The morning sun filtered through the curtains of the
modest house in Model Town, casting golden streaks
across the tidy room. Books were stacked neatly on the
shelves. A whiteboard on the wall was scribbled with
formulas, reminders, and one quote underlined in red:
"Discipline is the bridge between goals and
achievement."
Rayyan stood before the mirror, adjusting the collar of
his crisp, ironed shirt. Tall, fair-skinned, and sharp-eyed,
he carried himself like a man already used to being
respected. At just twenty-two, he had achieved what most
of his peers could only dream of—he was the topper of
Punjab University's business program, a youth icon often
invited to speak at seminars and TED-style talks in
Lahore.
His mother entered the room with a cup of chai.
"Allah ka shukar hai, mera beta star ban gaya," she said,
beaming with pride.
Rayyan smiled as he took the cup. "Ammi, I'm just a
student.""A student whose photo is in the newspaper again today."
She held up a copy of Daily Pakistan. On the cover was
Rayyan, speaking at a tech summit the day before.
Rayyan chuckled. "Bas dua karti raho."
That was Rayyan's world—polished, controlled, full of
accolades and pressure. He didn't drink. He didn't party.
His friends joked that he was "Lahore ka robot," always
focused, always clean. But inside, even Rayyan couldn't
deny the creeping sense of emptiness.
It wasn't the awards or the speeches that gave him
peace—it was the rare, quiet moments of walking alone
near Canal Road, watching the water ripple under the
setting sun.
But that peace was about to be disrupted.
It was during a university literature seminar—one he
hadn't even planned to attend.
The auditorium was half-filled. Students whispered,
yawning through the poetry reading. Rayyan sat in the
second row, nodding out of respect, but his thoughts
drifted elsewhere—his thesis presentation, the scholarship
application, an upcoming interview with DAWN News.
Then came her voice.
Soft. Deliberate. Dangerous.He turned instinctively. A girl had taken the podium,
dressed in black, her hair loosely tied, her eyes lined with
kajal. She wore no smile, no pretense. Just a haunting
calm.
"My name is Syeda Ayesha Shah," she said, her gaze
sweeping the crowd. "And this is a piece I wrote last
week... it's called 'The Monster in the Mirror.'"
Her words weren't romantic or innocent. They were dark,
visceral, uncomfortably honest. She spoke about masks
people wear, the fakeness of morality, the seductive pull
of power. It wasn't just poetry—it was a confession.
Rayyan stared at her, not blinking. He didn't even clap
when she finished. Everyone else did.
When the seminar ended, he found himself walking
behind her as she exited the hall.
"Excuse me," he called.
She turned slowly, eyeing him up and down like a cat
measuring its prey.
"I'm Rayyan," he said, offering a hand.
She didn't shake it.
"I know who you are," she said. "Topper. TED talk guy.
Lahore's golden boy."There was no sarcasm in her tone—just curiosity.
"I liked your piece," Rayyan said. "It was... raw."
"Raw scares people," Ayesha replied. "Especially people
like you."
Rayyan's pride flared. "People like me?"
"People who hide behind perfection."
Before he could answer, she walked away, leaving him
with a sensation he had never felt before—being seen,
not admired.
Rayyan couldn't stop thinking about her.
Ayesha wasn't in any of his classes, but he started
noticing her—at the library, near the psychology
department, sitting alone at the food court. She always
read strange books: criminal psychology, war memoirs,
Nietzsche.
One day, he sat across from her.
"I'm not hiding," he said bluntly.
She didn't look up. "Excuse me?"
"You said I hide behind perfection. I don't.""You just tried proving that to someone you barely know.
That's defensive. Which means you do."
Rayyan laughed, shaking his head. "You enjoy messing
with people."
"I enjoy truth. It makes people uncomfortable."
"And what do you get out of it?"
She looked up, her eyes sharp as blades. "Clarity. You
can't change the world until you understand how dark it
really is."
Rayyan stared at her. "And you think you understand it?"
"I was born in it."
