead body like her life was dependent on it.

"No!! No! He is alive!! No!! I won't let him go! Please don't take him!!" Her aunt moved forward to help her get off her father's body, and with full resistance, she finally moved and hugged her aunt tightly and cried on her shoulders.

The men in the house shouldered the body and headed for the graveyard while she cried and cried till her tears dried down. Her mother couldn't seem to get out of the trauma and immediately locked herself in the room after all the guests left, who came for the funeral. She took sleeping pills to escape reality, leaving her only daughter to herself.

It was noon, but Zahra still had locked herself in her room. She could not accept the fact that her father was no more. The bitter reality was eating her from inside, deepening the hollow pit in her heart in which she had been caged for the last 5 years. Her parents were all she had. This never mattered to her that they were poor, but she only craved happiness and attention from her parents. After her father's death, she only wanted to die along with him. She had no wish to live. She was so connected with her father. Always trying to do things that could make him happy and content. Be it good grades in her class or earning a scholarship from the university. She always looked up to him and wanted to be like him. A man full of self-respect and dignity who would do anything for his family.

She was just thinking about the memories she had created with her father, and that made a fit of sobs hit her hard. Big sobs raked her whole form, and she was a crying mess within minutes. A knock on the door ceased her sobbing and diverted her attention. She only wished her father was knocking on the door. And this thought alone deepened her grief.

"Who is there?" she asked in her heavy voice, which was all hoarse due to crying.

"It's me, Daniyal."

"Daniyal," she whispered to herself.

On realizing he stood there, she immediately stood up and ran towards the door, unlocked it, and gave Daniyal a bone-crushing hug. Her emotions took a toll, and she started to cry wholeheartedly on his shoulder. He was left bewildered, it was the first time his love had hugged him or touched him. Nonetheless, he patted her back to soothe her. His heart wrenched on seeing her vulnerable state.

Daniyal and Zahra both deeply loved each other. He was related to Zahra from her mother's side. When her parents were working hard to earn money, he was always there to dismiss her loneliness and give her the best company ever, since then, they both realized they were in love, and their relationship began. He was the only man whom Zahra trusted other than her father. Despite being in a relationship, Zahra didn't permit him ever not to touch her in any way neither she allowed him to even hold her hand.

“Shhh Zahra, everything will be fine,” Daniyal soothed her.

“How come I don't cry? My father left me leaving me all alone,” With that, her sobbing renewed.

“I am with you Zahra and always will be by your side,”

“Never leave me alone. I cannot live without you, Daniyal,” Zahra said. "Promise me you'll never leave me.”

"I promise, I swear on my life I will never leave you, but first relax and calm down. Please stop crying Zahra, my love,” Daniyal cooed at her.

"Ehm Ehm,” someone faked a cough as a gesture to make their presence known.

Zahra lifted her eyes and saw Shoaib, the elder brother of Daniyal standing there. She immediately left Daniyal's shoulder and reached for her scarf to cover her chest, which was on the bed inside the room.

"Hello Shoaib Bhai," she said in her heavy voice, and her eyes cast to the floor. Anyone could easily say she was nervous.

"Hello," Shoaib responded and then turned to Daniyal, "Daniyal mother is calling you downstairs. Go now."

Daniyal nodded and headed downstairs. Zahra on noticing that she'll be alone with Shoaib immediately tried to follow Daniyal and when she walked past Shoaib, he abruptly grabbed her elbow and whiffed in her fragrance to intimidate her. Zahra forcefully let her hand go of him and ran downstairs. While he only smirked as if he had won something.

She has been facing this harassment for the last 5 years. Whenever she went to her aunt's place his eldest son, Shoaib would harass her. But she kept quiet because she thought in the end she would be accused of possessing a bad character.

Moreover, her parents used to be too busy to give her any time, and they lost her trust. She became hesitant about telling anything to her parents, and they were also covered in heaps of work to note any changes in her daughter. Zahra noticed that her parents were overburdened with something, so she did not want to increase their burden and henceforth kept quiet.

For the last 5 years, continuous harassment and her parents' negligence made her nature introverted. She no longer was an extroverted girl who wanted to live her life to the fullest. A feeling of dread always crept over her nerves whenever any male was around. She did not trust anyone easily, especially men. The harassment led her mind to create a haunting perception about men, and she always tried to get away when any unfamiliar person was around her. She judged all men with the same eye. The eye that was born as a result of the harassment.

