Basma likes Fendi

19 | A connections lovers shared

• Rayyan

I've been in the hospital since I heard Basma was kidnapped.

To make it worse, the police keep visiting me. I don't get why I'm a suspect too when I'm a victim just like her.

I dreamt of her and woke up crying because I saw her pregnant and in pain—pain that I felt deep within my guts—it was like no other.

My family thinks it's because my car crashed into a trailer that I'm sick but I even feel sicker when I think of her kidnapped.

I wish I could speak to her. Maybe her voice would heal my bones and strengthen my sick body to health.

Today will be the sixth time the police is visiting me this month. I don't understand why I'm being questioned unreasonably about my car, the driver of the truck and a man I've never heard of in my life.

They keep mentioning a Bashir and I don't know who he is. They say a phone was found in the supposedly drunk driver's trailer beside an empty bottle of local gin, kola nuts and an envelope with a picture of me.

Coincidentally, the driver was gone before they reached the scene. The only mistake he made was leaving his phone behind and on it, a message was found from a 'Oga nomba 2' saying : is the work done?

They called the number and the recorded network providers voice kept repeating the same thing which was that the number didn't exist. Soon a lead was gotten after the number was traced to a Bashir Jalal who I was sure was a stranger to me as much as he was to them.

The doctor says I'll be discharged in 24 hours and I can finally move back to my house. My parents have begged me to return to my old room in their house so they can take care of me but I refused since I was able to walk and feed myself.

I only agreed to follow them back home so I could eat my mothers cooking and ask Aunty Yusra about Basma's wellbeing.

I slept off as soon as everyone left and proceeded to wake up to perform the magribh salat. I'm not sure how I woke up but I remember feeling a light breeze and fingers touching my face.

My eyes were welcomed by nothingness but I was scared as hell. The lights were bright and I could feel the emptiness of the room but my body still felt the presence of another watching me. Really I thought waking up in the middle of sleep was for horror movies and at 03:00am but like in the movies, a spirit was staring at the person.

Figuratively, or should I say theoretically jinns are living creatures and I very much believe in their existence. What's worse is the fact that I can hear footsteps of hooves yet I can't see anyone.

I repeat some duas silently till I feel better and less consumed by the thoughts of sharing a room with a being I can't see.

Slowly, I lift myself off the bed and stalk to the bathroom to purify myself before praying. Once that is done, I return to pray and plead with Almighty Allah to save Basma and to safely return her  return to her family and to me of course.

Upon folding my praying mat and getting off the floor, I notice a piece of paper on my bed. I open it and read it's contents, with fear, for it was never there to begin with.

It reads:

For the sake of a lover
You should strive
In her honor you shall survive
Bleak is this moment
And you're all in need
Step forth to a path of danger
It's there, a seed you'll see
It would come in two
But when it sprouts
Only one of its leaves bears a healer
Someone within is a killer.
-A concerned individual.
080********.