Chapter Four SOK

Atiq really hates old people. In fact, these days he hates young people too. Personally I think he hates just about everyone...Atiq is in the mosque at prayer time and all he can think about is his hatred. When someone requests of him to get in a row with them for prayer he grabs their arm and twists really hard. I can't believe he did this at prayer time! You would think that an area that claims to be so religious would at least be kind at prayer time, but everything is opposite of what you think over there. After the prayer Atiq shares that he can't stand the thought of going home and seeing no house chores done and his wife huddled in a corner sick. He decides to stay at the mosque for a while longer. While he is there you get to hear some war stories from veterans. They were kind of interesting. One guy spoke about how there were dead people everywhere and about how terrible they smelled. Tamreez refuses to accept this though. He says there is no way that the dead bodies smelled because they were the ones who had died fighting on their god's side, and that they smelled as though perfume was radiating off of them. After listening to them for awhile, Atiq goes home to find the house chores done. His wife has done many things during the day, but she is still sick. She says she wants to keep doing her wifely duties until the end. They fight a lot about random things, and Atiq ends up pretty upset. At one point Musarrat said something about them never loving one another. I think this hurt Atiq. Musarrat asks Atiq what the doctor said about her condition, and he gets mad and storms off. Then the chapter switches to Mohsen. Zunaira is still upset with him, and he finds her sleeping in another room. He goes outside to his porch, where he sees Atiq walking by. I find it so ironic that Mohsen and Atiq are suffering the same thing essentially. They both actually love their lives in a world where that is a sin. They both have been having fights with their wives recently too. But apart from that, they are practically opposite of each other. It just goes to show that no one is exempt from the curveballs life can throw...