By: Zunaira Rehman
She was baking a cake in the kitchen when the bell rang. She knows who is at the door. She opens the door swiftly by keeping an arc of a big smile on her pleasing oval face. A man of average height with hazel-cloudy eyes stood there with a shaky smile while holding a white rose in his hands. After all, you have accepted your mistake. I’m happy about this. Jack, mistakes are just life’s way of teaching us, she says benevolently.
For a moment, a torch of hope lit up the darkness around her.
He replied bleakly; I didn’t say this. “I was coming to the home and saw these white flowers on the corner of the street, and I bought them. Save these lectures for someone else; I’m not in the mood.
Leave it, Jack! You will never accept your mistakes. I have made the dinner and a surprise dish for you. She settled the dining table for dinner. After dinner, she presented a chocolate cake as a surprise to Jack. She did this only to make him happy. Anna thinks, “Finding joy in the little things is often the key to lasting happiness.”
They both have been living together for the last two years. Jack and Anna are polite souls. But Jack has an attribute—he never admits his mistakes. They fight over this again and again. So, at the dining table, Anna says, “Jack, I baked this cake only for you.” I know you’re a good human, but you cannot justify it. She always politely treats him. But Jack got angry because he thought Anna was showing sympathy to her. He said, “Your sympathy is not helping. It is just making things worse. These sympathetic words do not change anything.”
Jack’s parents and siblings have left him at a separate house. And they all live together happily except him. Jack often feels inferiority and complexion, but he never focuses on his mistakes. He thought he was perfect. But no one is flawless. That’s what Anna mostly tries to realize: perfection is an illusion we chase.
At the dinner, a fight again starts over the sympathy that Anna is showing for Jack. Anna is compassionate and generous. Jack got up from the chair sharply and went to his room. Anna unwillingly and sadly gets up and cleans the table and the kitchen while thinking about all her efforts and time that she has spent the whole day making this dinner a special one. She was hurt.
“Your words have a way of reaching into the darkest corners of my heart, where even the smallest spark of hope gets extinguished.”
After cleaning the kitchen, she went to the room to sleep. In the morning, when she gets up to her surprise, Jack has gone to work without telling her. The day, she remained at home only with her thoughts. In the evening, when Jack comes back home. She asked him to clear all the things. She
made him realize that she did not show sympathy. She always pleasantly does everything for him. But Jack’s nature was the opposite. He started to fight over that you do not understand me, and you always show sympathy because my parents are not with me.
Anna uttered, “Do you even remember what started it? Why is this all happening, and why are you like this today? Ask yourself.
He was with no words at this and went away while shutting the door, carrying a lot of words with him. She was quiet and totally quiet. In this echo of quietness, she just looked out the window pane on the new horizon.
The writer can be reached at zunairarehman42@gmail.com
