His Little Neighbour

twelve

Murat was a workaholic they said.

But Mashal didn't know it was to this extent that he keeps working even in the wee hours of the night. She was scrolling through her Instagram feed, bored out of her mind. It was two a.m. at midnight and she can't fall asleep easily and with so many lights on, sleeping is out of the question for her.

She loves to sleep in the dark but her husband doesn't. He even has sparkling neon star stickers pasted on the walls above which keeps the bedroom illuminated even after the lights are turned off. She wanted them gone so badly though.

But a relationship is all about compromises. And Mashal was willing to adjust, even if it gets on her nerves sometimes.

"How long are you going to work?" She asked with annoyance. He hasn't even talked to her properly today.

Murat has left early in the morning and came back at around eight in the night. And started working on something right after eight-thirty. This has been his routine for the last one week, ever since that important call which told him that he's supposed to leave the country for five weeks straight.

"I'm trying to wrap up everything before stepping into the next project, Mashal," was his response. His eyes never once left the laptop, causing her more irritation.

She was starting to feel ignored and neglected. After a month of having his undivided attention, even with hectic schedules and to see him suddenly so coped up with work was not a good feeling. She hated every bit of it and the reflection was showing in her job.

Mashal's senior has yelled at her three times today because she failed to do simple tasks. She wasn't used to getting yelled at before. But the real world was so cruel. It doesn't care if you were pampered all your life, they treat you however they want if they have the authority. It made her want to quit her job already for it was too much for her.

It's been almost two and half months since she started working and Mashal started to appreciate every little thing that was provided to her by her family every day. She has seen people working days and nights, harder than her just to have a little bit of the luxurious lifestyle that she lives in. She doesn't even have to work for they have enough wealth to survive a lifetime but it was her wish to do something. To stand up on her own feet. That wasn't an easy task so far.

She thought it'd be fun but newsflash, it wasn't.

The ping in her notification snapped Mashal back to reality. It was two-thirty now, Murat was still not yet done. What the hell was so interesting about that laptop, she couldn't comprehend.

"You barely talked with me today," she complained to him whilst trying to hold his hands. He removed her hands and frowned at the screen.

"I'm busy, Mashal. This one needs my attention right now. They made a lot of mistakes, we should be releasing this add soon this week," Came his expressionless response.

Mashal huffed before getting up from the bed and grabbed her pillow and blanket, it was theirs actually. He doesn't look like he'd sleep, so she's taking it now.

"Where are you going?" Her actions made him pause as he eyed her quizzically.

"Now you're not busy, huh?" She glared at her husband. She was surprised he even noticed her actions.

"I'm trying to wrap it up today so that we could spend some time tomorrow before I'll leave. Please try to understand, Mashal." Murat replied exasperatedly. He was exhausted from all the work he did last week. It was hectic would be an understatement. And to top of it, he has some other headache to take care of. Something he didn't even want to think about but he was dreading it already.