She had been locked in a shell of her own. Talking to herself about her situation. Looking at the mirror, clearing her tears, she won't find any shoulder. Whenever she would try to tell about this harassment to her mother, her mother would always be too busy to pay any attention to her. On the other hand, her father was busier than her mother. At times, she won't be able to see him for weeks given his work requirement. The workload on him had always been too much. Her parents won't talk about the core problem in front of her. They would try to act lively, yet an intense tension-filled atmosphere would always be there. They wouldn't go shopping or to restaurants as it was becoming too expensive for them to afford. They had begun living from hand to mouth in the past few months, and this financial condition had been not suppressing but rather growing. Seeing her parents too tensed and worked up, she couldn't find it in herself to worry them more by telling them about the harassment when she was aware her parents were very much dependent on Shoaib's family.

“Ammara everything will be fine, have faith. Be patient.”

Right now, they were sitting in the drawing room, and her aunt was sitting beside her mother and consoling her.

“Neelam, how will everything be alright? What will I do without my Mujtaba? I will not be able to do anything without him.”

"Have faith in God. Be patient,” Neelam consoled her sister.

Zahra came and sat beside her mother on the couch to comfort her, but tears again brimmed in her eyes, making a sharp pain in her nose, indicating she was on the verge of crying. At last, she couldn't hold her emotions, and salty tears cascaded down her eyes, soaking her cheeks. She only wanted to be strong, at least in front of her mother, but her emotions could not seem to get in control.

Her father was her life, and she never once thought what her life would be without her father. The mere thought of it always made her depressed, but now her life took the biggest turn, leaving her in a blind alley. Currently, she has no goal nor any will to live. And she was praying for her death to meet her father.

"Mama please stop crying," she beseeched, while she was crying her eyes out.

Her mother laid Zahra's head on her lap and gently caressed her long brown locks to ease her daughter. But Zahra didn't have it and began to cry out loudly. Her body shuddered with big sobs, flushing her face red. She cried her heart out on her mother's lap, and at last, sleep engrossed her.

....

Her eyes fluttered open, and she found herself in her room. Her head was aching so badly that her whole face seemed to be frozen. Then reality hit her hard, and what she thought was a dream happened, her father was no more with her. Before her emotions could control her, she heard unfamiliar voices coming from downstairs. She thought that they must be the people who came for condolences, but their voices and the vicious way with which they were talking told another story.

She grabbed her dupatta and headed downstairs. She was halfway through the staircase when she could hear them.

"We want the rest of our money back," a goony voice demanded.

"How could we even give back this much money when you know that all we have is this house? Why don't you go and ask Asim?" the desperate voice of her mother had her eyes widened. She didn't know what was happening and what money they were asking for.

"Asim told us that you have the money and all the papers had Mujtaba Shabbir Syed's name, not Asim's,” another voice snapped.

"Asim made us sign those papers we only demanded 1 million, not 20 million, which we know we are not able to pay."

"We don't care; our boss only wants the money, and it's up to you to pay back our money in the given time."

"How could we gather this big amount of money? It will almost take a lifetime to pay back the rest. For the last 5 years, we made all possible efforts, but it is next to impossible to gather this much money in such a short span, which you are asking."

"Either you give us this house or return our money." After hearing this, Zahra was left bewildered and immediately ran toward the TV lounge, from where the voices were coming. She was hysterical at the moment and didn't care about the outcome. She only did what she wanted, and what she wanted was for those people to leave her house immediately.

"NO!! LEAVE US AND OUR HOUSE NOW!" she shouted frantically in shock.

All the heads immediately turned toward her. Her mother, her aunt, Shoaib, and Daniyal were there. Those two goons eyed her lustily and exchanged glances with each other, showing that a mischievous plan hit them.

"Zahra, go inside," Daniyal seethed after noticing those two men exchanging glances.

"NOW!" he boomed. Zahra jumped but didn't back off.

"First ask them to leave our house. NOW!" she said with the same intensity.

"Let's make a deal," one of those men suddenly said.

"What deal?" Shoaib asked.

"Either you give us this house," the goon looked around, observing the house.

"Or what?" Neelam challenged.

The men looked at her, then at Zahra, "Or hand over this girl to us."

Everyone visibly gasped out of shock.

"Now it's up to you what you would like us to give."

"Take this house but don't dare to even look at my daughter. I will claw your eyes out," Amarra deadpanned, looking straight in their eyes.

"Two days," he raised his two fingers, "we give you only two days to leave this place."

Zahra was traumatized; it was a thunderbolt for her. She never knew such inhumanity existed. She stood baffled in her place for a good two minutes. But her aunt's question snapped her out of her trauma, and now she was anxious.

"Where will you go, Amarra?" Neelam asked.

"You can stay at our house, Aunt," Shoaib said.

