Once Upon A Lifetime

Chapter Nineteen ~ Do I actually have a chance?

Aasim's POV~

I couldn't stop thinking about her. Was this really happening? Taalia had a brain tumor and I was finding out weeks after she got her results. And there was someone else asking for her hand. And she couldn't fast and Ramadan was her favourite month of the year.

I had studied about all kinds of tumors before and a brain tumor was one of them. I wondered how long it had been growing for. Will she undergo the surgery required to remove it? I hope so. If she didn't, it would spread further down her body and... I took a deep breath and tried to relax. This was driving me nuts. To top it all off, my training would only go on for about eight more months and things were only going to get harder until I was fully qualified as a doctor. I don't think she would wait eight months for me. But I had to act soon. What if she said yes to that other guy? They could be married before I even get my certificate! Ugh, this was so hard! I wanted to be there for her but I couldn't except from a distance. And I couldn't ask for her hand yet because I didn't have a steady job.

I was thinking about getting a different part time job for the meanwhile but my parents and Saqib told me it would just bring more stress for me.

So that night, I prayed Istikharah. Was she even the one for me? Did she feel the same way? Would she accept? Or did she have feelings for someone else? Ugh, I needed to stop, I'm going to make myself go crazy.

After praying, I went to bed right away.

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Taalia's POV~

"Taalia, could you come downstairs?" Ammu called.

"Okay." I put down the book I was reading and hurried downstairs.
"What is it?" I asked as I walked into the kitchen.

"Daiyan and his family aren't coming today. Daiyan has a meeting, I think, so they might come on Friday." Ammu explained. I mentally exploded with fireworks and jumped up and down.

"Oh okay." I replied.

"Wipe that grin off your face. I still want to know who this other guy is." I frowned.

"Ugh, Ammu-"

"Don't try to get out of it 'cause you won't." Ammu said and turned back to whatever she was cooking. I sighed.

"Can I go back up to my room?" I asked. She nodded and I left.

My mom was making things so difficult. Daiyan would certainly make a great husband but I just didn't see him that way for me. And who knows if she would approve of the one I had in mind.

Maybe.

Or maybe not.

I buried my face in my pillow and thought hard. I couldn't lose anything by telling her. And this could be a good thing. Maybe she would be happy with my choice and go tell his family right away! Or maybe- I'm going mad. I lay in bed facing the ceiling and count the glow in the dark stickers. I've had them since forever and over the years, I had gotten many more and added them to my collection. Now my ceiling was covered in them.

I looked at my clock and saw that it was almost Maghrib time. I got up to do wudhu then sat on my prayer mat reading the Quran. After praying, I continued reading my book from earlier. After I got bored, I started playing some nasheeds.

I didn't know when I fell asleep but when I woke up, my phone was playing the Adhan for Isha.

After praying, I started looking through my books on my book shelf. I suddenly heard a loud thud and looked down to find a box about the size of a shoebox on the ground that had fallen from the top of my shelf. I bent down to pick it up and blew off the dust. I didn't even remember having this. I opened the lid and gasped at the contents. It was all the stuff from when I was a kid. Many of these things were from Aasim. No. All of this stuff was from Aasim. Misha's and Saqib's were in other separate boxes. But why wasn't Aasim's with the others' in my closet?