"Hi! Sorry to bother you; I know you probably get asked this a lot, but do you ever struggle with your faith because of your sexuality? - Anon."
Malik Ishtar is a Muslim journalism student who works for a freelance newspaper, and he lives in San Fra...
Hey, guys. I got into my first choice for college so by this time next Saturday, I'll be up in Galway unpacking. I hope you enjoy this chapter. Thank you so so much for drawing-cookie on tumblr for the fantastic fanart for this chapter - I honestly screamed when I saw it. Enjoy!
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The night before they were due to go to pride, Malik finally joined the others in bed. He had been a little nervous to beforehand, but they managed to coax him in with promises that they would stay up to finish watching the new Orange is the New Black season. None of them were a huge fan of it anymore, and they were all outraged by the fact that some of their favourite characters had been sidelined, but they wanted to see it through.
Bakura had dosed through the last ten minutes, and Ryou followed him to sleep shortly after it ended. Mehi stayed up with Malik, watching as he typed out the end of an article on the brutality towards protesters in Bangladesh.
"You misquoted that." Mehi pointed to the screen.
"Shit." Malik rubbed his eye and doubled back. "Thanks."
Mehi sighed and squeezed his hand. "Leave it for tonight. You're tired and this is something that needs to be written well."
"I can write it well now." Malik huffed and fixed the quote. "Or at least write it okay-ish and edit it before I send it off."
"You probably won't get the go ahead on it," Mehi warned. "They've literally been taking down social media posts. I'm not sure that even your news outlet's going to touch this with a ten foot pole."
"I need to try." Malik shook his head and finished it off. "Okay how's this?" Mehi peered at the screen.
The government needs to take ownership of Bangladesh's fallbacks rather than trying to sweep it under the rug and allowing students to be harassed, attacked, raped, and killed so as not to draw international attention to itself. These are not statistics - these are human lives that are being toyed with for the sake of saving face, and it should not be tolerated on a national or international level.
"Looks good to me." Mehi yawned. "Now put it away until morning."
"Let me just read through it once more." Malik clicked back to the top of the word document.
Mehi huffed and ran a hand through her hair. "You're worse than Ryou when he's cramming."
"I'm not that bad," Malik mumbled, already half distracted by proofreading.
"Yes you are." Mehi glanced over at their other two partners.
Bakura was on his side, facing the wall, but Ryou was sprawled across the bed. She frowned. He usually slept curled up between them for warmth.
She leaned a little closer. A frown was creasing his face, and he was moaning softly in his sleep.
