Don'T Be The Antagonist
Last Request

“Aina, how long do you think our marriage is?” Fauzan looked at his first wife's pale face with an increasingly frail body with a straight look. “What all this happened because of Keisha's presence?”

Aina takes a look. Didn't want to see her husband with her two sad eyes that implied her pain. “No. I just don't want to be with you anymore.”

Fauzan rubbed his face rough. “Actually what was your reason for giving a letter like this to me?” Fauzan tightly clenched the divorce papers that Aina had signed closely. “You don't love me anymore?”

Aina was silent for a moment. Making Fauzan even more suffocated with their situation. “If that's what you want, I'll obey it.”

Fauzan took his pen and put his signature in the letter. “Satisfied?” he said, while showing the contents to Aina.

Aina swallowed her hard saliva and was about to grab the paper. But Fauzan immediately tore it in half. “I won't do everything you want!”

Aina froze in place. The divorce paper that had been tagged both had been torn until Aina could not fix it.

The woman sat on the edge of the bed with a glare. The pain starts to attack the head and make it become congested.

“Is it so hard to let me escape your life?” Aina looked at Fauzan grimly. Her tears almost dripped from her blackened eye patch.

“Yes. That hard. I don't want to do this for our family. I still love you, Na.” Fauzan spoke softly as he expressed his feelings for Aina.

Aina frowned. That pale face instantly flushed perfectly amidst the storm of tears falling down his cheeks.

 “If it is like that, I should still feel the same way about you, Mas.” Aina shook her head weakly. Covering his face with both of his trembling palms. “But I can't feel happiness anymore when with you.”

Fauzan. He was surprised by the confession. “You don't love me anymore?”

Aina shook her head weakly. “I don't know.”

Fauzan's face changed. The nanar gaze that the man showed could carve all his feelings in the minds of his interlocutors.

“I can't believe you said this, Aina. You don't love me? Have you loved another man?”

Aina shook her head strongly. This time he looked at Fauzan who looked disappointed at him properly.

“I never loved another man when I was with you. Or before or now. I never expected you, Mas.”

Aina gives a pause. Tracing both of her husband's brilliant eye beads deeply.

“But what about you? Am I still the only one in your heart?”

Fauzan breathed out from his mouth. Her tears came down. Accompanying the pain that pierced his chest thousands of times violently.

“You suspect me?” Fauzan leaned himself on the head of the sofa. Both of his legs were already limp due to this rare altercation, feeling so strange for him. “You are the one who asked me to marry Keisha, Na. You are! It's not me who wants it!”

Aina looked down and cried at the same position. “I don't mind that wedding. I thought you wouldn't love her as long as I was by your side. But your gaze when you see it is never wrong, Mas.”

“Do not accuse me! You don't know what I feel. Even after I married her, I chose to be in your room instead of finding her sleeping. You think I love her more than kam—“

Fauzan. Seeing both of Aina's noses spitting out blood and making his wife's body look shaky.

“Aina, you are fine—“

Hoek!

Fauzan raised both hands to face his wife's vomit that began to slow down. Then the red liquid pooled in his palm quietly.

Fauzan. Staring at Aina who spoke with her mouth still full of blood and her unfocused gaze.

“This is also because of my deteriorating condition.” Aina grasped Fauzan's weak arm. “So release me from our bond before you release me with the verses of Allah.”

***

"What do you mean, Doc?!" Fauzan slammed the doctor's desk in front of him.

The nanar gaze that showed non-celebrity at the elaboration of Aina's illness made her appear depressed.

“The cancer cells inside Bu Aina's body have spread widely to all her internal organs, Sir. He won't live long."

Fauzan. Staring at the doctor who had just drawn a solid line of explanation after a medical explanation that he did not really understand.

"You said he's fine. Why is it different now?" Fauzan frowned. Unaccepting. "You're lying, right?"

The doctor nodded slowly. "I lied to the kids. But for you, I don't dare." The doctor breathed a long, tired breath. "Bu Aina didn't want her two children to think too much about it. Their studies are more important. That's what he said."

Fauzan rubbed his face rough. He slightly lowered his head and stared blankly at his two feet.

"So you mean, his condition still does not improve even though he has been undergoing treatment for days here?"

The doctor was silent. Seeing Fauzan's jaw strained with anger, he was unable to say "Yes" as the answer.

"The condition didn't improve after all the drugs I prescribed. Ms. Aina's body was too quickly immune to the new drugs I always prescribed her."

"If that is so, why–"

"Sir, I am not God. I'm just a doctor. I take care of patients if I can. Still in my ability." Doctor confirms. "But I can't fight fate even though I'm eager to see all my patients cured."

Fauzan crying. This was the second time she had shed tears in a day just because of Aina.

"Then what should I do now? Even if he doesn't improve here, shouldn't you send him back?"

"Medicine still plays an important role in maintaining the consciousness of Ms. Aina. If you ask him to come home, I won't be able to do much."

The doctor continued to explain. Convincing Fauzan not to make rash decisions in the face of this situation. He just had to be stoic and accepting before things got worse and made his heart wound even more hollow.

"I'll keep it as long as I can. But you also have to be prepared for the worst possible." The doctor showed a sad reaction. "Master, actually good people never have as long a despicable human age in my eyes."

"You mean, I'm despicable?"

The doctor shook his head. "I know he wants to get away from your family. Can't you do his wish? Call it, that was his last request."

"Now you think I'm shackling him?"

The doctor returned. "My patient couldn't breathe properly because she was holding back her heart. Sir, I also have a wife and I am a jealous person even though I have a patient attitude."

Fauzan frowned deeply. "What do you really want to say to me, Doc?"

"Bu Aina– seems like she is very depressed with you. He didn't show it, because he's a patient man. But the more silent a person is, sometimes his heart is too broken until he is unable to express it."