By morning, Yugh's house no longer felt like a home, it had become a place of gathering.
Neighbors began arriving in small groups to view Zahra's body. Some came with genuine sorrow written across their faces, but many wore grief like a borrowed mask. Their voices were soft, their expressions carefully practiced. đ
As they stood near the doorway or in the living room, condolences flowed, followed quickly by curiosity.
"Such a young womanâŠ"
"So suddenâŠ"
"Did anyone know where she was going that night?" đŁ
They leaned toward one another, whispering theories, trading half-truths, trying to piece together the accident through rumors rather than facts. What should have been silence was filled with murmurs, each one heavier than the last.
Yugh's parents heard everything. đ
His mother sat stiffly, hands folded in her lap, her eyes empty yet alert to every word spoken behind veils of sympathy. His father stood nearby, jaw tight, absorbing the whispered judgments without responding. Yusuf, too young to understand the cruelty hidden in soft voices, felt the tension pressing down on his chest.
The neighbors' murmurs reached them all questions disguised as concern, doubts wrapped in polite sorrow. đ·
And yet, the one person everyone expected to see was nowhere to be found.
____________________________________
Yugh had not returned home. â
While his house filled with condolences and quiet cruelty, he remained elsewhere, inside a dimly lit bar. Glasses lined the counter before him, each one a failed attempt to numb the ache tearing him apart.
He drank without counting, without tasting. đ„
Faces blurred around him, laughter from strangers slicing through his grief like mockery. With every drink, the world dulled slightly, but Zahra's face remained painfully clear in his mind.
He did not know how to go home.
He did not know how to face a house full of whispers,
or a world where Zahra no longer existed.
So he stayed where sorrow was drowned in noise, unaware that back home, her name was already being reshaped by rumor. đŸ