jijisDrafts
For years, Safa watched Sadiq from a distance. They were cousins, though not particularly close ones. They had never spoken in person. To him, she was the quiet, shy, reserved girl he saw at family gatherings. To her, he was the boy she could never quite stop noticing, no matter how hard she tried. She'd always had an on-and-off crush on him when she was younger, one that resurfaced whenever she saw him at family functions.
So, by the time she was eighteen, curiosity finally pushed her to approach him anonymously. She texted him in a harmless attempt to get to know him better, and it went well until he figured out it was her. Much to her surprise, he didn't mind.
They would go on and off, staying in touch, not as relatives or friends, but rather as acquaintances. Yet Safa wanted more. She couldn't pinpoint exactly what it was about Sadiq that drew her in, or why she refused to let go of it even after all those years. She knew it wasn't love. What she wanted was to be wanted by him, to know that the person she had spent years quietly obsessing over could desire her just as intensely.
And when Safa was twenty and Sadiq twenty-two, something changed. Something mutual grew between them, and the line between curiosity and temptation began to disappear for her. They developed a sexual attraction toward each other, only they were responsible enough to acknowledge that what they felt could not be acted upon outside of marriage. Neither of them was willing to pretend the attraction didn't exist, which left them with only one choice: to get married.
A marriage fueled by sexual intention, desire, fascination, and one-sided obsession, with little else holding it together.
Safa was smart. She knew this marriage wouldn't last. There would be countless negative consequences surrounding it, the most significant being that their extended families were worlds apart.
And beneath it all was the uncomfortable truth neither of them could escape...