Papa's cough resounded through her room. He must be awake now, she thought as she heard footsteps dimming away. She discreetly pulled over her blanket and turned on her cell phone. 11:42pm
Dimly she could hear Papa talking in Hausa on the phone. Outside it was still raining. She could hear the pouring of light showers but nothing intense. From the window, bright light from the car park in the opposite mall reflected. Soft breathing of her sister Abida reached her. Good thing she could sleep. Faride wished she could do the same. Her mind was whirling around the events of the day. She put her hand on her chest. It was still thumping hard. She was praying in the deepest of her mind. Somehow, she phantom that Papa would still find out. No matter how long it took, he always found out. And if that happened, she was in deep shit. She knew it. Accepting a lift from a complete stranger was a SIN in the Abbas household. They would all be in trouble. Ya Allah please don't let Papa find out.
Turning to face the window, she sighed. A lot of thoughts wandered into her mind. What could he be doing now? If he had a girlfriend or a wife then maybe they were … no, no Faride. Eww. Why on earth would you imagine them doing private stuff like that? Though she had heard that some spent hours at it. Horrible. She tightened her eyes close to stop the images dancing before her. SubhanAllah. Besides, at this time, he must be asleep. Yes, that's what normal people do. She tried to think of something else. Anything. But all she saw was his face. The most gorgeous guy she had ever come in contact with and talked to. And who kept looking at her. What did he think of when he saw her? For her, she saw beauty and calmness but with a mystery surrounding it. And lots of pain. His eyes, the line around his cheeks, they all screamed sadness. He must have seen a lot of things in his life. She wondered what Alessandro had seen. Alessandro. She rolled the name on her tongue. What type of name is that anyway? In a blink, she sat up and turned up her phone. Straight to google search, she typed Alessandro. A bunch of sport news popped up. Nah. Not what she was looking for. She typed again. Alessandro name. Her eyes flitted towards the door. This won't do. Slowly, she tiptoed around the room to the door, which she pushed to a close. At least, if someone came in, she would be aware.
Sites popped up. Ohbabynames, babynames.com, thebumb.com, nameberry.com, Wikipedia. Yup. Wiki would do. Her eyes popped as she drank in the new information. So Alessandro was an Italian name, the Italian version of Alexander. It meant saviour of mankind, defender of the people. From what she could see, it had historic origin. Wow. That meant her mystery man was an Italian. She wished she knew his surname so she could search for him on Facebook. Was he even on Facebook? Maybe not. Or maybe, yes. The real question was would she see him ever again? Her chest ached at the possibility of never seeing him. She lay back on her bed, clutching the blanket. A tear slid across her face. She didn't bother wiping it away. Why did she care about this man so much? What was it with him that intrigued her to this point? Whatever it was, time will tell.
Next morning, it was quiet as usual. The siblings sat around the dining table, having breakfast. They were in a hurry to finish and leave before Papa came out. For Faride, she felt anxious for no reason. Hence, her appetite was so down. The moment her siblings stood up, she followed suit. "Goodbye, Mama."
"Goodbye, my children." She prayed for them.
They walked across the room, to another mini sitting room and to the far bedroom. "We're leaving." Ibrahim called out to their father.
"Okay. Take care. Be careful." His deep voice answered back. He sounded asleep.
"Yes, Papa." They all replied.
The condominium was a large one, one of the biggest in the city. On their floor were six other apartments with a double lifter located at the centre left. They all trooped in, while Nana pressed Ground floor. She was slowly adjusting to things here. At nine years, she was pretty smart and attentive to her environment. Chubby and bubbly, she was named after Papa's mother, Saudatu. Hence, why they called her Nana. "Are we going to buy that biscuit again?" she asked, jumping about as they walked out of the lift. The ground floor was huge, containing offices and a medium sized shop at the far end. They climbed down the short steps leading to the gate, and showed their residence card before the security opened it for them. "No, Nana. Maybe when we return. We're sort of late already you know?" Hajara replied, checking her watch. Nana was obsessed with a biscuit they bought last week at 7eleven in the train station.
Faride didn't even care whether they were late or not. She just wanted out of that house. Anytime a red Mercedes passed them, her heart stopped. She imagined it was going to be him. They walked the usual six minutes to the train station and bought their tickets. Today, they planned to drop Abida first then Nana before going to their college.
As they walked on the curb next to the street, Faride's heart would drop at the sight of any Mercedes. What if it was him? She had to push the thoughts to the back of her mind for the entire journey to school. She had come to realise the truth. No one cared about her. Her mystery man was never coming back. Why would he? To him, she was just one of many girls that he had met and made small talk with. There was nothing special about her. He was in his own world and she was in hers. She willed herself to forget about him and not cause damage to her health.
Surprisingly, she found class very boring. Instead, she sulked at the back of the class with her friends and played candy crush. If class was not interesting anymore, she wondered what would. Life was already boring as it was. She found herself drowning in her own tears every night. Sickening thought filtered in her mind. Negative ideas. Sometimes she imagined what would happen if she was gone from this world. Would anyone miss her? Perhaps Mama. Yes definitely mama. But then her siblings too. Papa might try to blame her death on someone in the household while playing the guilty card. But then she would be gone and wouldn't even know what was happening. The notion of death in itself was scary. As a Muslim, she knew that committing suicide was a major sin and that was the only thing that stopped her.
Things would get better someday InshaAllah, she prayed. Perhaps this was what God had written for her. Her destiny must play out like this.