Deceptive Glitters ✅

Chapter 30: Moving on.

Third update for the day, two more.....

Abuja, Nigeria

“Fahad,” Barr. Salima called knocking on his open bedroom door, Fahad looked up with two red eyes, his hand massaging his temples. She looked around the organized room in appreciation as she entered noting how everything was looked, he is the neatest amongst all his siblings, followed by Nabila, the rest only Allah can help them.

“Are you coming down with a fever?” she touched the back of her palm to his forehead, satisfied with the temperature, she moved and sat beside him, her hands running over his back soothingly.

He towered over her even seated but she didn't mind that, even though she is tall, he is very much taller but he still feels at peace in her presence, like a baby would feel in his mother's arms, he'd never outgrow that warmth he knows.

“Do you want to talk?” he didn't answer but made a sound in his throat, it meant no so she let it go,, for the time being.

Huda entered the room without knocking which earned her yet another glare from her mother, she'd thought their mother was in the kitchen but turns out she wasn't.

“I'll knock next time.” the words stumbled out of her mouth in a rush, she didn't want another scolding, she might've escaped not sleeping but she won't be lucky every time and the only person that might coerce her into letting her off the hook is Fahad who doesn’t look to be in that state of mind.

“Oya drop it and go.” Huda is the informant of the family, and she wanted more than anything to hear the conversation they were going to have, so she stood at the door as discreetly as she possibly can.

“When I get there Noorulhuda you'll not like what I'm going to do to you.” she'd mentally bargained what would hurt her fourteen year old self, not much but then her phone and TV accessibility came to the forefront of her mind,  her father might be a billionaire but what the missus says stands. With a resolved sigh, she walked off stomping all the way, very childishly on her part, but she was a child anyways, she consoled herself.

“Fahad, when are you going to move on and stop this endless cycle of suffering? Hmmm-” he turned his face clearly not wanting to have the conversation but she was resilient, as a mother she was tired of seeing her son in so much pain, the worst kind, the one he doesn't speak of and that hurt more than everything else.

“Don't you want me to have peace? I don't know what to do anymore, should I get on my knees and beg you to be fine,” her voice broke but he still didn't turn afraid of seeing the tears he knew would be there.

How can he explain it when he doesn't understand the problem himself? He has tried to move past it by came out empty, his coping mechanism was fixing other since he couldn't fix himself, but what can a broken person do? The broken can't help the broken. He wanted to be fine but he’d since come to the conclusion that he didn’t know how so he simply let it be.

“Please look at me,” he closed his eyes and shook his head, he could bear seeing anything in this world but tears in his mother's eyes is something he couldn't see, he could handle almost anything but that and knowing he is the cause of it made his heart bleed.

“Please….” he whispered in despondence. He remembered his advice to Jawad, maybe he needed to tell himself that too, but will he be able to cope with it? No, he wouldn't and he knew that.

“Is this what you want for yourself?” his mother asked after a moment of silence, when he didn't respond or make any move to show that he heard, she continued “You'll not get married, live this day every year in grief, torment? You don't want to get better? For yourself? Me? Your father?” as a lawyer, Barr. Salima knew how to get people to answer her, get the truth out of them, knew how to make them tell her exactly what she wants them to, but her son, her first son, he didn't crack under her scrutiny, there was simply nothing she could do to make him talk, sometimes he does give her credit and says just what she wants to hear but that was it.