LET ME LOVE YOU

Chapter 42 - bombshell

3 months later.

Aya

"I think we should go with this," I pointed to the piece of paper that was in the middle of three others, which were all placed on the unique glass center table that was in front of me.

Mondays were never my thing to be honest. And before you ask, no, it's not because of my school days when I was a little girl, I actually grew a dislike for Mondays when I grew up and started working. Every sort of nightmare seemed be scheduled that day; Hard and extremely long movie scenes, endless photo shoots with ridiculous concepts, and 5 hours long meetings to name a few, so yeah, Monday was always ever ready to kill me with work.

But, for the first time ever, that particular Monday, I was excited, even more excited that I get on weekends or free days where I have nothing to do but sleep, watch my favorite shows and stuff my face with ice cream, and I wasn't surprised about it, because I found a purpose and was finally doing something I truly loved and had passion for.

I started working on my skincare brand 3 months ago, and Alhamdulillah, things were going really really well. We were still at the early stages, but with the way everything was looking at that moment, I knew that inshaAllah, Novage was coming to take over and show them who's the boss, because I made sure to pour my heart into even the smallest details and go all out to make the brand even better than what I had been creating in my head.

What began as a mild struggle with extremely sensitive skin became the catalyst for my journey of skin-care discoveries, inspiring me to learn more about my skin and how to care for it. I had been getting in touch with some of the best dermatologists and estheticians I could find for some years, ever since my career started taking off, and I got the wonderful opportunity to learn from their expertise, and Of course I made an instant decision to share my learnings with everyone.

The first collection I was putting out featured 10 products, which were to be housed in neutral tones of nude, beige and grey packaging, including a scrub, a face wash, a cleanser, a toner, an exfoliator, a vitamin C8 serum, a face lotion, a lip oil, an eye cream and a night oil. I know a 10-step routine sounds like a lot to some people, but it fits my own everyday skincare routine perfectly, It's
what I've been doing for as long as I could remember, even when I signed with oriflame -which is the only brand that was safe for my super sensitive skin- I formed a collection with these same 10 products, and that routine worked magic for me.

And that's how I started Wanting more of that, I wanted more of that 'magic', but on another level. I wanted a consistent routine with natural and more effective ingredients, something that's not only 'safe' for my sensitive skin, instead, something that will feed, nourish and pamper it like never before. But Ofcourse, I didn't find that anywhere, everything was more of the same, nothing unique, and that's when my interest in skincare grew out of my own control, so I started getting in touch with Ifeoma Amadi, a credible dermatologist, and Salma; Hamma Adnan's fiancée, who happened to be an incredible cosmetic chemist and developer. The three of us put our brains together and came up with a routine similar to what I had with oriflame, but instead of it being just 'safe' for my type of skin, it transformed it into its best form.

When I received the first set of samples, I made sure to try them on myself, my friends, and my family members of all age groups because I didn't want Novage to be restricted to a certain demographic. I tried them on my mom, my mother in law, Adda mimi, Asma, Amal, Aleena, Hamma, Maleek, And even Anas, and they worked wonders on everyone, only Amal had minor issues because she was allergic to tea tree oil, which is a major ingredient in the face toner, but the rest of the products were according to her, 100 times better than all of her Neutrogena products combined, and trust me, she was obsessed with that brand.