Explaining to mom why we had to cook even more food for dinner tonight was easier than I thought. She didn't question me as to why I suggested it and for more than two hours, me, mom and Jasmine spent our time in the kitchen making food for our guests tonight; a little extra for the guests they didn't know about too.

"I think that's about done now." I was now mumbling to myself after packing the last bit of rice into the container for Abdullah to take to the boys when coming back to the Masjid. Sure enough I had to make sure that no one saw what I was doing, but it's best that no one knew where the food was going. If it came down to them noticing, I would just say I was hungry and might have eaten a bit. 'A bit' consisting of a whole pot worth of food.

"Abdullah come into the kitchen!" I shouted in no direction in particular in order for him to hear me and come.

Hearing the kitchen door open, I saw my brother stepping inside out of breath; he probably ran here. "Good timing. I was just about to leave for the Masjid now anyway." I gave him a smile to show how much I appreciated him doing this.

"Thanks again man. Listen, I'll take you out for smoothies on Saturday if it all goes well, okay?" He nodded and walked back out. It scared me that I was sending my little brother to do this, but the boys had to be starving and I doubted they would do anything to harm Abdullah anyway.

I took one last look around the kitchen before retrieving to my room to change into something suitable for this dinner. All the food had already been set on the table, so the boys had gone to pray while the girls were getting ready; we had already prayed. Looking in my wardrobe, I picked out a black maxi skirt with a thin maroon jumper that had lace detailing at the bottom and got changed, adding a hijab when I was done. Everyone had to look 'nice' tonight and I didn't know whether that was moms way of insulting us by indirecting we look horrible every other day, or to wear something fancier than normal day to day clothes.

I had just rolled up my sleeves when I remembered I needed to talk to Jasmine. Yesterday's events were still nagging at the back of my head and I needed answers. All in all, I was angry to how my sister could resort to doing something as horrible as that.

Leaving my room, I walked a few steps to be in front of her door. I didn't bother knocking because I knew she was done changing from long ago and instead walked straight in and found that she was happily humming along to some song coming from her phone.

'Does she have a case of being bi polar?' I asked myself in my head because even though she had been helping out earlier, she was still a little put off by something and it didn't take a genius to figure out it was something about yesterday.

"Hey sis, you okay?" I asked out loud to her and took a seat on her bed and making myself comfortable.

She rolled her eyes at me knowing that I knew she hated when people sat on her bed. "I'm great. What brings you here?" She sounded hesitant and I didn't know whether that was a good thing or not.

"I wanted to talk about yesterday." At that she turned around giving me her full attention. "Don't give me half answers like yesterday. I have a right to know what is happening with my sister, even though I may not like you very much." I added the last part in to ease her a bit though I was dead serious in wanting answers.

"I don't even know how to explain..." I could see the tears forming in the corner of her eyes, but I didn't have time to say anything as moms voice echoed through the house announcing our guests had arrived.

"We'll talk about this later, we have to go downstairs now." Taking her hand in mine, we exited her room and made way downstairs. I didn't want to be questioning her like this but it was necessary.

Walking down the steps, I could see seven people in our open living room and was seated on the sofa. Six which were laughing at something dad had just said and one who looked like he wanted to anywhere but here. Shoaib.

"Asalaamalaikum everyone." I greeted happily and soon got enveloped into a hug by aunty Aliza while her youngest daughter went running to Jasmine. That everyone smiles at.

"Walaikumasalaam. Look how much you've grown. Makes me upset that you're just next door and we don't even talk." Her voice was warm and motherly like it should be.

"Oh no don't be. We have loads of time to talk over dinner now, come on." I smiled and lead everyone to the kitchen and mom looked at me impressed that I was showing manners and making a good impression.

"Well we've certainly missed out a lot. Last time I saw you, you were dropping ice cream on your sisters head and running away trying to make out you were innocent." Everyone began laughing again at uncle Isa's words and I couldn't help but give a sheepish smile and shrug while taking a seat at the table.

"Psht, well let's not dwell on the past. And by the way, you deserved it Jasmine." I smiled evilly at my sister but it dropped when I saw she was trying to hide her distress once again. Something tells me it wasn't about the little conversation we just had upstairs; something was bothering her now. Could it have been Shoaib's daunting presence?

"So Umaymah how's school going? I hear you and Shoaib have classes together." I looked away from Jasmine to find Aunty Aliza smiling at me. I loved her smile and part me of wishes that her son could have comfort in his mothers sensitive nature rather than leaning away from it. What is done is done though.

"It's going good, you know apart from the fact I was ill for a week and missed everything." Laughter rolled in again and I waited for it to settle before continuing. "I have a few with him, how do you know?" Like her son, she seemed to know a lot.

"Well his dad here makes it his mission to know everything the boy does. I hope he's behaving though." Beside his mother, Shoaib was glaring down at his food and even though it wasn't my intention to look, it had caught my eye. Well the corner of it anyway. I could tell he didn't like the fact his dad did that; heck if my dad done the same I would probably throw a tantrum, releasing the inner five year old in me.

"Yes he is. He likes to share his textbook when someone forgets theirs." My indirect was only obvious to me and Shoaib but everyone else seemed content and began chatting amongst themselves, that which I was glad for.

Dinner rolled on without me participating much to the conversations unless it was directed at me. To my surprise, Shoaib had not spoken either throughout the entire dinner or even made any snide comments about anything. Instead he ate his food, but in silence. I wasn't sure whether this was normal for him when around his family so in a way it bothered me. Was he putting up a facade in front of his family or me?

