Dushman Ka Humsafar
— Uzair Baloch x Reader — [ch.1/?] [Dark romance]
"Woh dushman tha, yeh toh pata tha. Par yeh nahi pata tha ki woh itna qareeb aa jayega ki dushman aur humsafar mein farq karna mushkil ho jayega."
A/n:- Hey everyone! Just a little heads-up before you start reading. Dushman Ka Humsafar is going to be a dark romance fanfic, so I'm really going to explore some darker themes, heavy angst, and intense obsession here. It's my first time diving deep into a dark romance series, so I hope you guys like the vibe! Let's get into it.
The heat that day was the kind that sat on your shoulders and refused to leave — thick, stubborn, and exhausting. By the time the final bell rang, the only thing keeping you moving was the thought of Aalam bhai's doodh soda waiting for you on the other side of the street.
Aalam bhai's juice shop was always buzzing, with tables and chairs arranged neatly. A ceiling fan worked overtime above every table, doing its best against the humidity and mostly failing. It was loud, familiar, and on days like this, it was the only place in the world you wanted to be.
Aalam bhai spotted you before you'd even properly walked in.
Aalam bhai's juice shop was always buzzing, with real tables and chairs arranged neatly. A ceiling fan worked overtime above every table, doing its best against the humidity and mostly failing. It was loud, familiar, and on days like this it was the only place in the world you wanted to be.
"Bibi! Aayein, aayein!" He was already moving toward your usual table, already signalling to the back. You dropped into your chair with a sigh that came from somewhere deep, and your friends settled around you in their usual chaos — bags everywhere, dupattas askew, everyone talking over everyone else.
The doodh soda arrived cold and perfect.
The first sip was, genuinely, heaven.
"Kal aayegi na college, Y/N?" your friend asked from across the table, already halfway through her own glass.
"Haan aungi," you said, setting your glass down with a small smile. "Aur waise bhi ab kuch hi din bache hain. Kal farewell ke liye shopping chalenge, samjhi?"
She groaned dramatically. You laughed.
Aalam bhai appeared at your table again before you'd even finished your first glass, setting down a second one with that big, warm smile that made the whole place feel less like a juice shop and more like somewhere you actually belonged.
You really loved him. In a way that was almost embarrassing to think about too directly, because he felt more like a father to you than your actual father ever had. He asked how your exams went. He remembered which flavour you hated. He always made sure your table had the fan directly above it because he knew you ran warm.
Small things. Quietly done. Never mentioned.
"Kaisa laga bibi? Aur kuch laun?"
"Nahi Aalam bhai, bas kitne huye woh bata dijiye," you said, already reaching into your bag.
And then it started — the hands, the dramatic waving, the whole performance you could have recited word for word by now.
"Areh nahi nahi bibi! Aapse kaise paise loon? Arshad sahab ki wajah se hi toh mera dhandha chalta hai, yeh toh banta hi hai—"
"Aalam bhai." You gave him a look. "Phir se."
"Areh—"
"Kal se main nahi aungi agar aap paise nahi lenge." You stood up from your chair, put your hands on your waist, and stared him down with the most serious expression you could manage while fighting the urge to smile.
He looked genuinely wounded.
"Areh nahi nahi, aapko dukan mein bina dekhe soona soona lagta hai yahan! Areh — Hamza!" He spun around suddenly, voice going sharp. "Dheere kar! Todega kya? Dheere kar, yaar!"
The new guy froze mid-step behind the counter, holding a tray like he'd been caught mid-crime, blinking at Aalam bhai with the expression of someone deeply reconsidering their life choices.
You and your friends snickered — first quietly, then not quietly at all, until the whole table was laughing and poor Hamza looked even more confused than before.
"Acha Aalam bhai, main chalti hoon. Der ho gayi."
You slipped the money onto the table while his back was still turned and walked out before he could argue, your friends' laughter still trailing behind you through the door.
After parting ways with the girls at the corner, the street settled into that particular late afternoon quiet — vendors packing up slowly, children being called inside, the heat finally beginning to loosen its grip. You walked alone now, bag on one shoulder, humming to yourself, entirely unbothered.
This was your father's territory. Everyone knew Arshad Papu's daughter. You could walk these streets at 3 AM and not a single soul would dare to even glance at you sideways.
Well. Except for one.