Zahra sensed the hidden motive behind his suggestion. He only wanted to be close to her so that he could easily do whatever he wanted with her.

"But I think Waqas won't allow it. You can stay at our place for a week, for a month, even though I want you to stay for your whole life, but still her-" Amarra's voice cut short her sentence.

Waqas was Neelam's husband. He was a very greedy person and a penny-pincher, and if he let Ammara and Zahra live in his house, he would humiliate them with every step they took, and Amarra knew that.

"I know where we will go," Ammara announced.

People walked past him with their gazes held down, meekly greeting him. He only gave a curt nod to them and continued walking towards his lift. His domineering aura had them hurrying past him, avoiding eye contact at all costs. Their heartbeats became erratic in his presence, their blood-pumping organs almost jumping into their throats. Nobody knew whose last day it could be at work; a small mistake could lead to a level of humiliation they never knew existed. After all, their CEO had his hawk-like, calculative eyes on everyone, but you never knew when he would be observing you. He reached his lift and hit the top floor button, where his office resided.

On reaching there, he saw his second-in-command, Yawar, standing in front of his office door, engrossed in conversation with someone, unaware of his presence. He rested his eyes for a few moments on the man whom Yawar was talking to before looking away. He went for his office door and walked past them. On noticing their boss had arrived, Yawar immediately dismissed the person and entered the office, the white door silver-plated with the CEO's name, IRTAZA HAIDER SYED.

The name he had built over the years through hard work, making the company progress by leaps and bounds. And so did his family name.

As soon as his second-in-command entered, he found Irtaza standing by the large glass window, viewing the whole city with his narrowed grey eyes. While looking out, analyzing cars that appeared like toy cars and busy city traffic, his mind was elsewhere. "Who was he?" he asked without turning back. His hands were inside his pockets.

"He was Asim, came here for some documents, nothing so important," Yawar immediately spoke.

He only gave a curt nod before facing Yawar and motioned for him to sit, which he did. "Work is done?" he asked after sitting on his black swivel chair, his voice holding authority.

"Yes, boss. May I?" Yawar inquired.

"Proceed."

Yawar nodded and stood, moving towards the left wall of the office, while Irtaza sat typing a message on his phone. Yawar clicked a hidden button inside the wall, and a secret door to a lift opened, revealing a badly beaten man with roped hands, gagged mouth, and blindfolded eyes. Blood spattered all over his face, his nose broken, and his cheekbones marked with bruises. He was breathing slowly and heavily through his mouth. Another man stood beside him to support him, equally battered. His nose was smashed, and his eyes were almost shut with swelling. His arms were wrapped around his stomach as if holding it in, and he was beaten as badly as could be.

Yawar viciously snatched the beaten man's arm and followed him to the front desk. He made the man kneel in front of Irtaza and stood beside him. The other guard who was in the lift also came and stood on the other side of the beaten person. The blindfolded man knelt at the center while Yawar and the other man stood on each side of him in front of Irtaza's desk. Irtaza placed his phone on the desk and steepled his fingers, observing him, who shivered. Both his subordinates could feel his steely gaze on them, making them as vigilant as they could be. They knew no details could be missed by their boss's eyes, and they didn't want to challenge him on that. He had always been apt, calculative, and sharp, with a specialty of not showing what was going on in his mind.

Eyes were windows to the soul. This sentence never worked for him, given the training he had received over the years of masking his emotions. And he was the maestro of that. While dealing with business, the mafia, or other matters, his eyes wouldn't betray a flicker of emotion in front of his men. That side of his was kept only for his family.

"Report," he commanded after a few moments of silence.

"Boss, he is Faizan, one of the most trusted men of the second-in-command of the Osmanis," the other man from the lift, whose name was Amaan, reported to Irtaza.

"We found him when we raided one of their warehouses, but he is too stubborn to give out any information other than that they also are going to raid some of our warehouses. Yet he did not spill out their locations," he further reported.

Irtaza signaled something to Yawar with his left hand, and Yawar left the room through the hidden lift. He took a deep, heavy breath and opened one of his drawers to take out his Beretta 92FS. Standing from his chair, the gun in his left hand, he took menacingly long strides toward his prey. The heavy, sharp sounds of his boots striking against the marble floor enveloped the room in eerie silence. Sweat started to pop out of the kneeling man's face; he very well knew in whose territory he was. The country's most notorious mafia leader had him clutched in his paws, and he very well knew that by hook or by crook, he would soon be spilling out the information.

"So, you feel like keeping your mouth shut? Hmm?" Irtaza was now standing just in front of him, the tip of his gun caressing the man's face.

"I don't know anything," he feigned ignorance, yet his shivering body betrayed him.

