The night passes slowly, as the girls continue talking in Sarah's family room. The hotel room was lit by lamps on the sides of two single beds. Sana said she'd sleep on the floor in between the beds with a duvet and blanket while Sarah and Maryam got their own beds.

In the dimly lit room, Sana sat up on her makeshift bed on the floor. Sarah covered herself with her thick blanket as she lay on the bed, getting ready to sleep. Maryam laid on her side, facing Sarah and glancing at Sana when she talked.

Sarah yawned, and both of the other girls knew that meant it was past their sleepy friend's bedtime. "Sana, Maryam, I'm going to sleep," Sarah announced, in her soft low voice, already half asleep.

"Alright, sleep, but I'm going to answer your question now," Sana teased, knowing her best friend would stay awake if she had tea to spill.

Sarah sat up, temporarily shaking away the sleep weighing down her eyelids, "About Hasan?"

Maryam raised an intrigued brow at her elder sister's exchange. "Akhi Hasan?"

Sarah and Sana looked back at Maryam who was glancing back and forth at them curiously.

"Hasan sent Hania to hand me his extra coat because he guessed I would forget mine," Sana spilled the tea. Maryam gasped, covering her mouth with both hands. Sarah raised a brow, and a smirk crept onto the side of her lips.

"Is that so?" Sarah held her chin. "That's weird of him,"

"No!" Maryam retorted. "That's so sweet of him!"

Sana sighed and stood up to tuck her best friend under the blanket. "More tea later, now go to sleep,"

"Are you alright, Sana?" Sarah asked, knowing Sana must be so bewildered right now.

"I will be," was all she said as she switched off the light at Maryam's side. "Sarah keep yours on," she said, referring to the lamp by Sarah's bed.

"Alright then, 3 Quls Ayatul Kursi (read for protection) and go to bed!" Sarah announced.

***

Sana couldn't sleep that night. She stirred restlessly on the makeshift bed on the floor and frowned at the "argument" she had with Hasan earlier. Her heart clenched and tightened at the thought of him. It hurt. Was he pushing her away or drawing her close? Drawing a line between them or expelling any lines? The uncertainty loomed over her heart like a persistent shadow of doubt.

She lifted the heavy blanket off of her and stood up. She grabbed her khimar from her bag and positioned a prayer mat towards the Qiblah indicated on the ceiling. She saw the digital clock beside Maryam on her bedside table, and it read 4 AM. Following the direction, she locked herself away in prayer.

She let her thoughts flow in Salat-at-Tahajjud, the time when Allah is closest to His slaves.

My Lord, You know your slave better than I can ever. Forgive me and forgive him. Guide me and guide him to make decisions that please you – and ease this pain in my heart that you are aware of, but I don't recognize. Our Lord! You certainly know what we conceal and what we reveal. Nothing on earth or in heaven is hidden from Allah. [underlined dua from Surah Ibrahim, Ayah 38].

Sarah blinked awake with bleary eyes. Her eyes registered a figure in a long dress and popped open. She stared at the figure and saw it move swiftly yet steadily. Sarah rubbed her eyes to clear off the blurriness of her eyes, only to see her best friend. She hid herself under the blanket and tried to listen in on her conversation.

"Why does it hurt so much?" Sana thought aloud, frowning, feeling that stupid clenching feeling in her heart again as she thought back to her encounter with Hasan.

Sarah didn't want to intrude further on her friend's heartfelt prayer, so she started sniffling to show Sana that she was awake. She stirred under the blankets – and the sudden noise made Sana abruptly turn her head in Sarah's direction.

"You're up?" she croaked, because of the sudden loud voice she used; her eyebrows relaxed as she turned to her friend. Her face glowed under the light of the lamp from Sarah's side.

Sarah nodded, "Yeah, you too?"

Sana rolled her moist eyes, "No I'm going through the REM phase right now,"

Sarah scoffed at her friend's sarcastic comment, "Yeah sure, I'm talking to your sleep-walking form right now,"

"Shut up, you'll wake Maryam up," she whisper-screamed. She wiped her eyes with her khimar, subconsciously.

"Anything I can do to help?" Sarah asked, concerned about her friend.

"Yeah, just shut up and go back to sleep," Sana said, "I'll wake you up for Fajr later,"

"Alright, I love you," Sarah recited like there was a tilda (~) at the end.

"Whatever," Sana replied, with the same warmth.

As for the boys in Ibrahim's room, Ishaaq was trying his best to switch on the TV. Ayyub was arguing with him about how the TV worked. Hussein went through the fridge of their room and found an apple, so he was washing it. Hasan was attending an Islamic class on his phone, and Ibrahim had joined him over his shoulder.

"Subhan Allah," Ibrahim announced, making Ishaaq teleport behind Hasan's screen. He wanted in on whatever Ibrahim was doing. He listens to the lecture for a while and sees Ayyub switch on the TV just fine.

