The drive home had been quiet. Too quiet.

He glanced at his mother in the passenger seat, fingers tight around her bag. Her face was calm, but there was that familiar weight behind her eyes—the weight of plans set in motion that can’t be undone.

Saira sat in the backseat, silent, hands folded neatly in her lap. He could feel her nervous energy like static. She didn’t speak; she didn’t have to. She didn’t belong in this world—not yet, not here.

He kept his eyes on the road, gripping the wheel harder than necessary. His thoughts spun in a thousand directions, none of them safe. Home. His wife. Their kids. Their life. The life he’d loved more than air, more than the law.

And now Zafran was about to fracture it all.

The driveway came into view. The familiar hum of their neighbourhood. Children’s laughter from next door. The smell of roti canai from the stall down the street. Domestic normalcy.

He exhaled slowly. Just… get through this, he told himself. Just get through this, and maybe she’ll understand.

But he didn’t know how she could.

He stepped out first, heels clicking against the driveway. His mother followed, steady, calm, exuding that quiet authority that had always made him flinch as a boy. And then, Saira. From the car to the driveway, her head bowed slightly, hands still folded.

His wife appeared in the doorway—beautiful, unaware, holding Raiyan while Zahra clung to her leg, Khaalish with a soccer ball at her feet. Sunlight hit her hair just so, and for a second he forgot everything. He forgot Saira. He forgot his mother. He forgot the carefully rehearsed words in his head. He just saw her, his wife, the woman who had loved him through every stupid fight, every sleepless night, every parental argument.

{{user}} smiled when she saw him. Just a little, sleepy smile, and his chest tightened.

Then she noticed the others.

Her eyes flicked past him. Took in the car. Took in Saira. Took in his mother.

Her smile died slowly.

“Abang… what’s—” She stopped herself, instinctively tightening her hold on Raiyan. Her voice was cautious, fragile.

He opened his mouth. Nothing came out. His mother’s gaze was steady, but the silence pressed on him like a vise.

Saira looked up then. Quiet. Respectful. Vulnerable. He could feel her trembling slightly.

And she—his wife—finally spoke.

“You brought… her… here?”

The words were soft, controlled, but the hurt underneath them was sharp enough to cut through steel.

He swallowed, heart hammering, lungs tight. “Yes.”

She laughed, a sound brittle as glass. “Yes? You just… yes? After everything? After us?”

He wanted to say it wasn’t like that. That he hadn’t chosen to hurt her. That his love hadn’t changed. But none of it would matter—not to her. Not when she looked at him like she was seeing him for the first time and the man she married had betrayed everything he’d promised.

“Mak—” he started, but his mother shook her head, calm. Too calm. “I’ve done what needed doing. He’s done what was right,” she said softly, almost like a verdict.

He wanted to collapse right there. Wanted to sweep her into his arms and never let go. But the sight of Saira standing quietly behind him, the way she seemed to shrink into herself… he felt the weight of this impossible choice crushing him from all sides.

And his wife? She just stood there, arms tightening around their youngest, eyes burning, heartbroken, and he realized: the woman who had loved him through everything was the one thing he might destroy forever.

A slow, unbearable silence filled the driveway.

He didn’t know if he’d survive the look in her eyes.