BROKEN

Mirrors

"I've been good fam, I haven't seen you in so long." Fuad said to Hakeem.

"Yeah I've been good also." said Hakeem.

"You just kind of disappeared after you know..."

"After what?" I accidentally asked out loud.

"I'll explain later." laughed Fuad. Hawo was standing off to the side, watching everything.

"Aunt Nadira sent me to bring you and Hakeem food." I said to Hawo. "I was just about to leave."

"Tell her I said thank you sweetie, and thank you for stopping by. But I don't think I got your name." Hawo said to Fuad.

"Oh hi Auntie, my name is Fuad."

"And you said you're a cousin of Warsan's?" she asked skeptically.

"Yeah."

"Okay well it's nice to meet you Fuad."

What was Fuad thinking? He could have easily gotten me in trouble if my mother or grandmother saw him. We were lucky that Hawo was the only person that did. We stepped outside and I pulled him into the staircase, the same staircase where I first read Hakeem's poetry.

"I missed you so much." He picked me up and spun me around. "Do you know how hard it was everyday without you, Warsan? We have to make this time count." He placed me back down on the ground.

"My family is inside and they are probably wondering what's taking so long. I should probably get back."

"Yeah I know, I'm going to let you go for now. I just had to see you, even if it was only for a few minutes. I also wanted to formally invite you on a date tomorrow."

How could he stand here and act excited to see me as if he wasn't telling my best friend that he loved her yesterday? Maybe if I agreed to go on our "date" tomorrow, I would have the perfect opportunity to confront him and break up with him.

"Okay, perfect." I said.

"I'll pick you up at two." Before I could agree he pulled me in again and kissed me. He didn't know that just a few moments earlier I had kissed Hakeem also. He pulled away, "I'm going to get home now and spend some time with my family. I'll see you tomorrow. I love you."

"I love you too." I said and went inside of my apartment.

---

I couldn't shake the fact that Hakeem and Fuad knew each other. I decided to confront Hakeem about it that night when everybody went to sleep. I stepped out and knocked on Hakeem's door, his mom was at work. He let me in and paused his show.

"What's going on?" he asked. I sat next to him on the couch.

"Why didn't you tell me that you knew Fuad?" I asked.

"I didn't know that you were dating that Fuad."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah. You never really described him to me. I totally forgot he even existed, I haven't seen him in well over a year."

"How do you know him?"

"That's my ex's cousin."

I had completely forgot that Fuad had told me that.

"Oh."

"That's a bad thing Warsan."

"How?"

"She saw us kiss. If she finds out that you were dating him at the time that it happened she's going to tell him."