A hand shot out from the dark alley and yanked you in before you could even process what was happening. Your back hit brick, the air knocked clean out of your lungs and then you saw them. Those eyes. Familiar, dark, insufferably amused.
You let out a slow breath. "Uzair."
"Kahan ja rahi ho, dushman ki beti?" he murmured, lips curving into that infuriating smirk. He didn't step back. If anything he leaned closer, one arm braced against the wall beside your head, the other finding your waist like it had always belonged there. The smell of him reached you a second later — vanilla, musk, something warm underneath that you'd never quite managed to name. "Kal se na koi message, na call. Kitna miss kiya, jaanti ho?"
"Dara diya aapne." You shoved his shoulder, more out of habit than actual irritation. "Exam tha mera."
He said nothing.
That was the thing about Uzair that unsettled you most not the possessiveness, not the intensity, but the silences. He just looked at you, unhurried, like he had already made some quiet decision and was simply waiting for you to catch up. No judgment in those eyes. No impatience. Just that absolute, unguarded attention that you didn't know what to do with because nobody, not once in your entire life, had ever looked at you quite like that.
You hated how much you wanted to lean into it.
"Bohot der ho gayi hai." You dropped your gaze, focusing on the topmost button of his kurta, the small embroidered detail at the collar that gave your eyes somewhere safe to land. "Jaane do. Abbu intezar kar rahe honge."
Something shifted in his expression — subtle, barely there. His grip on your waist loosened just slightly, and when he spoke again his voice was quieter. Less smirk, more something you couldn't name.
"Arshad Papu busy hai mere bhai ke piche." A pause, perfectly placed. "Tumhare liye waqt nahi hai unke paas. Par mere paas hai."
Any other time, the way he said it might have sent warmth crawling up the back of your neck. But tonight it landed somewhere else entirely deep in the part of you you'd spent years plastering over and pretending was fine. The burn started behind your eyes before you could stop it.
You shoved him. Hard. This time meaning it.
"Bakwas baatein na karo." Your voice came out sharper than you intended, cracking slightly at the edges. "Aaj unka birthday hai. Unhone wada kiya tha ki woh aaj hamare saath dinner karenge."
You didn't wait to see his face.
You stepped out of the alley and back into the open street, jaw tight, blinking fast. Behind you, Uzair stayed exactly where he was — still, silent, one hand still slightly raised where your waist had been — holding the shape of something he didn't understand yet.
You cooked for almost four hours.
Your mother's recipes, learned secondhand from the house staff who had learned them from her. Abbu's favourites the ones he always said reminded him of her. You stood in the kitchen until your dupatta smelled of cardamom and your feet ached, until every dish was exactly right, until there was genuinely nothing left to do but wait.
You missed her at times like this more than you could put into words. Which was strange in its own way — missing someone whose face you had never seen, whose voice you had never heard. She had died the same night you came into the world, and sometimes you wondered if your father looked at you and saw the trade he never agreed to make.
You showered. You dressed carefully. You came downstairs and sat at the big dining table and waited.
You were still waiting at midnight.
The food had gone cold an hour ago. The candles you'd lit — a small, embarrassing impulse you couldn't quite explain — had burned themselves down to nothing. The house was the kind of quiet that wasn't peaceful, just empty, every small sound swallowed up by how large everything was and how few people were in it.
"Aaj bhi unhone apna wada nahi nibhaya." Your own voice surprised you in the silence, barely above a whisper. You pressed the back of your hand to your cheek and found it wet. "Main hi zyada expect kar leti hoon."
You sat with that for a long moment.
Then, without fully deciding to, you picked up your phone. Scrolled to a name. Pressed call.
He picked up on the second ring.
"Kabootar khane aao abhi." Your voice was still shaking, but you kept it firm. "Mujhe milna hai."
You hung up before he could answer. Before he could ask why, or say something careful and quiet that would make it hard to remember all the reasons this was a terrible idea.
You set the phone face-down on the table.
Outside, the city was still and dark and vast. Somewhere across it, you already knew, Uzair Baloch was reaching for his keys.
Author's Note: Here I am yapping again, lol! I really wanted to portray this fanfic like a gritty TV serial, so just a heads up it's going to be a real slow burn. Feedback means the absolute world to me, so please leave a comment if you're liking the vibe so far. Thank you so much for reading, love you guys! <3
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