If I Loved You Less by Aamna Qureshi EPUB & PDF – eBook Details Online
- Status: Available for Free Download
- Authors: Aamna Qureshi
- Language: English
- Genre: contemporary romance
- Format: PDF / EPUB
- Size: 2 MB
- Price: Free
Handsome clever, and rich, Humaira Mirza lived nearly twenty-three
years with very little to vex or distress her—
Yet, a pout is plastered on my face.
I am surrounded with the general splendor of a beautiful walima:
glittering chandeliers, melodic Urdu music, candles and fresh flowers,
laughing guests dressed in smart suits and shining shalwar kameez.
The stage is decorated with white gardenia and pale pink hydrangea
flowers, along with hanging lights and greenery. At the center of the stage,
on an ornate and plush sofa, sits my Phuppo: radiant and beautiful as ever –
and the reason for my sour mood.
When Mama passed away, Faiza Phuppo, youngest sister of one
Mahmud Mirza, my father, moved in with us. She was twenty-seven at the
time and not yet married – a sort of self-declared spinster – and she came to
the rescue, even though I was thirteen and my older sister Naadia was
fifteen, and thus we didn’t exactly need someone to take care of us. We had
cleaning ladies, and Papa always said we could hire a cook, but Phuppo
wouldn’t hear it, and I was secretly glad.
Naadia didn’t care for the attention – goodness, she was a moody
teenager – but Papa says I was more of a delicate sort and needed the extra
consideration. Who was I to deny my concerned father?
In the decade since then, Phuppo became my closest confidant and dear
friend, and now here she is, being married off! Leaving me, to live her
happily ever after! Just like Naadia did the year before. From a technical
perspective, you can say it was all my fault, since I was the one to set both
of them up with their (now) husbands, but who has time to be technical?
I am too busy pouting and generally feeling sorry for myself. I flit my
gaze over to Naadia, hoping for some sisterly support, but she’s busy
chatting with her best friend, Sadaf Chaudry, who’s here with her sister
Haya, and her best friend, Zahra Paracha, all friends of mine and Naadia’s.
I don’t feel like going over and socializing because I’m preoccupied
with quietly sulking. (It really requires a lot from me.) Besides, they are
discussing Haya’s engagement and impending nuptials this spring, and I am
only slightly bitter that someone younger than me has found love.
So I stand on the side, looking devastatingly beautiful in a baby pink
open-front gown and lehenga that I got designed by Elan in Lahore. It’s a
very classic walima look, with Swarovski crystals set into hand-sewn
embroidery, and weighs about fifteen pounds.
I’m wearing Mama’s diamond set, too, the one Papa got her for their
tenth anniversary, but you can’t tell because it’s hidden beneath my hijab.
At least you can see the teeka, glistening on my forehead, and a bit of the
necklace, peeking out from under my scarf.
Sipping my pina colada (virgin, obviously), I look around, trying not to
let my sour mood show. From the outside, I’m sure no one can tell. I stand
poised, my chin lifted. My round black eyes are lined with kajal, my cheeks
rosy and my cheekbones highlighted.
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