Journey towards Happiness (ON HOLD)

Chapter seventeen.

Amanda's POV

Uncle stayed while I entered the hall. The floor was carpeted and beautiful lights hung from the wall. Some girls stood up at my arrival. They showed me around the place and offered me coffee.
I found some mixed emotions erupting inside my heart like are these people really sweet and welcoming from the inside as well? Whats so special about their religion? Would it be hard for me to adapt their lifestyle? What is the purpose of headscarf? And so on.

"What is your name, pretty girl?"

An elderly lady broke the string og my thoughts.

"I'm Amanda", I smiled to her.

"Well Amanda, This place serves as a platform for communication between muslims and non-muslims. I'm glad that you decided to come here. By the way you can call me Azka",

I liked where this conversation was going so I took the lead.

"What exactly is Islam? And who are muslims? To be honest, I know they are not like the ones murdering innocents around the globe",

"My dear, Islam is the religion of peace. These extremists are nowhere near its teachings. Islam preaches good moral values and ethics. You better not listen to all that the media tries to shove into your brain unless you are a victim of it",

And there we sat for hours exchanging opinions on different topics. I trusted her and told her about the problems I faced in life. She promised to help me if I'd visit her more often and I agreed. I dont exactly no what but her personality was captivating. I also saw other non-muslim females around me that too were busy talking with the muslim ones and I wondered was it that easy to revert?

"Are you not going to force me to covert..?"

What did you just say Amanda!

"It's all upon you. Pray to God to guide you. You are always welcome to Islam", she spoke rather softly despite my expectations.

I said Goodbye and exited the hall and saw something shocking. My eyes rested upon the men on my left. They all were standing in the same position and worshipping. It was a good view because it reflected their brotherhood. I also pointed out uncle david in the fifth row.
After their worship was over, he rushed towards me.

"So how was it?", he asked excitedly.

"Um.. it was good. I interrogated them a lot. Who knows they might want to kill me but hiding it..", I chuckled.

"Haha no. They are here for this. Let me guess what you are thinking about?",

"Yeah..?",

"You want to discover the fun in this religion. Am I right?",

Since when did he learn to read minds. Impressive.

"Actually I too had the same question in mind during my journey towards happiness",
He added.

"You are right. How am I supposed to worship all the time. I find this hard enough in my age.", this was real talk. I wanted happiness but some sort of burden on my shoulders.

"You'll get to enjoy everything in life so much that you'll have to thank the Lord for this. Worshipping is only thanking the lord and showing gratitude", he sounded more like some religious sort of person rather then the uncle I knew.

"I'll think on this. Just give me more time", I wanted this to end. It was good knowing a lot about Islam. But I wasn't ready yet. Converting?! I couldn't even think of it. Mom's going to kill me. Or maybe she'll have a heart attack. Or maybe I'll need to shift my school because of this.

Why was this so hard!

After bidding goodbye to him, I took a cab to home. It had been a tiring day, not physically but me mentally. I needed a good reason to live and enjoy, not to take such heavy steps.

Mom was sitting in the lawn having a cup of tea with a familiar face. Guess what? Mr. Edwards. Pheww. The presence of him kind of annoys me. Jack was goofing aroung with a ball and scaring away butterflies. I wore a sheepish smile on my face as I saw Jack. He was a good entertainer.

I scoffed to get mom's attention and that worked.

"Oh honey, where have you been after school?"

So seriously, she still cares about this.

"Nothing much. Just hanging out with friends.... "

Okay so where did friends come from? I'm a horrible liar!

"Oh my.. I'll check on you. Just give me a few more minutes", she ended the talk since Mr. Edwards was feeling uninvited in the convo.

"Take your time. I'll take a nap", I winked at her and a fake pink tint arose on her cheeks.

Ridiculous. Ain't it?

I drifted to sleep immediately after pulling up the covers.