"Jazakallah for the food, it was delicious. Oh and Umaymah, seems like you're nearing the age of marriage huh?" I stopped myself from laughing along with everyone else at Aunty Aliza's words but still smiled; I didn't want to be disrespectful.

"Ahh well, let's find someone who can handle her first." My little brother Zakariya spoke which again everyone laughed at.

"That may take a while." I had to look up to make sure it was the right person I heard saying that. In front of me Shoaib looked at me with a smirk which I was tempted to wipe off, but didn't. The two families then said their goodbyes and with his parents and siblings they left to go next door. I'm pretty sure everyone was shocked to have heard the boy talk, but they hadn't made a fuss about it.

Everyone was either now going back upstairs or chilling on the sofa. Unfortunately I had seen Jasmine trying to go upstairs. She had another thing coming if she thought I forget about our conversation or her behaviour throughout dinner - she mostly just smiled and gave a short reply when someone asked her a question.

"Jasmine. We need to talk now." I didn't want to be interrupted again and so after entering her room, I closed it behind me and stood firm in the ground until she looked up to see my face.

"Honestly if I had the guts to tell you then I would. But could you just give me time?" Her voice was low but I could just about hear everything she said to me. I didn't know whether I should press on the matter or not; the fact I also had a short temper didn't help either.

"You can't keep asking for time. I need to know soon so I can help you." My efforts to reason with her into telling me wasn't going well.

"I'm sorry for making you saw what you did yesterday, but it's going to take time for me to open up about it." There was no point in waiting around anymore and with a last smile I exited the room and stood outside my brothers room. All three of my brothers shared a room but I was sure only Abdullah was in there at the moment.

"Can I come in?" I asked opening the door a little to poke my head inside.

"Well you're already in, so might as well." He spoke from his bed and I took a seat next to him. He had a smile on his face as he looked at something in his phone.

"So how did it go?" Along with wanting to know what happened to Jasmine, I was also interested to know what had happened during Abdullah's visit at the gang house.

"Man it was almost heart breaking to see them grab the food like that. It's like they hadn't eaten in days." His phone was now long gone from his hands and he was now looking at me, sincere to what he had just said. Abdullah didn't know that his words were in fact true and I didn't want to say anything either.

"I'm just glad they got the food and thanks again Abs. So, you wouldn't mind doing this everyday? And by the way, I lied about getting smoothies; sisters broke you see." Our conversation was short by me running out the room before the textbook he had picked up to throw at me, wouldn't touch me, but I heard him scream that he didn't mind dropping food off for the boys.

Once away from Abdullah and inside my own room, I took my hijab off and changed into some comfortable pyjamas so I could hop into bed. I could have just slept in the clothes that I was in, that's how tired I was feeling at the moment, but of course sleep wouldn't come so soon.
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In Fact, I laid in bed thinking. I had been more than taken back to find that Shoaib wanted a favour from me, came to dinner, behaved and left as quietly as he had came in. My sister was also of a concern but if she thought she needed time then I won't question her about it until she comes to me herself telling me what the matter is. An even better question was lingering at the back of my head:

Why were the gang starving?

Shoaib was rich enough to provide the entire town of food constantly for about ten years straight, but now he can't serve some to about 15 boys? It didn't make sense to me and I wasn't sure whether I had the right to know or even question the gangs well being. I knew what ever the reason may be, I had to send Abdullah everyday to deliver some food. There was no going back now; after being told they hadn't eaten in days, who knows the next time they would eat another meal?

Late night thinking always got the worst of me, especially when I had school the next day but I couldn't help but think why Shoaib had ever decided to lead the life he is now. His parents are loving and caring yet he didn't seem to be anything like them.

Was it wrong of me to judge his actions without knowing his reasons though? After all, he's only gained a bad reputation but if there's any justification then maybe it would explain many unanswered questions that he's left me thinking about; all of which he doesn't know about. He thinks I'm just an obstacle in his way of doing things, and that may be true although I have a reason to.

My thoughts were cut off by my phone ringing. It seems that I had become the most popular person to ring nowadays.

"Hello?" I asked out holding the phone to my ear. It was pretty late, so I wasn't sure who this could be, especially since the number was private.

Silence.

It seemed like I had been pressing the phone to my ear for a long time demanding who this was, however silence was all I seemed to be getting from the other line. If this was a prank call then they obviously needed to learn a few things. Talking would be the first thing. And then I heard it, just as I was about to put the phone down.

"You should watch out." The line went dead after the warning I had just received. I didn't know whether to brush it off thinking its a prank or if this was a genuine threat by some Mafia leader who could chop me up and send my body parts to Africa.

This was unexpected to say the least but I decided to keep my mouth shut. I was more than capable of looking after myself if it came down to dangerous situations. Wait, no I'm not actually.

"Today has been too long and tiring for me to even care anymore. I give up." I announced to myself while looking like a mental case in the huge mirror in front of me as I threw my hands up in the air followed by an exasperated sigh. Sleep was dawning on me and after five minutes of waiting to see if I got another creepy phone call, I drifted to sleep knowing no one else was going to be bothering me again for the night.

***

It is a bit hectic in this chapter so I'm sorry if it was too much! 😌 Like always, let me know what you think ❤️

Dedicated to @Innocentmuslim for always commenting and making my day with her views and being so sweet ❤️