Trust Me (An Islamic Love Story)

Chapter 13

My heart thumps loudly as I peek through the wardrobe door with my breath held. Tears are dripping off my chin, but I ignore them as if I'm used to them. I see him walking around the room, stepping slowly.

"Hmm, where did my angel fly to?" He waits a bit before walking out of the room. I wait for a few seconds, still not breathing as I am terrified, and all I hear is silence. All of a sudden, a knife thrusts through the wardrobe door, making my heart stop for a split second, the tip of the blade only a few centimeters away from my face.

"Oh angel, do you want to die like this being suffocated in a wardrobe?" He opens the door and looks at me lazily.

He removes the knife from the door easily, wiping off the splinters from the tip. "I have a better plan. I want to make it easy for you, angel. You know that, right?" He sneers with a cold smile and then leans in, "I will make it easy for you. You don't have to kill yourself. I'll kill you."

He grips my arm and yanks me out of the wardrobe, and I fall to the floor on my face. My nose starts bleeding, and my eyes start blurring, but I don't make a single sound. I haven't spoken in such a long while that I have forgotten my voice. "There is a price, angel. There is a price for everything. You will only die after I sketch every inch of your body. You'd be beautiful, angel." He pauses. "Trust me."

Darkness engulfs me, and I'm running in the middle of nowhere. I can hear him laugh, and I'm running, running away from him. His laugh becomes feeble and feeble till it stops.

I stop running and inhale deeply. I see light shining from my right, and I step closer to it curiously. The familiarity draws me in.

As I come closer, I see a male figure, and immense light is bursting out of his chest. It's so bright that it blinds me, but then my eyes adjust to it, and I see Azar standing in front of me, his face spotless and shining.

"Azar..." I breathe out, unable to look away from his eyes.

"I brought water for you," he says, his voice so smooth that I feel like closing my eyes and drowning in his voice.

He cups his hands, and I see there is crystal-clear water in them.

I hesitate to approach him.

"Drink the water, you need it," he insists, and I bent down a little, my lips touching his hands, and I close my eyes letting the water quench my thirst.

I pull away, and he drinks the water too, his eyes never leaving mine. After he is done, he smiles at me, leaving me warm inside. "That wasn't so hard, was it?"

"Abeer, get up," I hear Maliha say, and I sit up abruptly with my eyes wide open.

The warm, fuzzy feeling is still trapped inside me. Go away. Go away. I order it, but it doesn't.

Why did I take the water? Why didn't I run away from him too? Why was I feeling so peaceful? After all, what Azar said to me last night, this is what I dream about?

Why is this dream coming to me again and again except longer this time? I can't forget the look he gave me; there was something different in his eyes... and his smile... I can't forget his smile...

"You okay?"

"Huh?" I mumble. "I'm fine: just a little dazed." It's bothering me. It's bothering me so much. Azar is nothing like what he was in my dream. He is not the same, Abeer, I tell myself as I get up from the bed and walk to the washroom, absently reading the dua. Not the same, Abeer. He hates you. He doesn't give a damn about you.

Forget him, Abeer. Pretend nothing happened, and one day you will forget you were pretending.

I slept so well that I missed Fajr. Maliha was going to take a purity bath tonight, and Mom is on her days off too, so no one woke me up for Fajr. I do Wudu and pray. After finishing, I make dua: