4th April

The week went by pretty normal with the exception of some relatives visiting. I was getting used to this house, with my Parents in-laws and and Mahir's siblings. There's his younger sister, Meena, who is 3 yours younger than him, and his younger brother, Maruf, who is 9 years old. He also has a older sister who is married and lives twenty minutes away.

Meena and I are similar aged- she is 8 months younger than me. We grew quite close over the week and she became my friend. Maruf is a cute kid and very smart for his age. At first he was shy around me, but now he is becoming normal. He chats around me casually now, talking about school, friends and his favorite subject, cars. The kid is obsessed with cars. He got a huge collection of cars of all sizes and types. In the car racing video games, he is a pro. sometimes he asks me to race him. I play with enthusiasm, only to be defeated by him repetitively. But there is fun in being able to compete properly with a kid. Normally when we play against children, we go easy and let them win. But that is not the case with Maruf. no matter how hard I fight, he always comes first and I'm unable wipe that smirk off his face. He also knows a lot about real cars, some facts that even I don't know although I have a driving licence and he doesn't!

My Mother-in-law is a sweet loving woman whose passion is to talk. She can talk non-stop even if there is no particular subject to talk about. She is capable of maintaining a conversation even without the other person responding. It is actually a relief for me as I'm not very good at conversing with the elderly people. And when I say she talks a lot, I mean no disrespect whatsoever. Like I said, she is 'sweet and loving'. And she doesn't talk evil of people - which women her age often tend to do. This is something I admire about her. She just has this talent of describing an event with details to such extent that I suspect she would get more than A*s if she was to do English exams now. Just imagine how her essay writing skills would be, there wouldn't be enough pages!

And then there is my father-in-law. He is a man of few words - very few - which balances out mother's talking habits. I think he got used to mother talking enough for the two of them that he just developed the habit of talking less. He is nice to me, but because he talks less, I feel like there is a distance between us. I want the distance to shorten, but it might take time. That's the huge contrast with mother and father: while she is all sunny and immediately able to make you feel home, he is cloudy with his gentle smiles that are cracks letting in moonlight.

Oh, I forgot to tell you, I have decided to call my Parents in-laws mother and father after pondering over it for a whole three days. I didn't want to call them Mum and Dad since that's what I call my own parents, and it might confuse things. Okay, there's a little more to it. I felt like if I call them what I call my own parents, it would be like I was replacing my parents with a new set of Mum and Dad. I know it's silly, but I couldn't shake the feeling away.

So, as I'm a fan of classics and find it fancy to call father and mother, I decided to give it a go. It is a bit unusual and feels odd in my mouth when I call them out loud. But I am hoping to get used to it In sha Allah.

Maliha, Mahir's older sister went home yesterday. She was staying over since before the wedding to help out, and it's also easy for her to come and stay over because she doesn't have any kids yet. I kinda miss her now. I never had a older sister so I didn't know what a privilege they can be. To have someone looking out for you, being able to ask for sisterly advises that you can't share with anyone else, being annoyed by their bossiness yet not being able to get angry at them - it all comes in one package in the name of an older sister. Although I'm not that close to her yet, we are beginning to form a relationship that I reckon might turn into something special.

I described everyone in my new family now. Or have I...? No, I haven't forgotten. I haven't illustrated my special person yet not because I forgot, but because I wanted to save the best for the last. I am glad that you can't see my face now. Metaphorically speaking, if I was to demonstrate how I'm blushing now, the ink of my pen would turn pink. No, I'm not saying that I'm blushing pink now, because that's not possible. I always thought of it as a hyperbole, when authors described their characters to blush with crimson cheeks. But you get the idea.

Mahir. How do I describe him? It is so simple yet so complicated. Simple because we understand each other so easily. Complicated because the feeling, the pull that I sense towards him is something inexplicable. Is it love? I have no way to know. Perhaps it's too early to tell and given that we are both new in this, it would take time for us to figure this out. I don't know how he feels about me, but I do think that he does feel something, whatever it may be. Just the way he gives that breathtaking smile of his, or the way he looks so fascinated suddenly, are enough hints for me. I don't want to go to extra details in here, in case this journal falls in the wrong hands. And the way Tanim's been prying these days, it probably will. So better stay safe than sorry.