***
On Monday morning, it rained heavily as everyone at the Ali's house dressed to depart for work. Ali dropped the twins at the elementary school, seema headed to work. While Farida and Maryam went out together. Farida dropped Maryam off at the sagir's mansion, silently praying that none of them could see her. She zoomed off the moment Maryam got out of the car, not even giving the girl any chance to say goodbye.
Soon, she arrived at her working place, Elliott and sons only to find that her parking space had been occupied. In fact, there was no parking space at all, she had no other choice but to park outside. That made her wonder why the parking lot was so full,Mr Elliott never mentioned that there would be any guests.
Outside, men and women hastily marched to their destinations in rain coats. Many carried umbrella but a few didn't. Just then she remembered that she had neither a rain coat, nor and umbrella. She mentally face palmed herself at her stupidity, she was in such a hurry that she forgot to take care if herself. Turning off the engine, she inhaled deeply and exhaled loudly before opening the car door. Droplets of water landed on the driver seat before the door was closed and locked.
Farida ran to the door in her black heels with her hand bag hidden inside her red dress jacket. She pushed the door open and sighed in relief that she didn't get drenched.
Greeting everyone she came across, she proceeded to the elevator, the memories of the her short awkward moment with sudais flashed and she shook her head to get it out.
Something made her feel like the event had happened several times before. She felt like that wasn't the first time he had looked at her in that manner.
Farida leaned against the elevator's silver walls and thought. Why would her brother in-law give her such a look.
Her phone rang and interrupted her thoughts. After a few seconds of struggle, she finally got the phone out of her black hand bag. The screen showed fahad's name and she rolled her eyes.
"God! He's such a stalker." She exclaimed angrily and rejected the call. The fact that he kept calling her to say hi, instead of giving the phone to little faysal so that he could talk to his friend was all strange to her. Something made her hate the fact that Fahad had feelings for her, it was pretty obvious and he had no idea. The elevator paused and opened. She stepped out of it and spotted sudais approaching her from the direction she was supposed to head to. Turning on her heels, she ran to the other direction.
She arrived at her office and saw that her colleagues had been enjoying the rain with hot chocolates. Some had even slept off.
"Don't tell me, I missed this little party." She exclaimed and all attentions turned to her. Jared pushed his glasses to sit properly on his nostril with his index finger and grinned sheepishly.
"You didn't think I would finish your favorite beverage without you, did you?"
She laughed and Mercy handed her her own cup full of steaming hot chocolate.
"Thank you!" Farida said and went to her table. Soon Betty entered with loads of papers and files, almost dropping them on the way. She placed the bunch of papers on her table and glanced around the room at her colleagues who looked like they had not gotten any sleep at night.
"Okay people, you need to get your brains jacking. We have a lot of work, I don't think we can finish this today if you continue like this." She said loudly, so that the sleepy ones could hear her.
There was a chorus of groans and hisses as replies to what's Betty had said. She rolled her eyes and began to share the papers. Farida didn't waste any time, she went through them and started her work while sipping her beverage.
Meanwhile, at the sagirs building company in London, workers could be seen running around to get their works done, unconcerned about the tempting weather. Unlike the employees, the boss was sitting comfortably and silently on his office chair, ignoring the pile of papers on his table. He constantly twirled his seat around as he waited patiently for the private detective he had hired to search for ex wife's medical reports.
A knock sounded from outside his office, bringing him out of his reverie.
"Come in." His deep voice echoed. In less and two seconds, the door opened and a young and tall, fair man with red hair walked in.
"Good morning Mr sudais." He greeted, his strong French accent was bold.
"Good morning max, its good to see you." Sudais said, genuinely. Max didn't need to be asked to sit as he had already made himself comfortable on the opposite chair.
"So...did you get them?" Sudais asked eagerly.
"Yes, I have them." Max said, pulling a White hospital file out of his brown leather suitcase and leaned forward slightly to hand it over to sudais.
Sudais opened the file and scanned the first paper, it had farida's name on it as the patient. That was the only thing sudais could understand on the paper, his eyebrows knotted in confusion.
"I don't understand a thing on this paper." Sudais complained. Max chuckled and collected the file.
"This is her first medical report from Broadmoor hospital." Max mentioned. Sudais nodded.
"Its a psychiatric hospital by the way." Max added and sudais's frown increased.
"A psychiatric?" Asked Sudais.
"Yes, that was in 2013. And her first attempted suicide." Max explained. Sudais's heart gave a thud at his chest, his doubt and anxiousness was clear on his face.
"Suicide?" He asked, placing his elbows on his office table. His golden brown eyes were trying very hard not to tear up.
"Yes." Max answered and proceeded to read the details.
"A couple found her on their porch, here in London. In her own pool of blood, wrist brutally slitted." Max said and Sudais turned his chair to the other side, hiding his expression away from Max's sight. Max paused for a moment as he reasoned with sudais's action, he believed the woman was of importance to Sudais.
"Go on, please" Sudais said.
"After being treated and bandaged in the nearest clinic, they transfered her to Broadmoor and contacted her parents." Max explained and paused for a moment before proceeding.
"I guess they figured out what she needed was a mental check up."
"Did they mention the cause of her mental disorder?" Sudais asked, he silently prayed that he was not the reason behind it.
"A depressing heartbreak. The woman whom i paid to get the file gave me a bit more info. She said that the patient kept chanting that she didn't do it, he used her and tossed her aside." Max elaborated.
Sudais didn't know what hit him, he felt an unfamiliar pain in his heart. His head had been clouded with different thoughts, it was almost unbearable. He felt like he was going to go mad. He held his face in his palms, hiding his tears. He didn't know that he had broken her to that extent.
"In the next week, she drowned herself in the pool." Max added, sending chills into sudais's heart.
"Okay, thank you. Leave the file on the table, my brother will send you the money." Sudais said suddenly, he couldn't bear to listen to the whole story.
Soon, max left the office reasonably. He knew he had to let him be alone for a while.
Sudais uncovered his face, he stood up and locked the door. He walked to his office couch and sat on it, hands folded below his chins.
What he didn't understand was why she would do that.
That moment, Sudais figured that Farida had not wronged him. He had wronged her.
"I will find out who did this to us" Sudais said between sobs. His shirt collar had been drenched with his tears. He couldn't believe he ruined his own marriage.
He remembered the distaste in her eyes when he saw her earlier at Mr Elliott's company, she didn't know that he saw her running away from him.
***
"Since we've all decided to be lazy lackeys today, we will be working late tomorrow. You better prepare for it." Betty said to her coworkers. The rain had indeed frozen their brains.
"Again?" Mercy complained. Betty shook her head at the questions.
Farida packed her things and pushed them into her bag hurriedly. It was already past nine in the night.
She unlocked her phone and saw many missed calls.
"Give it a rest, will you." She said annoyingly, she guessed that Fahad had been calling to disturb her. To her disappointment, none the calls were from Fahad, her parents had been calling to check up on her.
She hurried out of the building and went to her car. The streets were bright and full, it was as if the day had just began. She scanned the area, amused at how people were enjoying the night. She hated to be outside of the house at night. She drove away, unaware that her ex husband had been sitting in his car, watching her come out of the building. His car followed hers, the headlights turned off.
Even Sudais himself didn't know why he was following her. He just felt the need to do it. He could park in front of her house and watch her all day, but he had to prepare for the loads of work he ignored. Parking his car a few yards away from her house, he watch her get inside. Then, he left to his own house, mentally promising to come visit more often.
***