#i am TRYING to get back into writing selfpara bc i am rust af

[mallickshah]

should have, never will.

Mothers always knew best. 

How often had she warned him, that if he did not pay attention enough, his wife would up and leave him behind. She hadn’t meant it in the way that she did end up leaving, the world and taking bits of his apart in her departure. Mallick was sure she’d never meant her words to be that, but it still held on tightly to everything he was. He hadn’t paid enough attention, he hadn’t protected her enough, he hadn’t been there when she’d needed him the most. He’d put her life in danger. If not for him, she would still be alive, somewhere, with another man, a man that would not be him, but she would be safe and alive. She would be laughing at someone else’s antics, she would be kissing the bruised knuckles of another lover, and somehow, those images no matter how upset it made him, he found them to be more peaceful and acceptable than the memories of her in every corner of this house. 

He never slept here now, only lingered overnight during the very rare times he didn’t feel too raw to handle her scent. He’d kept everything the way it’d been the last day she’d been in their room. The other rooms had changed here and there, mostly, Mallick’s mother had dropped by now and then and fixed a few things that Saiyah had had the habit of doing herself. There were two main reasons why he avoided their home, the first obvious one, that she was everywhere within these walls. 

The second, that each time he walked in, he had all of the things he’d never done enough of rushing back in. The things he wished he’d done more, come back home more often. Stayed longer in the morning, held her tighter every night. Spent every bit of time he’d had at home and not outside, never had a single resentful word towards her during the hardest period of her pregnancy. Mallick would catch himself wishing they’d never had a day of arguing, ever. 

That the only thing he’d ever done was make her smile, and laugh, and smile harder. That he’d kept her happy, without a trace of unhappiness, or anger, or sadness, or disappointment. Because he’d had his fair share of making her eyes swell up with the rise of fresh tears. The most recent one had the sound of her voice cracking as she tried to explain to him why she wanted him to be more in here with her, than out there with his brothers and his friends. That ever since the pregnancy had really started to shift her moods left and right, she’d felt as if he’d grown scarce at home. As if he’d been pulling away.

It hadn’t been true, he’d been out of his element during that week. Out of touch with what was to happen, she’d been more sensitive than ever and he’d been thinking that giving her the space to be by herself would help. That had done the opposite of course, it had made her sadder and more upset. The way she’d broken down and cried through her words still echoed in the corner of the kitchen where he’d found her, looking down at the emptiness of her hand, the other curled over her stomach. 

The solemn atmosphere had halted him immediately in the door, before her hiccups had made him stride in--with fear, but also with the instinctive need to fight away whatever had made her cry. That it had been him had hurt him than he’d ever admitted, to himself or to her. Private as they’d been, save for when his mother came by to visit, bring some spices from his grandparents’ travels, or simply to chastise Mallick over how to properly care for his wife, they’d never let anyone else in on the worries that each of them might have had. Mallick should have asked his father, he should have reached out. 

There were so many things he should have done and they were here, frozen in time never to be revisited, never to be touched again. They would always remain where they should have been and he would always swallow each bitter bit of it, swallow each bile as he gauged how much he could handle each time he let himself walk inside of their home before he had to head out and find shelter elsewhere. Needless to say, he hadn’t spent a night in the home itself since her death. If he spent his nights there, it was with the knowledge that he was not going to be closing his eyes, least he wished to be welcomed by an onslaught of vivid images of all the things he had done that he should not have done.

All the things that would never be fixed or mended. 

He truly envied those who could still apologize after a fight with their loved ones, but mostly, he advised them to think it through before ever saying anything that would potentially harm them too. Because when they would be gone, without a way for them to return, whether we were right or wrong in a certain argument would not matter anymore.

What would be left, would be the hard to swallow reality that instead of harming them, you should have loved even the btis that you thought were too hard to handle. That once they were lost, you would understand what you’d had all along and how much you should have cherished it. Much more than you probably were while you had them. That was why he would never be able to replace her. What he hadn’t been able to give her, the things he should have done, the more he should have given, he never wanted anyone else to have it.