E l e v e n

Prayers should be the key in the morning and the lock at night.

☆

Mashal

Life has been really good to me recently and I thank Allah for that. Everything is just falling back into place as if it never went wrong.

Ibrahim is probably the best sibling ever. (well at least compared to Minahil)
He let me join college again and didn't even force me to look for a job.

He works at a bank and somehow even manages the mosque at the same time, meaning I seldom see him.
He comes home late at night when he's too tired to do anything other than eat the dinner I make and compliment me on how 'amazing it is' even when it is burnt.

He drops me off and picks me up from college everyday without complaining about me always being late.

To sum it up, he is the perfect brother any girl would dream of.

With him time passed so quickly and happily that a month felt like a week.

But even when everything seemed to be perfect, I knew it wasn't.

Zeyara had stopped coming to college for some reason unknown to me. I ignored his absence for a few days thinking that it might be that 'secret job' of his that Marwa mentioned but then when a month passed without him showing up, I got a bit concerned.

No, not just a bit, actually I got really very concerned.
He was missing his assessments and lessons and this was not good for him at all. He was not an A grade student, he was an average student and missing so many classes for him meant that he could fail the finals.

He had done so much for me, he was the one who reunited me with my brother, my true family and it felt bad to me not to do anything for him.

So with the new courage I had gained by meeting Ibrahim, I went to Zeyara's personal tutor who was my tutor too, and casually inquired her about the reason of Zeyara's absence.

For a minute she seemed as if she was debating over whether she should tell me or not but finally she gave in with a deep sigh and said, "He's not absent. He just quit college to support his family."

"What? Why?!" I asked incredulously "Isn't this college free..... I mean it's funded by the government."

She shook her head and gave me a sad smile, "Its not about his college expenses, it's about his job. He had a full time job and he couldn't manage that with college."

"Oh. Okay thanks." I muttered getting up and quickly left her room before she could see my extremely worried expression.

That secret job again.
I need to know what that is.

A job should not be more important to him than his education. If his family is struggling, they should get the funding from the government like all people do......he shouldn't just start working full time.

I had completely forgotten about the zuhr salah when my phone started buzzing because of the azan alarm that I had put on.

Mentally slapping myself, I rushed to the reception to get the keys. As usual the receptionist handed me a file in which I had to sign with all my details to get the key.

I was doing that when the curious cat inside me, forced me to turn the page back to the time when Zeyara was still in college. He had roughly signed in his name and I wanted to laugh at his shaky writing.
Seriously, it seemed as if his letters had polio.

Ignoring that, I stared at his phone number. We also have to give our phone number when we take the prayer room key and I know that this was wrong, completely absurd and utterly wrong but I quickly copied the number down on my palm while the receptionist was busy with someone else.

What an angelic thing to do Mashal, steal people's private information.

After that I rushed over to perform wudu and than ran to the prayer room to pray in time, completely forgetting that I still had that phone number scribbled across my palm.

It was when Ibrahim picked me up that I remembered I had taken Zeyara's phone number. I opened my balled fist to view the phone number on my palm and groaned when I realized that the writing had faded because of my wudu.

I quickly began typing the number in my phone before losing it completely.
I could easily see all the figures except for the last one. It had been smudged off completely.

Making my struggle useless.

I groaned once again and this time Ibrahim noticed it. "What's wrong Mashal?" He asked with his hands on the steering wheel.

Should I tell him?
I think I should. But I won't tell him that I took Zeyara's number from the prayer room file.... that would make me look like a creep.

"I'm worried about Zeyara." I stated plainly, looking at him.

"Why what happened?" Ibrahim asked with his voice laced with concern and I could feel his muscles tense.

"He hasn't been coming to college and his tutor said he left college to work." I whined.

Ibrahim didn't speak for a few seconds and just concentrated on driving. I thought that maybe this conversation was over when he suddenly started speaking again in a very harsh tone that I had never heard him use with me before. "You even went to his tutor to inquire about him? He is not your concern at all. He is just your old neighbour and I really don't want you near him."

"Ibrahim!" I exclaimed in a state of speechlessness and disbelief "How can you say that he's just a neighbour? He was the one who reunited me with you!"

The car stopped abruptly and I almost hit the dashboard because of Ibrahim's harsh brake.

"Alright yes I admit that he was a great help but what now? You want me to spend the rest of my life as his slave?" Ibrahim spat with frustration and anger as he leaned in and opened the door on my side. "Get out now. We reached home."

I stared at him as if this was the first time I had met this person. I had never seen this harsh side of Ibrahim. I had only heard his beautiful voice when he laughed and recited the Quran but never this.
"I can't believe you're Ibrahim!" I gasped, "You want me to just forget about Zeyara?"

"Not only Zeyara but that dear papa of yours too!" He growled "Now get out before you make me late like you always do in the morning."

I stepped out of the car in silence with my fallen face.

Did he just say that?

I stood there with damp eyes as he sped off, leaving me in that state of misery.

I thought he was the perfect brother. I thought he never felt bad about me waking up late because he always smiled but then people only show their true faces when they're angry.

It felt too difficult to walk to my room with the realisation that this was my real brother who had treated me like that.

I plopped down on the couch and curled around like a baby wanting the warmth of his mother. I felt heavy sobs escape my mouth even when I tried my best to supress them.

Okay...I guess I understand why Ibrahim hates papa but why Zeyara?
Aren't they friends because I saw Ibrahim shaking hands with Zeyara that day.

I cannot be so mean and cold hearted towards Zeyara's problem when he helped me to solve mine.

"Yes Mashal, you need to be brave." I whispered to myself as I stood up and wiped off my tears. Grabbing my mobile, I quickly opened the contact I had saved with Zeyara's phone number....except for the last digit.

Well, the last digit could be anything from 0 to 9 so maybe if I try all of those phone numbers, I might end up finding Zeyara's number.

Bracing myself to know that I was going to have a number of wrong calls, I began implementing my idea.

I tried putting in the digit 0 and waited for the phone to ring.

Come on.
Pick up.

'Hi! This is MZS0. Leave the instructions.'

What? What type of an answering message was that?
And it was in Siri's voice.
That virtual assisstant you get in your iPhone. God. Who would put such a voice message.

Ignoring the weirdness of my first call, I tried the digit 1.

Again.

'Hi! This is MZS1. Leave the instructions.'

Okaaaaaay.....this is getting creepy.

And I bet when I use 2, it would also be the same message, but it would have MZS2.

I tried that and yes I won the bet from myself;

'Hi! This is MZS2. Leave the instructions.'

I tried all the digits from 0 to 8 and still all I got was the same message in Siri's voice but with changing numbers after MZS each time.

I was getting so annoyed by that, I thought it would be useless to try number 9 but still I gave it a try.

One ring.
No answer.

Second ring.
No answer.

Third ring.
"Assalamoalaikum....who's this?"

This was undoubtedly Zeyara's voice. I heaved a sigh of relief and then answered cheerfully, "Walaikumsalam Zeyara...its me Mashal."

"What do you want?" He spat with his voice full of bitterness. He looked....like he despised me.

A chill ran through my spine. I thought Zeyara would be good to me.
He had always been good to me.
But no, I guess everyone hates me.

Everyone hates me.

"N-nothing." I stuttered with my voice cracking, "I'm sorry to disturb you."

I disconnected the call immediately before I could start crying in front of him.

Everyone hates me.

☆

There are going to be a LOT of plot twists. I love plot twists. 😂
And cliff hangers. 😍

Have a good day everyone!

-Muskaan.