A tale of love, loss, and new beginnings.
Hareem wants to start over, Momin is stuck in the past. Can a newly wedded couple learn to love and accept one another while also dealing with an uncertain future and a haunting past?
Trigger warning: ptsd...
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Chapter Seventeen
He didn't get a text back from Hareem until after the weekend.
His text message had been an invitation to take her out somewhere, perhaps to the mall or some place to dine. The purpose he wanted to achieve was to find out more about Ashiq's life from Hareem as his classmate, but after their meeting on Friday evening, he was more concerned about addressing her injuries.
He had been restless all weekend, thinking about countless scenarios of why Hareem was giving him the cold shoulder. He recalled his interactions with her, running over every moment of their time together. Was there any moment when he had said something insensitive? Anything that may have caused her to be upset with him? Had his ignorance of his own mistake fueled her displeasure into anger?
Did her coldness towards him stem from a single incident or was it connected to everything that they had been through so far? Was it possible that the fear he had felt before their marriage played a part in the distance they were suddenly facing?
There were a lot of worries he had to address, but he couldn't address them until he met his wife, who through her latest text denied him that opportunity.
I'm a little busy this week, can we go out some other time? ~ H
He let out a frustrated sigh as he re-read the text on the way to class on Tuesday morning. He had been feeling tempted to call his mother and share his thoughts with her like he always did when something bothered him beyond control, yet he felt hesitant. He knew he could get insight into a woman's thoughts through his mother, but the woman he was concerned about was his wife, and that relationship deserved a certain degree of privacy.
I'll wait for her. I'll wait for her to come to me. He thought, steeling himself as he entered the Calculus classroom.
His eyes searched for her despite his resolve not to. She sat in the second row with Layla, focused on browsing through the textbook. Her bandage had been replaced with a large band-aid, while the scars on her face were almost non-existence.
He wanted to hold her bruised wrist and examine it. He wanted to run his fingers over the gash, trying to trace how she could have injured herself so deeply. But he pushed those thoughts away and dedicated his attention to taking the attendance and then assisted the Professor through the lecture. When the students engaged in in-class activities, he walked through the rows, looking over the students as they attempted to solve the questions. He lingered for a few seconds near Hareem, but she didn't raise her head even once, filling him with more anguish.
He felt his impatience increase towards the end of the eighty minutes, in which Hareem hadn't made eye contact with him even once. It was almost tortuous being ignored with so much intensity.
As soon as the class ended, he watched Hareem be one of the first to head towards the exit. Usually she would pack her things slowly, stick around until most students had filtered out, and then hesitantly wave at him as she left. Yet that day she didn't. Not being able to control himself that evening, he brisk-walked towards her and called her out, surprising the pupils surrounding them.