Irtaza pressed the tip of his gun underneath his chin, lifting his face and removing the blindfold. The man's swollen eyes now stared directly into Irtaza's piercing grey ones as he asked again. "You won't tell us?" That look, that dark look in his eyes, paralyzed him in fear.

"Th...ey," Faizan stuttered, unable to form any coherent words and taking short, labored breaths. "They what?" Irtaza smirked and removed his gun from under his chin.

Faizan immediately lowered his eyes, not daring to meet his gaze. "Speak up," Irtaza's voice was deceptively calm.

"They are g..going to raid t..two of your penthouses, o...one near to the airport a..and one to the west...st of the seaport," he immediately spilled out the locations. Faizan knew that sooner or later, he would almost torture him to death for the sake of the information. "You should have brought him to me in the first place," Irtaza indirectly told Amman while eyeing Faizan skeptically.

"Will you leave me now?" Faizan asked, fear evident in his voice.

"Yes, I surely will, but first accept this little present of us," he said, amused, and turned the man's face with his handgun to the wall where the door for the lift was, and there came in Yawar with two bodyguards behind him, holding another badly beaten fellow.

Faizan's eyes widened in shock, but he immediately composed himself. "I do not know who he is," he told Irtaza.

"I did not ask you anything," Irtaza quickly reciprocated. "Now did I?" Yawar pushed the man forward, bringing him in front of Irtaza and making him kneel.

Irtaza placed the tip of his gun right above the second man's skull and looked straight toward Faizan.

"See what they made us do," he said to Faizan, nonchalantly, and after a short while, the whole room boomed with a gunshot. It was right into the skull of the other man.

A body lay dead on the floor, blood oozing out from the top of his head.

Faizan only shivered and kept looking toward the dead body in bewilderment.

"Do tell your boss we caught his fucking spy," Irtaza seethed.

He placed the sole of his shoe on his head, crushing the dead man's skull.

"And don't forget to take this shithole with you," he bent down and tightly grabbed a fistful of his hair and smashed his forehead right onto the floor.

"Tell your fucking boss to stop messing with me or he'll have hell to pay," with that, he smashed his head again, causing stars to invade his vision.

"Understood?"

"Y..yes, lea..vee me," he croaked.

"Yawar!"

Yawar immediately nodded and asked the other men to take these two, and they did so.

"He was lying," Irtaza told Yawar and Amman when they were left alone in the room.

"It was all planted; that man was only there to mislead us," he calmly said while sitting back and placing the gun on the desk.

"Sir, then why did you let him go?" his third in command, Amman asked.

Before Irtaza could answer his question, the realization hit him, and it dawned on him that it was all planned. The rivals planted that man to misguide them, but their boss beat them to it and made them think that they bought the lie Faizan told them.

He was once again greatly impressed by the level of intelligence his boss possessed and nodded to him, indicating he got his answers.

"These Osmanis are getting on my nerves; I want to wipe their existence as soon as possible. Yawar, you are going to keep tabs on their head, Khurram Osmani. Station your most trusted and skillful men around him. I want every single detail of his every activity." "Ok Boss, on it," Yawar nodded.

"And yes, you Amman, they soon will be attacking one of our penthouses. I want you to give a red alert to all the penthouses and ask their heads to tighten the security." "OK boss, consider it done," Amman affirmed.

"And that man Faizan, keep a check on him, and right after 3 days seize him again; I'll deal with him," he ordered. His elbow rested on the wooden desk, and his forefinger was pointed in a downward direction as he gave orders.

They both nodded.

"Boss, an issue needs your attention," Yawar spoke.

"What is it?"

"We granted a loan to a man of 20 million, but he died this morning, and his family is not able to pay the rest of the money back."

"Do what is necessary. 20 million is neither a big amount nor extracting 20 million from them is the issue at hand."

"OK, boss."

"And next time, lend money to someone worthy enough to pay back. I don't want this to happen again."

Yawar looked down in shame.

"Sorry boss, it won't happen again. Asim brought that man to me. He assured me that he was reliable."

"Nonetheless, it shouldn't be happening again," he instructed.

"Moreover, send some more men to the west side to help Moosa let go of the drug consignment easily."

Moosa was his first in command and his childhood friend. He was in charge of all big operations held under his Mafia, and this operation of shipping the drug consignment out of the country was the biggest issue for him at the moment. He would be getting a billion after the successful shipping of the consignment, but his rivals were creating obstacles to doing so. And the biggest enemy of his Mafia at the moment was the Osmani family. He wanted to make the operation successful as soon as possible and then deal with his rivals comfortably.

"Yes sir," they both said with unity.

