Al Qulub Haris

Seventeen

"Hello? Baban Ummi?" Maryams shaky voice called into the phone as she waited for a reply.

"Yes Maryam. How are you?" Came Sahabis ever so calm voice.

"Listen, I want you to come home immediately. Leave that cursed place there's no need to campaign anymore" She sobbed.

"I'll call you later" he said sounding distant from the phone, the call was ended before she could object. It was then it dawned on her that she was crying in front of Jibrin, she sucked in a breath and looked up at him with all seriousness.

"Here" she passed the phone to him and looked back down, telling him off with her hand she buried her face in her hands as fresh set of tears sprang down her cheeks. Through her silent wailing she could hear the continuous repeat of her husband's attempted assassination. Somehow it was as if the channel had nothing else to broadcast. They did make mention of everyone being safe but she needed to hear from him that he was unhurt, she needed him to shake her back to her senses and tell her he was fine.

She angrily turned off the TV and flung the remote control across the room which landed at someone's feet. He sighed, picked up the remote control and walked to the middle of the room to drop it on the centre table.

"Is this how mad you are at me?" Maryam gasped at the sound of his voice, her tears interrupted as her eyes traveled slowly from his shoes up to his face meeting his soft smile. He walked to where she was seated and squatted down so they were face to face. Maryams eyes kept wandering across his face, she buried her face back into her hands and cried out. She didn't know why she was crying but knew she needed to. Sahabi couldn't help but chuckle in amusement looking at and listening to his wife cry when he was right before her eyes, unharmed. She sucked in a breath, wiped her tears, got up and headed for her room. Sahabi sighed getting on his feet too "Women" he shook his head, proceeding to his room.

Sahabi took a long hot shower making sure he let go of the tension and stress with the water droplets that went down the drain. Not wanting to waste much time he threw on a Jallabiya and lumped down on his king size bed feeling a bit relaxed. All he wanted was to be alone, to get away from the troubles of the world. He said his sleeping azkar and drifted off to dreamland.

✊✊✊

Zahra looked down at her phone, she was growing impatient. The class was boring, she was tired and it was as if the clock wasn't ticking. Her wandering eyes found Haidar looking up in frustration.

She whispered "Haidar" Loud enough for him to hear. He turned to the side to look at her, his face looking as if he was about to give up making Zahra giggle as she turned her attention back to her phone. Viewing stories on snapchat wasn't helping her case, she sighed paging through the applications on her phone.

What kind of boredom is this?

Zahra picked her favourite game to pass time, 'Mmm Fingers'. As expected she had totally forgotten she was in class by the time she was almost beating her highscore.

"Zahra Sahabi Kamba please step out" she heard the lecturers voice in the background, she crashed into one of the spikes immediately failing her game. Her head shot up with her eyes balled and caught a glimpse of Haidar laughing just before turning her gaze to the front of the class where she saw Andrew standing beside the lecturer.

"Where is she?" The lecturer asked, a few heads turned to look at Zahra. She quickly shoved her book and phone in her bag and sprinted to the front of the class to meet Andrew, they were excused from the class and they both walked out. A part of her was relieved she had escaped from that dungeon of boredom but she still wanted to know why Andrew had called her out.

"Your mother has asked me to get you home immediately" he told her once they were outside and on their way to the car.

"Is everything alright?"

"Yes" he lied. Opening the door for her, he waited for her to get in before getting himself seated on the passengers seat.

"Usman please turn on the radio" Zahra requested. Usman and Andrew shared a terrified look knowing the news of her fathers attempted assassination may just be on one of the stations, Usman cleared his throat "Let me connect the auxiliary cord and pass it to you instead. Then you can play whatever you want"

"I don't want to listen to anything in particular just turn on the radio, the silence in here is too much" The two men in front of the car turned deaf ears to her request, she huffed in annoyance stretching her hand to do the job herself. They both swallowed hard when the radio came on, Andrew breaking a sweat and Usman praying for music to be playing. They sighed in relief as sport news came out of the speakers obviously from the sports station and lucky for Andrew and Zahra the radio hosts were discussing the epic failures of Arsenal which was the team Usman supported. The rest of the drive home was filled with evil laughter, from one side of the car of course.

✊✊✊

Nadine walked face down through the hallway, she had seen Murtala at the cafeteria which he never visited and had reason to believe he knew she was avoiding him. Worst part was them sharing an office. She increased her pace at the thought of him seeing her unfortunately bumping into someone.

"Hasbunallah! I'm so-" she was unable to complete her sentence when her eyes met with Murtalas glorious grin, how did he get here?

"Gotcha!" he exclaimed, sounding as if he achieved an accomplishment "Nadine Bakir, you've been avoiding me" his hands were neatly crossed against his chest.

She let out a silly awkward laugh "That's insane. How can I avoid you when we share an office?"

"Anyway" he sensed her discomfort "There is this awesome movie I got, wanna watch it with me?" his grin grew bigger.

"I can't right now, I'll give you a flash to send"

"I said it... Nadine why are you avoiding me?" her discomfort didn't matter anymore, he just needed to know the reason behind her weirdness. She had been acting distant since the day they had lunch with Zahra. He felt his phone vibrate in his pocket and got it out to check the message that he'd just received.

Mami: Come home immediately.

He excused himself from the conversation - which Nadine thanked God for as she swiftly walked away - to call Maryam. The minute she answered the call he knew something was wrong, he had mastered the sound of his mothers voice after she cried thanks to the numerous amounts of time Adam made her cry.

"Mami what's wrong?" was the first sentence out of his mouth.

"All is well in sha Allah just come home immediately"

xoxo hairanumar