Bitter, he throws himself onto his single bed. Then he sits up and crosses his arms. "The TV has bad taste,"

The TV was switched on and now the problem was how to get it to turn off. They were on some news channel blabbering about random things. Hussein was annoyed, he had his green apple in one hand and pulled off the main switch of the TV with another.

"Guys just leave the gadgets for now," he said, crunching on the apple. "Let's do something,"

Hasan looked at his little brother, amused after his class was over. Hussein is the one who plays the most Minecraft among them. "What's on your mind?"

Ishaaq pretended to think for a while, and he said with all this confidence, "Truth or Dare!"

Hussein nodded in approval, "Yeah, something like that,"

***

After a while, it was only Ibrahim and Hasan awake as the other boys fell asleep.

"And they said they'd stay up the whole night," Ibrahim laughed softly as he looked behind him from the balcony into the room.

"You know that never happens unless they're gaming," Hasan sighed, staring forward at the sea and mountain view in front of them.

A moment of silence passed, and Ibrahim broke it, "What's on your mind these days?" he started, noticing his friend's continuous lost expression. "You don't have to talk about it if you don't want to," he added.

"Do you have someone you love?" Hasan asked, out of the blue.

What–

A flicker of an image of a cheerful niqabi sister flashed through Ibrahim's mind at that question.

"Do you?" he returned the question, unsure of how to respond.

"I'm not sure," Hasan admitted.

"Me neither," Ibrahim admitted as well. "But if you asked me that, maybe you are a bit sure?"

"Maybe, but I need to be... more certain," Hasan said, as he held the moon's gaze.

Ibrahim stared forward at the mood, the brightness of it reminded him of how Sarah's eyes glistened under the moonlight that one time. "Same here,"

"I ask Allah (سبحانه وتعالى) to guide us," Hasan made Dua

"Ameen,"

***

Sana slept for a bit after Fajr, and then they woke up at 8 AM for breakfast. Of course, Sana was the first to wake up. She stood up and pushed the sliding curtains to the side, letting the sunlight spill into the room. The flood of sunlight woke Maryam up as she squinted, facing the wardrobe on the wall.

"Up, up," Sana clapped, announcing the morning. "We're supposed to be down for breakfast in a while,"

Maryam rubbed her eyes drowsily, her voice rough with sleep. She recited the dua to wake up then faced Sana with an eye open, "What's for breakfast?"

"Wash your face first," Sana said, walking over to Maryam and ruffling her messy hair.

Meanwhile, Sarah was snoring under her covers, burying herself in the softness of the blanket to escape the sunlight assault.

Of course, on the boy's side, Ishaaq is the first one on his feet running around the room waking up the rest of them. And when the fathers call their children, the excited ones (Maryam, Ishaaq, Sarah) jump out of their rooms and into the elevators and down to the first floor for breakfast. The others take their time waking up and then come down to join their parents for breakfast.

The men and boys sat at one table while the women and girls sat at another table.

Sarah surveyed the entire restaurant from her chair.

It was a buffet restaurant!

Ishaaq was the first to get everything from one side and sit on the plate while the other boys took their time to survey the area and plate their food.

Maryam just settled down at the girls' table in the busy restaurant. She grabbed her plate on the buffet side and realized that there were only two people on this side of the buffet area – her and Ishaaq. The realization made her eyes widen. She felt like she was being eyed by him when in reality he was all too busy being ecstatic about the food.

Ishaaq just noticed her awkwardly shuffle with the lid of the dish she seemed to want to add to her plate. He pretended to take that too and opened the lid for her and took a piece from it. Surprised by his action, Maryam turned to look up at him, and he nodded with the same polite smile at her and walked back to his table as she stared after him.

She felt another layer of pink blossom on her cheeks – since she was already pretty tense about being alone with him in the area. (there were more people but they were farther from them)

MEANWHILE.

Ibrahim had just finished his first serving. Sarah too had finished, so she was headed to the food area to get some more of the other dishes she hadn't tasted yet. Ibrahim was checking his jade watch since they were supposed to go hiking later. Sarah was ensuring no hummus had spilled on her abaya or khimar – and that is why none of them noticed the other walking toward each other.

And so –

BUMP.

"Sorry," they both say and realize the identities of the persons before them.

Sarah bint Khalid

Ibrahim bin Ya'qub

They do a little bow and go their own ways. Not before clearing their throats. And not before thinking of... how much of... a hug–

Ahem.

"Astaghfirullah," they say to themselves, remembering their brief physical contact. Although it was just their arms, something... sparked.

Sana had folded Hasan's coat and handed it to Hania who had returned it to Hasan. He patted his little sister's head as he thanked her – and then is when Sana and Hasan shared a lingering glance. Confusion and uncertainty etched on both of their expressions, with Sana's scrunched eyebrows that she didn't realize were knitted, and Hasan's calm poker face, that hid a lot of his heart's doubts.