The Ends of Love

14

"What are you doing here?"

Asma turned to look at the intruder even though she easily recognized his voice, "Why? Should I not be here?"

Saad dug his hands deep in his hoodie, his lips twitching up, "I didn't mean that." His gaze traveled to the large pool in front of them, the blue color illuminated by small lights inside it. "Why are you here?" He asked the question instead, shaking his head and licking his lips. "I mean, why leave the crowd that has gathered for you?"

Asma chuckled at his ranting. She didn't reply right away and he took the time to walk over to her, "The same reason that brought you here," she answered eloquently.

Saad nodded with a smile, "To breathe some fresh air?"

Asma nodded as he took a seat beside her after rolling his khaki pants. He then dipped his legs inside the cold water.

"Yes, to breathe some fresh air," she chuckled. "You know, sometimes being in between so many people suffocates me, whenever I can't relate to their humor or dark jokes, whenever they speak of the things I have no clue about, whenever it becomes overwhelming, I just.. I just slowly get away without them realizing."

"What about you?" she asked when he quietly listened.

"Me?" he asked, pointing to himself, "Yes, you," she laughed.

"I am an introvert, that's a valid reason don't you think?" He shrugged, shaking his legs and it caused a slow rhythm of movements in the water. " I am not meant for the crowds."

Asma looked at him the same moment he turned to face her, their eyes met. "That's a valid reason, indeed," she replied, studying his face under the warm lights of her backyard. The lights gleamed in his glasses, almost making it impossible for her to see his brown eyes but even with the dim lighting, she couldn't unsee the shadows beneath his eyelids. "Are you not sleeping well?"

Saad immediately looked away, he didn't realize when he had started to warm up to her but no matter how much he denied it, he had warmed up to her. She has become a friend he can rely on, a person whom he can speak his heart out without being cautious about it, She has broken the barriers he had built around himself so that no one knows what he was going through but Asma, since the beginning, she had seen him in the places she wasn't supposed to.

"What?"

"You have bags under your eyes, Saad. They weren't there the last time I saw you," she accused, an unwanted tension spiked up in the air at his silence, so, to bring back the calm, she joked, "Are you not happy with the fact that you got your bed back?"

Saad broke into a chuckle, "Yeah! I was happy when I was on the couch."

"Liar, did something happen after we left?"

"No!"

His quick reply made Asma's eyebrows raise. "It's okay if you don't want to share it with me," she whispered slowly as if she was hurt. It's a technique she used whenever the opposite party acted as if they were thinking about whether to disclose an issue or not.