Hearts We Call Home

2. Mum's Orders

Nura

For as long as Nura could remember, she had spent her life in survival mode. She had heard the whispers at family events she attended as an adolescent, but especially at home from her relatives - constantly reminding and chiding her that her life had come at an expense of another. Nura was meant to have a twin brother who had died at birth while she survived, and she had lived with this reality since she was old enough to grasp what death meant.

Her father, grieving the son he had lost and would never have as an heir, responded to her only in grunts while her mother, unwilling to let herself mourn, turned her attention to getting pregnant again. Just three months after Nura's birth, her mother was pregnant again, this time with a son that Nura could not kill.

Her grandmother, who disliked the notion of another granddaughter since Nura's older sister already existed, ultimately took on most of the responsibility of naming and raising her. This continued until she died, leaving Nura on her own at the age of fourteen.

Nura's phone vibrated, pulling her out of her thoughts. A text from Muna lit up on her screen.

Amu somehow managed to grab the washing machine free. Taking your bedsheet and pillow cover too. Need anything else cleaned?

A small smile crept onto Nura's face. Their hostel building had just one working washing machine, so the fact that Amal had somehow managed to find it free was a surprise. It was probably because it was a Monday night, or perhaps because Amal needed a mindless task like keeping an eye on the washing machine when something was weighing on her mind. Nura knew it was to do with her sudden departure.

Nura typed in a reply: Nope. Thanks, Momo.

Then she leaned back into her seat, pulling her hood over her head. She plugged in her earphones and turned her head to look at the dark trees that passed by the window. There were still seven more hours left in her journey. She had intended to book a sleeper seat on the bus, but due to her family's last-minute plans, only regular seats were available. Nura closed her eyes and rested her head against the window. She knew sleep wouldn't come, but she could at least try to give her eyes some rest.

*****

At six thirty in the morning, Nura's bus rolled into her town's bus station. The conductor paced down the aisle, calling out "Solara" repeatedly. Nura stood up, reached for her small suitcase in the overhead compartment, and grabbed it. She had initially planned to bring just two sets of clothes in her laptop bag, but Muna had insisted she pack at least a week's worth of essentials, and Nura, lost in her thoughts, hadn't argued.

With her laptop bag over her shoulders and her suitcase in hand, she stepped off the bus. A line of autos waited outside; she flagged one down and gave the driver her parents' address. Fifteen minutes later, she was standing at their doorstep.

Nura's hand hovered over the bell as she tried to steady the anxiety building in her chest. She despised this place and had avoided coming back as much as she could. In the past two and a half years, she had only visited twice: once during the break after her second semester for her older sister's wedding, and then again last summer after her fourth semester. That time, she had managed to escape back to campus after just a week under the pretense of a research internship that she had begged her professor to grant her.

"Why are you standing outside in the cold?"

Nura turned to see her very pregnant sister, Hana, standing behind her, wrapped in a long coat. Her gaze swept down the length of her sister's figure and then returned to her face, only to find her sister's eyes doing the same to her. With a disapproving frown, her sister said, "And what are you even wearing? You know that abba doesn't like you dressing up like that."