For the first time in his life, Rayyan felt outmatched in a
conversation. He wasn't sure if he liked it—or if he liked
her.
Probably both.
The days that followed weren't like the ones before.
Rayyan, who once spent his evenings buried in books or
coaching juniors, now wandered through the quieter parts
of campus, hoping—though he'd never admit it—to run
into Ayesha again.She didn't have a set routine. Sometimes she was at the
psychology building, sometimes in the old garden near
the law faculty, where few students ventured. She
seemed to prefer silence and shadows to crowds and
noise. And when she did speak, it was never small talk.
"You always look like you're solving a puzzle," she told
him one afternoon as they sat on the steps of the old
library, watching the sun dip behind the Minar-e-
Pakistan in the distance.
"I'm trying to understand you," Rayyan admitted.
She didn't respond immediately. Then, in a low voice, she
said, "I'm not a riddle, Rayyan. I'm a warning."
That should've scared him. But instead, it pulled him in
deeper.
Rayyan's friends noticed first.
"You missed Hamza's presentation?" his classmate
Usman asked him one morning.
Rayyan blinked. "What presentation?"
Usman frowned. "Bro... you scheduled it. It was your
mentorship group."
Rayyan scratched the back of his head. "I guess I forgot."
"You never forget."He didn't have an answer. And he didn't care enough to
find one. Because the truth was, ever since Ayesha had
stepped into his world, the rest of it had started to feel...
pointless.
His professors still praised his assignments, but the spark
was gone. He had stopped applying for fellowships, had
left two emails from an international firm in Islamabad
unread.
He started staying out later. Ayesha showed him a side of
Lahore he had never known.
They visited underground art galleries in Gulberg, secret
poetry clubs in Shadman, and once even ended up at a
private party thrown by a well-known politician's son in
DHA Phase 6, where alcohol flowed freely and cameras
were strictly forbidden.
At first, Rayyan was uncomfortable. But Ayesha moved
through those rooms like she belonged.
"Your world smells like textbooks and hand sanitizer,"
she whispered in his ear that night, holding a glass of
something amber. "Mine smells like truth."
He took the drink from her hand and downed it.Lahore's winter arrived early that year. Fog blanketed the
streets, making everything look dreamlike—and
dangerous.
Rayyan stood outside Barket Market at 2 a.m., leaning
against a parked car as Ayesha returned from a nearby
building, tucking something into her bag.
"What were you doing in there?" he asked.
She smiled. "Just talking to someone. Don't worry."
He should've. The man she had "talked to" was a local
businessman recently arrested for embezzlement. Rayyan
didn't know that yet. And when he eventually found out,
he would pretend not to care.
Because by then, Ayesha's web was already wrapped
around his heart—and his mind.
One night, after a long silence, she asked him, "What
would you do if everything you believed in turned out to
be a lie?"
He shrugged. "I'd rebuild it."
She stared at him. "What if I told you your success isn't
about talent, but obedience? That the world doesn't
reward the good—it rewards the useful."Rayyan didn't argue. He just asked, "And what if I want
to be useful… to something more powerful?"
Ayesha's smile turned cold. "Then, my dear Rayyan,
you've finally opened your eyes."
His transformation wasn't loud. It was a series of small
choices that quietly rewrote his moral compass.
He started skipping family dinners. Ignored his father's
questions about university. Stopped going to mosque on
Fridays. He told himself he was busy. But in truth, he just
didn't feel like playing the perfect son anymore.
He started using his student position to gather data for "a
friend" of Ayesha's. He didn't ask what it was for. He
didn't want to know.
He hacked into the student council's online systems once,
just to prove he could. Ayesha watched him do it, her
eyes gleaming.
"You're finally learning to break the rules that don't serve
you," she said.
And yet, a part of him still remembered who he used to
be. The old Rayyan—the disciplined, kind, proud son of
Lahore. He still lived somewhere inside... just buried
deeper each day.That night, as he stared at his reflection in the mirror, he
whispered to himself, "I'm still me."
But his reflection didn't believe it anymore.