When Stars Collide

Light

"Would you like to have a sleepover at my place?"

Hibba stopped typing on her laptop and turned her swivel chair to face Chichi who was asking. She quickly calculated her schedule and looked through her free days.

"When?" Chichi picked up her phone and began to flick through it, "What about the day after eid?" Hibba shook her head, she had a commercial picnic to cater drinks for and she would be dead tired afterwards.

"What about two days after eid? It's Ummi's six month birthday then, isn't it?" Hibba nodded, it was true. Ummi was going to be six months in a few days after Ramadan. She leaned forward and rubbed her forehead, she had not even done anything pertaining to planning, much less confirming plans.

"As long as it will be at my apartment. I can't carry Ummi everywhere yet. She's still too little." Chichi agreed immediately and they both went back to work. The two men they shared their office with looked at each other over their computers, shaking their heads at each other.

Hibba continued the email she was typing to the company's graphics designer for her to change the way she had out some of the words she had used in an about to be poster when her phone rang.

She let it ring, silencing the phone. She had already checked in with Nana some few hours before and nothing was wrong with Ummi. The phone stopped ringing and Hibba put all her attention into the revised version of the poster and edited several things before passing it on to the CEO's secretary for vetting and approval.

Afterwards, she took out the file of another candidate who was PR-ing with them and began to peruse his details. At the end of the first page, she felt so sleepy and bored so she got up picked up her mug and began to leave their office.

"Please can you make me a  cappuccino?" Mohammed Tarfaki asked Hibba, she turned to him, surprised because he didn't usually seek her out or anything, he didn't even reply salams, he only always grunted. Regardless, Hibba nodded and took his brown thick mug and walked out of the office.

As she walked, she heard whispers and turned to where the whispers were coming from. She saw the head of public records and the head of human resources arguing, if the scowl on the face of the head of HR's face was anything to go by.

Hibba took the long way around, not willing to be noticed and when she reached the kitchen without being noticed, she heaved a sigh and held her chest.

She out down the mugs and went to the mirror, checking out her peach jersey hijab she had tied smartly over the calf length, all black shirt dress she was wearing. The dress had cost her next to nothing, it came from a second hand shop owned by a friend of Chichi's.

The dress was in a really good condition and designer too, although not better than the Abaya she had saved up to buy but used the money for Ummi's malaria treatment at a private hospital near Life camp. Mardiyah's mother had said she was finally seeing the reason motherhood was not an easy job to undertake, now she really understood. She had to sacrifice a lot of things and she didn't even flinch, she just wanted the best for her baby girl.

Immediately she got back into her office, her phone rang again, making her hiss. She put down her coffee, handed Mohammed his and picked her phone.

"Assalamualaikum." She greeted the unknown number, thinking it was a prospective customer. She picked out a writing pad and pen to record their order.

"Walaikum Salam waramatullah wabarakatuh." Hibba pursed her lips at voice. Trouble had come knocking at her door, saying he had his own seat even if she didn't want to offer him one.

"My name is Salman Baanziye and I got your number from one of the cups of refreshing cups of Zobo you made this many days." He said all in one breath making Hibba exhale a deep forth breath. She didn't want anything to do with men, more so overly handsome men like Salman. So she said a small, "oh."

"I also want to thank you for driving me home that day, my life could have been endangered by my own hands but you took me on inspite of how much of a security breach it looked like. Thank you for that.

I ask you to forgive me for however I insulted you the other day at my step mother's office. I'm quite the  blockhead." Hibba finally chuckled at his apology, having a sudden image of him holding up his ears. It was a feel good image so she said she had forgiven him.

"Thank you very much. How's your daughter?" Hibba rolled her eyes playfully but answered that Ummi was fine. She looked round the office and found that although the others looked like they were hard at work, they had their ears in her conversation.

"Can you call some other time? I'm at work." He quickly acquised and ended the call. Hibba shook her head and pressed her computer's mouse to turn on her computer, trying to turn deaf to Chichi's hissing call. She also knew that her face would be a dead giveaway if she turned to Chichi so she resolutely faced the wide computer screen as though she had anything of interest in it.

                                    ******

"What did she say?"

Ayman asked Salman as he took off his airpods and put down his phone. He sighed softly at his friend's eager face, she had not committed to being nice or speaking nicer to him nor had she agreed to let him call another time. It seemed like she only accepted the apology and nothing else.

But, he wanted to know several things, he wanted to know how Ummi was, he heard she had spent three days in the hospital, he wanted her to tell it all to him, but she had kept mum and only accepted his apology.

"She just said I could call her back another time."Salman said and Ayman deflated, his excitement visibly going out of him like air leaves a balloon.

"That's bad. It seems she doesn't think you saw her." Salman nodded slowly, not knowing what to say. He wanted to get to know her, but every time he spoke to her, he seemed to gravitate towards saying nonsense that annoyed her. The last time, he had tactlessly asked about her marital status, this time, he was asking about her daughter without knowing the little child's relationship with her.

"Are you attracted to her?, scratch that, you're attracted to her." Ayman said to him very seriously. Salman frowned and shook his head, "Don't make it into some Haram relationship. I-" stopped talking, not knowing what to brand what he felt for Hibba.

Ayman asked his question again and waited for a reply, he stared straight at Salman and saw his every move. How he twirled his index finger around one of his forehead locks in deep thought.

"I suppose you could say I'm attracted to her light, to to the strength she exudes. I don't even know what I'm saying. I just know I'm attracted to her very person, at least she's all I've thought about since I got her number from Benazir two weeks ago." When Salman finished, he didn't see how Ayman shook his head at him.

"You're in too deep Abokina, in too deep." 

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Surprise surprise guys, I'm here again. Twice in one day😂😂

I'm just very happy with the comments in the last chapter and they spurred me on into writing this new one.

What do you guys think of their conversation? And Ayman? Why is he doing oversabi?

See y'all soon.
TheOmoope 💙💛🙃