The Last Prayer

Chapter Seven

Chapter Seven

~

I tightly squeeze my eyes shut until I begin seeing stars. When I peel my eyelids apart, Yasir is there. This foreign feeling that was bubbling deep down within me was like no feeling I had ever felt before. A concoction of excitement, confusion, passion, and a thousand other indescribable emotions. I guess this is what they call love. Even though I had been wary my entire life to not fall in love, the burning sensation was oddly comforting. It was like a flame had been ignited inside of me, and the flames were licking and burning the walls of my stomach.

I liked it. That feeling, it felt strangely good. It felt good to know that I was capable of loving someone, that I had the ability to experience human things.

Just as the bus came to another halt, and the students began filing out of the bus, the wonderful feeling vanished along with the sight of him. And with that, I returned to my senses. They were no longer dulled and made fuzzy with that thing called love, they were clear and sharp once more.

As I clambered down the steps of the school bus, I realized what had just happened and what I needed to do. I needed to forget about Yasir and stay as far away from him as possible. I knew that if I continued to befriend him and get closer to him whilst having feelings for him, I would only create more problems for myself. More than half of the year had already flown by, and graduation was going to be here soon. Not only that but, Rami and Yasmina were getting married in a few months. My mind didn't have any room for another thing to worry about, but my heart certainly did.

While walking through the hallways of the spacious school, my mind was still floating here and there. Halima had left me ages ago, but I didn't seem to notice. As I was walking to my first period that morning, I caught myself thinning about whether Yasir liked me back or not, several times. It was quite pitiful. Not even my grade school crushes had got me this way. I had just realized I liked someone, and I was already planning our wedding and what I would say to him when I saw him.

Walking, walking with my head deep in the clouds, I almost passed my class, but a well built boy-man stood in my way. A wave of deja vu washed over me as I looked up. My eyes were met with another pair of obsidian eyes. Oh, how I adored those eyes! I could stare at them forever.

"Where are you going?" Yasir raised an eyebrow, a smirk playing across his lips.

I shrugged my shoulders as I darted my gaze toward the ground. I know I said that I could look into his eyes forever, but my timidness got the best of me. "I guess I just got distracted." I say, shifting my feet.

"Sure," Yasir suddenly grabs me by the shoulders with his large hands, my eyes widen and my face reddens. "You need to keep your head out of the clouds, and class is this way Alfiyah." He turned me around and ushered me into the classroom. My body was so stiff, it was like I had forgotten how to move, speak or react. On top of that, it all happened so quickly that I hadn't realized I was already in my seat next to him. The entire class period blurred by, consisting of me moving around with wide eyes and stiff limbs. My mind was still replaying and attempting to process what had happened in the beginning.

Just as I begin to pack up my things and wait for the bell to ring, a girl I had never spoken to comes up to me.

"Are you okay?" Her voice busts through the enjoyable silence and the buzz of my brain like a fist through glass. When she says that, all eyes stop wandering and are glued on me. Even Yasir is looking at me. My palms begin to sweat from the pressure of several judging eyes.

I let out a nervous laugh. "What do you mean?" I ask. The girl takes a moment to take a compact mirror out of her bag and holds it up to my face. Before me was Alfiyah Idris, but her skin had paled to a sickly gray-ish color and her lips are tinted with blue and are chapped. The next thing I know, I'm falling to the ground, people shout and reach for me, and the bell rings loudly. Everything after that is history.

~

When I wake up, there is a pounding in back of my head and my vision is blurry and distant. There I lay, on a twin bed with a metal frame, in a room smelling of disinfectant and pain. The nurses room; my least favorite place in the entire building. Ever since the incident in my freshman year at that school. After a long hiatus of being paper-cut free, I eventually got one in ninth grade. But it wasn't any ordinary paper-cut, it was one of those paper-cuts that are between your thumb and index finger; the fleshy part. The part perfect for paper to slice right through. And of course, the sight of my own blood seeping out of the cut and all over my hand made me nauseated, so I threw up, and continued to throw up. All the way to the nurses office, and all the way home. It was a pretty traumatizing experience, and since then I hadn't step foot into the nurses's office or gotten a paper-cut.

But here I was again, back to square one. The door swung open and a tall lady with kind eyes came in.

"I'm so glad you finally woke up, if you're classmate hadn't caught you in time, you probably would've hit your head on the table and suffered from much more." I nodded my head. there was still a throbbing pain, making it hard to process her words.

"What happened to me?" I croaked through my still chapped lips.

"I'm not exactly sure what caused the discoloration in your skin, but I do know that you were quite dehydrated and over fatigued." The lady suddenly left the room, then came back with a glass of water. I grabbed for it eagerly, like a baby begging for it's bottle. I impatiently gulped down the water, my dry throat no longer felt like it was on fire. I mumbled a 'thank you' under my breath. As I placed the empty glass aside, I realized that I hadn't eaten breakfast that day or taken my daily iron intake. I raised up an anemic wrist and stared at the large, blue veins running up and down my limb.

"I'm going to let you rest for a few more minutes, but you're going to have to go back to class. You've already missed fourth and third period." After stating that, the nurse left the room and shut the door behind her. I flopped down on the uncomfortable bed and stared up at the ceiling.

I really didn't want to go back to class, fifth period was my least favorite class, anyway. World History, with a teacher that radiated with white supremacy and privilege. The class didn't even focus on the world, it focused on the diseased and terribly run European countries.

I didn't want to leave the nurse's office let alone continue a day that began terribly. All I wanted to do was curl up into a ball and sleep for hours and hours on end. But alas, there was no time for me to even rest my eyes for a millisecond. The school nurse rudely swung the door open and announced that it was time for me to head out.

Without another word, I heaved my book bag into my shoulders and slowly trudged out the door and in the direction of the stupid, stupid World History class.

~

Helloooo, I am back after several weeks of being gone. I promised to write this chapter quickly but I didn't and I feel like a horrible person! I hope you guys can forgive 'cause I've given you another semi long chapter. Please enjoy and be sure to comment, follow, and vote!

-Sumi