CHAPTER | TWO | ALIZA | POV

The bell had rung a mere second ago and I was now among the crowd of students fighting their way out of the school grounds as they laughed, pushed and chatted loudly to their friends. Me, on the other hand was just hoping that they would go a little faster so I could go home.

I finally made it out to the parking lot where Asif and Akbar were leaning against my car and playing with a football. Oh how I'm going to give them scars if there's a scratch on my car. I may not use it a lot but I'd still like it to look presentable for when I do.

"You two better move away from the car with that in your hands," I said while pointing to the football they were throwing between themselves and their friends. 

Both of them threw their hands up in mock surrender while backing away from the car. Giving their friends one of those 'manly' hugs, they said goodbye and made their way towards me.

"Asalaamalikum Ali, can we go McDonald's?!" Akbar asked. It is official, my whole family is completely and utterly obsessed with food. By now, I had unlocked the car and given both of them hugs while I had a 'thinking' face plastered on my face. Seeing this, Asif started whining and complaining; baby much?

"Calm it Asif. Since when have we not gone to McDonald's after school? It's like tradition anyways," I comforted the fifteen year old baby and in an instant his face had lit up matching Akbar's, though I don't think that's what he was happy about.

I followed his gaze to see that he was staring at someone from across the parking lot. Ameenah to be exact. Ameenah is one of our family friends' daughter and is in the same year as the twins. She was a nice girl with hazel eyes and she wasn't too fat nor too skinny either; she was also one of those people who you could have an easy conversation with as she was very nice. All in all, both families knew that Akbar and Ameenah had something more than friendship towards each other in their minds. Which is why our parents had arranged their marriage for when they were old enough.

"Hey Akbar, staring at her is kind of creepy," I joked to my little brother who had now snapped his attention back to me and Asif who was just standing there lost. At first, we thought that Asif wouldn't like the idea his 'other half' getting married, but he was pretty happy about it.

"Shut up Ali, let's just go," He mumbled out annoyed with me and my wiggling eyebrows. I simply chuckled at him and dragged a still confused Asif along with me to the parked car.

"Okay guys this time don't start singing out Maher Zain nasheeds when we go inside McDonalds okay? I don't want us nearly being thrown out again," I sternly warned them sounding like Mom would with all of us. And yes, they actually do that; five times in a row and counting. I'm surprised we haven't been banned from steeping inside yet.

"Chill Ali, you worry too much!" Akbar stated to me but he had that smug expression which worried me a bit because it was never any good when these boys' were up to something in their devious little minds.

"Well think about it this way: You do something stupid in there and the entire album of your baby pictures will be in front of Ameenah's eyes. In fact, I think Mom still has a few of your baby teeth, why not show them to her too? I'm sure she'll love them," This time Asif had caught on and was now in hysterics in the backseat. So was I.

"Wallah Ali, that's not funny, don't you even dare or I'll..." Akbar shrieked as he stammered to find something to threaten me with. I rolled my eyes knowing full on he'd never get anything against me; I didn't have someone who they could show embarrassing pictures to.

"You'll what bro? Hide her Nutella and Ben & Jerry?" Asif asked inbetween laughing.

Suddenly Akbar's face turned into a smug grin and I knew he had already thought about taking on Asif's suggestion. "Hell yeah! That's exactly what I'll do. You better watch out Ali." His grin somehow turned into a smirk as he finished his warning to me but that didn't faze me. 

"You see little brother, there is something called a supermarket where, oh I don't know, buy a new jar or tub of comfort food. Oh, and Mom." Those two sentences was enough to shut him up for the entire car ride to McDonalds.

All three of us entered McDonalds after another few minutes of driving. The twins had now left me to go find a table for the three of us while I went to stand in the queue. Absent mindedly, I took the white iPhone out of my pocket and walked up the the front; my gaze locked in the screen.

I was smiling to the text Farah had sent me that I didn't even notice I had bumped into someone until I felt the hard impact of their back colliding with my chest. I'm not going to lie, that hurt, a lot. Huffing out in a big breath, I stepped back and looked up to see who I had bumped into.

"I'm so sorry. I should have been looking to where I was going," I honestly apologized to the hazel eyed boy in front of me who looked my age. I waited a few more seconds for him to speak up but he hadn't said a word to me. At all.

"Isa man, hurry-" Someone had stopped mid sentence to the boy and was now also looking at me. I expected someone unfamiliar, not my older brother.

"Adam what are you doing here?" I asked my older brother after he let go of the hug he had just pulled me into.

"Just getting some food with Isa here. I see that you guys still come to McDonalds after school huh?" He said and that's when I realised that this boys' name was Isa. It somehow sounded familiar. Maybe Adam has spoken about him before.

"Yeah we do, and it looks like the twins are getting a little impatient with me," I said as I looked over at the twins who were fussing at the table that were seated at just a few feet away from us.

 "Oh well you get on. Mom knows I'm out with Isa, but I'll be back before Maghrib." He said to me while taking his hazel eyed friend Isa out of the little restaurant. I watched them until they reached Adam's car before carrying on walking to the cashier.

I ordered four galaxy McFlurries and waited till they were ready and handed over a ten dollar note and patiently waited for the change and ice creams to come. Smiling at the aging woman from behind the counter, I grabbed the ice creams and went over to the twins who had now proceeded to using each other as punching bags.

"You two better stop or these are going to melt." I told them both while walking out with them two hot on my heels till we reached the car.

