BROKEN

Priorities

I got to the apartment complex and ran into Ahmed at the door. We both entered at the same time.

"Where's Hakeem?" I asked.

"I don't know he left with Faisal after school. They probably went to his place to write or something." he said as we stood in the staircase. "Bayden told me about what happened at lunch today." he began. "Listen, you're my friend and I care about you so I'll tell you this." he began.

"Tell me what?"

"If I were you I wouldn't look too deep into all of that."

"Into what?"

"Hakeem's past. Naima tells me a lot and it's really ugly. She tells me things that I didn't even know about him as his best friend. You'll only get yourself hurt if you keep digging for these answers." I wanted to ask Ahmed what he meant but I knew I wouldn't get any answers. I somehow needed to get close to Naima to get the answers that I wanted.

"Are you ever going to tell Hakeem?" I asked.

"About what?"

"You and Naima. If she's telling you all of this information it must mean that things are getting pretty serious."

"I don't think it's that big of a deal. I really don't think he's going to care."

"If you think he's not going to care then why are you hiding it from him?" I asked.

"If he does care then that's bad for your relationship, not mine." he laughed. My heart sunk, he was right. If Hakeem gets upset about Ahmed and Naima's relationship, then it meant that he still had feelings for her. Now I really wanted Hakeem to find out just so I could see his reaction. "Anyway, I'm about to head back to my place. I'll see you later."

I went back to my place, laid on my couch and thought about everything I had found out in the past two days. I found out that nobody really knew why Hakeem and Naima broke up except them two, and maybe Ahmed. I also found out that Hakeem had known about me long before I even knew him, he had just been playing dumb this whole time. I found out that there is more to Hakeem than I originally thought. And lastly, I found out that Tasneem and Naima were now friends. All I knew right now was that I really liked Hakeem. I had hurt so many people that I cared about for the sake of being with him. I just hoped that it wasn't all for nothing.

---

On Friday in first period Miss. Matthews announced that we would be doing a presentation with a partner.

"I'll assign you and your partner with a topic and you'll present to the class next Monday." she explained.

"Can we pick our partners?" asked a kid sitting in the front of the class.

"No, I've assigned you partners." She began to read off the list of partners.

"Watch me get partnered with Naima." I whispered to Faisal.

"That would be better than me getting partnered with her." he laughed.

Working with Naima wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing though. I could ask her for information on Hakeem and also find out how Tasneem was doing. I really did miss her a lot. I zoned out and was deep in thought until I heard my name get called.

"Warsan will be working with Faisal." she said. That wasn't so bad. Faisal wasn't as scary as I first thought he was.

"So when do you want to work on this?" I asked.

"Today after school at the library." he said.

---

I saw Hakeem at lunch and he pulled me aside.