"Now, you both may leave."

Amman left the room.

"Yawar," Irtaza called him when he was about to leave the room.

"Yes boss?" he turned around. Irtaza was twirling a pencil in his fingers as if in deep thought.

"I don't trust that man Asim. If he acts out of the way, then keep an eye on him, and if not, then still I don't want you to trust him completely," He directed and placed the pencil back. Yawar knew the sharp observing skills of his boss; he just had to look at somebody's face to judge him thoroughly. And now he was getting fishy about Asim, so it bothered Yawar, and he decided to follow Asim to gauge whether he acted suspiciously or not.

"Noted sir!" Yawar asserted.

"You may leave," he ordered and opened his laptop to start up for work.

Yawar was about to leave the room when suddenly an old man entered the office.

"Well, well young lad, I am certainly not going anywhere," his jolly voice spoke.

Irtaza immediately recognized the voice, and his head shot up. His grandfather was there. He did not expect him to visit his office.

“Greetings Shabbir uncle,” Yawar greeted him “To you too. Live long,”

After exchanging a few casual dialogues, Yawar left the office, while Irtaza stood up, his hands in his pockets, and observed his grandfather, wondering what emergency brought him to his office.

"Well, grandpa, what brought you here today?" he asked when they were both alone.

"It's not the way to address your grandfather, you little donkey," He spoke while sitting on the swivel chair in front of the desk, and Irtaza sat back in his seat.

"Alright. I apologize. Now tell me," He smiled.

His grandfather was the only person to whom he was closer. And he was the one who passed his Mafia empire to his eldest grandson. In his time, his grandfather was also renowned as the most ruthless Mafia boss. And now he was holding the empire which his grandfather built over the years. Irtaza learned the skills, adroitness, and expertise of the Mafia world from him. Yet his grandpa was the only person with whom Irtaza had his frank and cheerful attitude."Huh young lad, curious, are we?" the old man cheered. "But the first promise you would have to agree to what I will say."

"It depends on what you say," he argued back.

"First promise me," his grandfather coaxed.

"No, first you tell me," he contended.

"If you aren't going to promise, then I am not going to tell, now it's up to you," his grandfather declared.

"Hmm, ok, fine, I promise," He said pensively.

"I'm gonna show you some pictures from which you have to select one," his grandfather announced, merrily.

"For what?" he raised his brow.

"For you to marry my son," was his nonchalant answer.

With that, he popped out a few pictures of some girls, out of his pockets, and handed them over to him.

"Seriously Grandpa, you came from the haveli (mansion) for this," he contended while taking the pictures and going through them.

Irtaza knew his grandparents were hell-bent on his marriage and overexcited whenever the topic was brought up, but he did not expect his grandfather to barge into his office and make him approve of one of the proposals at gunpoint.

"Yes, seriously my son, now select."

"You can see it's in my workplace, not any marriage bureau, we can discuss it at home," he randomly turned the pictures. "I'm sorry son, I gave my word to your grandmother that I will not be coming back until you choose a girl, so I am not going anywhere."

Irtaza knew if his grandfather had made up his mind on something he would do it no matter what, so Irtaza decided to do as he said.

He looked at each of the pictures skeptically and after carefully observing each of them, he faked a scowl.

"Ouch old man, you hurt me. You do not know my taste," he dramatically said, smirking.

"If it's not according to your taste then show me the one according to your taste, my boy," he challenged.

"If I show you then promise me you're going to stop showing me girls and pestering me to marry," Irtaza's face suddenly turned all serious, and the little smile on his pink lips flew away.

"First show me the girl."

"First promise me," he coaxed.

"Like father, like son," the old man muttered under his breath. "Ok, I promise now show me!" he exclaimed.

Irtaza opened the drawer to his left side, took a picture out of it, and handed it to his grandfather. He took the picture from his grandson's hand and eyed it, observingly.

"Well, do you like her?" Irtaza questioned him, a foreign excitement on his face.

"Yeah, I certainly do, she is beautiful but....but she seems quite familiar, have we met before?" he asked with uncertainty.

"I do not know that you've met before, but you know her very well," Irtaza smiled, looking him in the eye.

"But first I shall make myself clear that I'll only and only marry her," he declared.

The old man knew if his grandson had his eyes set on something he would surely get it. It did not matter to him if it was seven seas away or if it was deep down the earth, if he wanted anything he would go to any extent for it. And now if he wanted to marry this girl, he would marry her with or without his consent. Because it ran in his blood to always get what he wanted.

"Ok, now tell me, who is she?" He asked seriously.

"She is Mujtaba uncle's daughter, Zahra."