The twins chatted around to each other while I stayed quite for the rest of the car ride in thoughts about Adams friend Isa. Was I having a bad Hijab day or something that he didn't want to talk to me? Or was he angry because I bumped into him? I said sorry though, so I'm not technically the one to blame anymore.

I shaked the thoughts of him out of my head because it was just plain haraam for me to be thinking like this anyway. I had always been taught to never date, kiss or have sex with anyone apart from my spouse. Living my life like that was much better to be honest and I didn't mind it. Sure there are girls at school who have already experienced these kind of things with boys before but I found that plainly disgusting.

Again these haraam thoughts were filling my head and before I knew it, we were already back home and I had parked the car in the garage while the twins had already walked out leaving me alone in here. What lovely brothers I had.

Finally getting the chance to eat my McFlurry, I scooped up a spoonful and brought it to my mouth and savoured the cool feeling and opened the car door at the same time. Hanging the keys up on the wall, I got out the garage and shut the door behind me.

The house door was already opened so I casually walked in when Mustafa decided to come running up to me and clung to my legs which nearly caused me to stumble on the floor because my skirt was a little long.

"Calm down there buddy. Here I got your McFlurry." I said to him and handing him over the McFlurry as I beamed at the little boy.

"Ali guess what! Adam and his friend came over today and look what they got me!" Mustafa began telling me about how Adam's friend, which I'm guessing is Isa, got him a new action figure to go with his little collection in his room.

"That's great buddy, but I'm going to go up now and start on my homework okay?" I informed him before I started up the stairs to my room. He merely nodded at me; he was too busy making a mess out of his ice cream making him look like Santa with a snowy beard.

I entered my room and dumped my bag by the edge of my bed and began taking the pins out of my Hijab and settling the Hijab in my wardrobe with the rest of my other Hijabs. Wallah, if I wanted to I could open a Hijab store with the amount of them I have but it's absurd how I can never find one to match my outfit. Absolutely ridiculous.

Sighing, I took off my Converses off too and jumped in bed as I stretched over to get my bad from the floor. So I had ten questions to answer in Math and had to complete a chart about disecting animals for biology. Hmm, not too bad for a Monday.

The time seemed to have passed by quickly. Especially when I had turned my iPod on and began listening to a little Zain Bhikha to motivate me to continue with all this work, or else I would have probably dumped it all on the floor by now. 

As soon as I was done with homework I decided to change into something a little more comfortable. So sweatpants and a pair of sweatshirts will do. I could wear these kind of clothes at home as long as we didn't have any guests over.

"Habibi come and eat dinner so we can leave for the Masjid." I heard Mom shout out to presumably everyone who was upstairs in their rooms. 

I pulled my wavy brunette hair into a messy bun above my head and got out the room. As I got down to the kitchen I could hear my parents saying loving things to each other in Arabic. Knowing that even though my parents' had an arranged marriage yet they still loved each other this much gave me hope that if that's what they decide to do for my future then I shall be happy and hopeful.

Just then Adam decided to appear behind me and barge into the kitchen where Mom and Dad were still talking and I could see they were also holding hands.

"Ew, Mom, Dad we don't need another sibling." I gaped at Adam and shoved him into one of the chairs from around the table as Mom went red in the face and Dad started shooting daggers at him from next to Mom.

"Don't listen to him, but can we just eat now though?" I said as I hoped to make Mom feel better than she was already feeling at the moment but my stomach was now rumbling so both my parents chuckled and began serving the food.

By now everyone had come into the kitchen and was seated around the table. I looked at my plate and closed my eyes while breathing in deeply. Couscous. I opened my eyes again and saw that Mom was looking at me sympathetically; she knew I wasn't a fan of this dish. I also knew though that the rest was, so I sucked it up and said Bismillah and dug in.

Dinner went by smoothly and I managed to finish my plate without having the urge to gag. Right now we were all making our way into the family car so that we could go to Masjid and pray Maghrib like we do every day. I had on my abaya and Hijab, the same as Mom while everyone else was in jeans.

We had small conversations in the car and within minutes we had reached the Masjid where other cars were pulling up in the car park with their families. The car was parked and we all exited one by one. 

Everyone went their seperate ways; the boys to the men’s entrance, me and Mom to the ladies entrance where several other women were also heading in with their abayas.

Just as I was about to enter the Masjid, I was engulfed in a huge hug and by the smell of the musk radiating off the person, I knew it was Farah. We both let go of each other and looked up to each other.

"Salaam Ali, ready to go pray?" Farah asked me, but I was more interested in what was caked on her face than to what she was saying to me.

"Girl, that amount of makeup with your abaya?!" I asked as I doubled over in laughter as she had on a cute little pout on her face.

"Whatever Ali, let's just go pray," I was still laughing but still followed behind her and shrugging. The laughter instantly died off as I took my slippers off and headed inside the prayer hall to pray the Maghrib Salat.

The hall was always filled with women and children praying side by side and it always filled my heart to see kids at such young age praying with their mothers or fathers. It somehow made me realise just how much I would make my children have the love of Islam in their hearts.

With that final thought, I stood aside Farah and raised my hands in Salat as the Imam's voice rang through our ears.

***

Asalaamalikum and again EID MUBARAK! It's weird how I'm updating the next day after the last update, but I had already reached five votes on the last chapter and a promise is a promise. Next update will be after six votes this time, so may I please have that much votes?!

Dedicated to @Qruxeley, sorry if I spelt it wrong but she's always supporting so Jazakallah.

Have a Good Day and May God Bless You All.