If I Take a Chance [Unpublished]

|1| The Belkos

The silence was comforting to Noorul-Huda as she sat atop the window bench, sketchbook on her lap and a pencil caught between her index and pointer finger, staring intently at the boy on the paper. She worried her bottom lip with her teeth, wondering what to make of the sketch.

His grey eyes stared back at her with such intensity she wondered if he was real and could see through the protective layers she had enacted to hide away her scars.

Those grey eyes haunted what little dreams she got, recurring every single time she let her inhibitions down. She wondered if somewhere out there, the owner of said eyes also had dreams of her. It was a foolish thought but a thought nevertheless. Nothing of such could happen but still, a girl could hope. And hope, she did every day of her life.

The dreams had begun last month when she had taken a vacation together with Nadia and her brother. They were good dreams so she never made a fuss of them. Instead, she made a habit of documenting them down on her sketchbook every moment she woke up. The sketches and dreams were hers and the mystery behind them were hers to solve alone.

{••}

Snapping the small buttons of the abaya securely, Noor's mind wandered back to her mother.

She remembered the first time she had worn the abaya. Half Emirati half African, she had been fascinated with how her mother had always dressed in the same black garment with different intricate designs.

She had worn her mother's when she took it off and tripped on the long garment, ripping a part of it. Fearing what her mother would do to her when she found about the ripped garment, little Noor had hid behind the rack cowering, clutching it to her heart.

She had fallen asleep in there unbeknownst to her mother who had turned the whole mansion upside down looking for her. It was during the night her mother had found her curled up like a ball, patches of dried tears visible on the abaya.

Her mother had smiled in relief, woke her up then send her off to her bed after admonishing her for hiding in the closet. The next day, she had laid a dozen of the garment on Noor's bed and asked her to try them out.

"Shukran Dada," she had squealed and giggled, slipping on the garment. She twirled and danced in her new garment, excited that she had a dozen to call hers and since then, Noor had welcomed the abaya as her choice of garment to be worn anywhere and anytime.

Her lips curled up into a sad smile as she wrapped a sheila over her hair, slipping her feet into a pair of black sandals.

'Don't worry Ummi, your daughter is a soldier.'

{••}

Juwairiya loved the picturesque landscape of her gated community. Like a pearl, Ivy Hills hid its ugliness behind the flawlessly manicured gardens and dancing fountains.

It guarded the secrets of its occupants within high walls, only to come forth in the darkest of nights when others were too busy to care or when they avert their gazes because they too shared the same level of ugliness.

She recalled the first time she had seen him, her husband Al-amir Belko at a family function. Fresh out of college, good looking and with a powerful African background, he had charmed the women around with his easy smile and fine manner, her included. Sadly, he only had eyes for one woman, a woman who even in death still held a part of him.