GO TO HELL, CAPTAIN

42: FIRE ON THE MOUNTAIN

Run run run run... Jannah is making me do things I don't want to. Shaa Zayd is coming back soon. Don't forget to comment and we can get Zayd tomorrow❤️

ADAMAWA STATE, NIGERIA.

Now the door closed with only two women filled with words in their minds but their lips seem to be glued to each other, they both stood in awkward silence.

Layla stood by the door, her arms crossed below her bosom, she regarded the woman icily. Hama will definitely think she is not nervous right now but her stomach is tightening with each passing second. How could she not? This is the woman she thought she'd never see again in her entire life but here she stood strong, her head held high like she's never done a wrong thing in her life.

Hama on the other hand removed her hand from the edge of the desk to keep her anxiousness in check. This is not the time to think about the past, she has a few questions she wants to ask Layla here in front of her. But she knew her with another name, Elena and not Layla so why the heck is she using another name here? No, they both knew each other with different names but they might even be mistaken.

Perhaps they've never met and this is purely coincidental? She gulped down, her stomach quivering with unknown feelings. She doesn't know where to start from now.

"C-can you come and sit here? I really don't want to talk to you with such distance between us. They might hear us outside and I'm sure you don't want them to." She nervously gestured to one of the chairs in front of her, lowered herself to the main swivel chair behind the desk.

Layla looked at the chair for a moment before she strolled there with composed footsteps rivaling her taut stomach. She can deal with this woman like she's done in the past, nothing has changed. If she thinks she is going to play another game here and leave unscathed, then she hasn't met this new Layla. The other person she's met is totally different from this one right starting from experience, looks and every other thing.

Hama studied her for a brief minute, taking in the details of her face and the wisps of red hair showing from beneath her veil. She's changed so much from the little girl she's met looking panic-stricken and half craze. This one here is just surviving on the brink of precipice whether she lives or not, she doesn't care. How tenacious life must've been on her to get her looking all prosaic yet still a beauty.

"How have you been?" Hama's question was genuinely caring with deep motherly feelings embedded in it but that is what startled Layla and made her furious. She had no right to use that voice on her now!

Her wrathful eyes settled on the older woman's. "You really want to know how I am?" At Hana's nod, she leaned closer to the table, her arms braced on it. "Then listen to this carefully. I am totally not fine. I am constrained! I am all alone in this world and do you know why? Yes, because of you. I have no one and no one wants me. I am living with such façade and danger following me everywhere I go. All I want to do is end it all, everything should be done and over with but I cannot do that because I wasn't brought up like that. I might have zero knowledge about my religion but I know suicide is not always the answer but that doesn't mean I haven't thought about it million times. I did just few minutes ago when I met you! I wanted to die and not face the woman that brought every single peril, menace, uncertainty, insecurity you name it... into my life. Don't look at me like that, you don't have any explanation and I don't want to hear your bunch of lies. I feel so many things I cannot even word out."

Layla took a deep breath, her chest hurting and heart palpitating. Her eyes grow wet, vision blurring altogether. Her heartbeat is now in her throat, the feeling darn uncomfortable but it's happening at once. Her head has started pounding so hard like someone is in desperate need of pounded yam while her mouth feels gummy with saliva that has thickened the insides of her mouth.