Coming Home (English Version)

14. Brave

Hamdan

Layla looks at me with furrowed brows and disbelief in her eyes. I couldn't help myself, I've been thinking about kissing her since I first saw her today and probably every second since she came back to Dubai, but now I regret I even tried. The connection we have is something that I know I won't be able to find with anybody else and I'm drawn to her with inexplicable force. I was sent out of this world with the last kiss we shared and the idea of experiencing that same feeling today made me do what I did but she deserves better than an engaged man trying to kiss her whenever he feels like it.

"Layla, I--"

She shakes her head and jumps out of the car. I follow her with my feet sinking in the warm sand.

"Where are you going?" I ask her.

She spins around, the headscarf hangs on her hair as the wind keeps blowing it away. "It doesn't matter!" She replies with glossy eyes. "It doesn't matter where I go, I cannot escape from you!"

I take one step forward and try to take her hand but she pulls it away from me.

"I cried everyday for I don't know how long!" Tears begin rolling down her face. "After Maryam told me you were engaged I cried and cried on my bed, I couldn't function because naive 21 year-old me thought that night at the park and what you said actually meant something!"

My jaw slowly drops. "What? You said it was nothing, that it was not going anywhere!" I remind her.

She pulls the headscarf off her hair and holds it in her hand as more tears keep pouring. "It was everything, Hamdan! Everything! Couldn't you tell?"

My heart shrinks down in my chest. Of course I could tell. I always knew but assuming it wasn't such a big deal helped me protect myself from the guilt, the shame and my very own heartbreak.

"And every time I have cried since then," she carries on. "No matter the reason, a part of it still is about the way you broke my heart that day."

"Layla, I'm sorry..." I apologize. "It also meant everything to me."

She shuts her eyes in pain. "Please, don't. No matter what you say, you still didn't do anything about it."

I move forward and wrap my arms around her. She squirms, tries to push me away and hits my chest a couple of times with her fists, but I still hold her anyway until she surrenders and starts sobbing with the side of her face over my heart.

"I could never stop loving you, believe me, I tried." I confess. "It is something beyond me, the way I feel about you is greater than everything that I am."

Her arms climb up on my body until she wraps them around my neck to continue sobbing while I hold her up. My grip on her tightens and I close my eyes to keep myself from crying as well. I'm not sure I will ever be able to forgive myself for what I did to her. I'm out of words as they seem pointless, nothing I could say will be enough or make anything better.

After a while, Layla turns quiet and pushes herself down and away from me one more time, drying her face with the headscarf. My words won't change things but I think she deserves an explanation.

"That night at the park, it was like a dream, Layla." I say to her. "And when I came back here it was as if I was awakened into this awful reality where I couldn't be with you. And I couldn't face you, I couldn't look you in the eye and tell you I'm marrying someone else."

She sniffs and finally looks at me one more time. "I can't make up my mind on which pain is more profound; the one I felt when I got the news or the one I still get from the fact that you never said anything to me."