Brave Heart | ✔️

11

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I loved him.

With every fiber of my being.

Not being near him was like having the ground beneath me shake. It made me lose my balance, my grip on reality.

I had allowed him to touch me, to embrace me. I had allowed my skin to become familiar with his fingers, had allowed my cheeks to find home in his caresses. Being Muslim stopped us from going any farther than hugs or hand holds or cheek kisses, but even those small moments made my heart leap with joy. They promised me more if we would ever marry and have a future together.

Had he felt the same about me?

Had my hands on his hands made him feel some sort of comfort, some relief? Had my soothing tone ever lull him to sleep in my arms, had my smiles and laughs ever scatter his heart in disarray as his did with mine?

I guess I got my answer when he stepped away from me after ten months of false promises and vague ideas about our future together.

I'm not sure what we were, exactly. I wouldn't call us a "couple" because we did have a Muslim reputation to uphold, no matter how faulty it may have been. But all of our friends knew we had a thing for each other. Especially Imama, who always watched us very carefully. Our friends knew teasing us with each other's names made us blush and look away or giggle nervously.

At least it made me.

In my psychology class, I had learned about three attachment styles infants had towards their parents: secure, anxious-ambivalent, and insecure/avoidant. The more time that passed after our "breakup", the more I realized I fell into the second category. Anxious-ambivalent. Although this wasn't an infant-parent relationship, it bore the same characteristics. I was uneasy when he wasn't near me, but even when he came close, there was always that nagging sensation at the back of my head that he could disappear at any moment. That all of his promises could turn to dust and fly away forever. His absence made me restless, but his presence didn't do any better. It only dulled the anxious feeling in my heart.

Oh, God, I was so in love with him that it hurt. It hurt to think of waking up and not being able to see him. It hurt to think of seeing him in another woman's arms. It hurt to even breathe when he had held my hand because I thought of all the ways that hand could be let go. Of all the ways I could be hurt.

In my life I did not have a very strong sense of control. Everything was done for me. My mom decided what my hair length would be and my dad completed all my financial documents for me. I felt that I had never thought for myself, that I never had a voice of my own. I was puppeteered by everyone around me.

Perhaps that's why being around him felt so dangerous yet freeing at the same time. He was something I had control over, even though I never had the guarantee that he would stay. But choosing to love him and keep him a secret was something that gave me control, and I didn't want to give that up.

So when my mom found out about him, it angered me. She monitored everything about my life and made decisions for me. She put words in my mouth and when I spit them out they tasted all wrong, but she kept filling me up with more. It was poison.

I didn't want her to be able to control the way I felt about him.

So I told her I wanted to wait before marrying him (even though it wasn't necessarily true). Of course, this angered her, but I did not find it in me to care. It was something I had control over, and despite everything else she did, my mom had always said she would never force marriage on me. So I wielded that to my advantage. Because I needed time to talk to him. I needed him to figure out that he wanted me. That he needed me just as much as I needed him. That he was my breath of fresh air and that I was his.

Too bad it was all in my head.