Post B # 6

Tariq has finally returned. He has returned from what I first thought was the grave, but then realized that Rashid payed off Abdul Sharif earlier in the novel to lie to Laila. He comes back, 25 years aged, but still the same Tariq that Laila knew and loved in her youth. "He was an adult now, Tariq, a twenty-five-year-old man with slow movements and a tiredness to his smile. Tall, bearded, slimmer than in her dreams of him, but with strong-looking hands, with tortuous, full veins. His face was still lean and handsome but not fair-skinned any longer; his brow had a weathered look to it, sunburned, like his neck, the brow of a traveler at the end of a long and wearying journey (295)." When he comes back, even though we know he was never on the total brink of death, he seems like a risen man. He's wise, doesn't have the same childish cockiness anymore, but still loves Laila in the same way he did before. Earlier on in the novel, Tariq asked Laila to marry him, and move away. She very much wanted to get away with him and live somewhere safe, but couldn't because Laila knew it would crush her father. Now, as they finally meet up again, the feeling of regret comes about with both of them. "I [Tariq] should have tried harder. I should have married you when I had the chance (305)." This kind of talk fills Laila with guilt and she tells him to not speak that way. Tariq asks her if he should leave, and tells her that she just needs to say the word, and he will go away forever. She sharply tells him no, and finds she is clutching his arm to herself. In her darkest hour, a thin sliver of light has finally shown through the cracks of Laila's jail cell.