He hadn't planned to come back. Not really.
The return had been imminent; written in his marrows long before his mind caught up.
It had started as a quiet ache, a thought he'd shove aside each time it rose. Then came the signs, too many to ignore: The dream of a veiled yet familiar woman. The echoes. The closed doors. All were pointing him home.
And now, here he was.
The bus hissed to a halt, brakes wheezing like an old man in sujood. Jamal stepped off slowly, rainwater kissing his ankles as his sandals met a shallow puddle. The scent of Nur Afiya struck him like a forgotten verse: wet dust, charcoal smoke, and the faint, bitter memory of mango bark rotting in the gutters.
"Welcome to Nur Afiya," the new stone sign read. Clean. Polished. Official. It replace the old rusted iron board that used to tilt on a single chain, swinging wildly in the harmattan.
He paused beneath it.
Nine years.
Nine years since He fled this town like a ghost, heart pounding under the weight of unspoken pain. And now he returned, more real than he wanted to be, to a place that seemed to have continued without him.
Fawas had begged him not to go then. Begged him to speak. To tell someone. To fight. But back then, He had no language for betrayal, at least not that kind.
Nur Afiya had changed. Paved walkways. Solar streetlamps. Madrasa domes now stood where thorn bushes used to stretch wild. But some things hadn't changed at all; like the neem trees slapping zinc rooftops or, the heavy, holy silence that comes after rainfall.
He moved through the town like a shadow: past elders murmuring by mosque gates, past boys hawking sim sim, past mothers sweeping puddles off their porches. No one noticed him. He liked it that way.
His feet followed the old familiar road toward the outskirts, toward Fawas' house.
Then he realized something.
This path also passed by Almeida's gate.
He hadn't meant to come that way. Not really. Hadn't realized his body was drifting there until the memory seized his chest. It was instinct, muscle memory, like grief circling home. But not again. Not today.
He turned fast, cutting toward the long route; past the vendors, through the bend that led to GRA Phase II. It would take longer. His legs would ache. But who cared?
So long as he didn't have to face the ghosts that once kissed his skin.
Sometimes Allah saves you from yourself without asking permission.
He wasn't even sure they still lived there.
He wasn't sure he wanted to know either.
Nine years hadn't dulled the memory, it had only layered it. Shame, anger, longing, guilt. All of it folded in so tightly he could no longer tell where one ended and the next began.
He remembered something Ustaz Hamid used to say when grief made him bitter:
"There's much to do with hate, Jamal. But there's so much more to do with love."
And Love? that was why he'd come back. Not for her. That story was long buried, sealed in silence. He was here for something more tangible. Something simpler, yet heavier.
He couldn't tell if that night had been a misalignment of destiny or probably a divine redirection, but one thing was certain; his life had never been the same since.
He walked on, sandals whispering over stone. Rain still hung in the air, but Nur Afiya didn't accuse him anymore. It just watched. Like an old friend waiting to see who he'd become.
After walking an extra hour because of the longer route he'd taken, he finally reached Fawas' street: deep inside the GRA. His feet ached, his clothes clung to him with the leftover dampness of rain, and his breath came in short, quiet pulls.
How sad it is tricycles don't come this far at night. Especially not after rainfall.
he moved through the dim street, sandals whispering on wet interlocks. The air hung heavy with scent of mango bark, rusted iron.
Fawas' space: The old mango tree still leaned towards the flickering streetlamp, casting its bent shadow. But the house? Repainted off-white with black trim. New, sleeker gate. No more stern looking guards. No dogs. No rumbling engines. Just stillness. Too much stillness. Unguarded. Unthinkable for a place that once swallowed visitors whole. Fawas' father protected everything.
Yet tonight, the gates stood ajar. Forgotten? Forgiven?
Compound lights still worked, some habits are just die hard. No pressure now. No fear. Jamal stepped in like he belonged, not by entitlement, but by friendship.
The front door loomed. Above, a fluorescent bulb buzzed, pulsing light onto the wet stones. A black-and-grey cat, one white paw, curled on the steps. Its eyes glowing momentarily in the flicker. It raised its head as Jamal approached.
"Still here?" Jamal murmured, crouching to rub its head. A low purr, then indifference resumed. He straightened, knuckles lifted to knock.
The door slid open before contact. Quiet. Deliberate.
A woman stepped out. Thick-hipped. Confident. A sea-blue hijab slipping, silk cascading over her shoulder. Her walk was measured, like crossing a memorized minefield. She didn't look at him. Didn't greet. Didn't flinch. Head high, faint perfume, steps precise through ruins of prayer.
Jamal watched her dissolve into the dusk. "Still no change with Fawas, huh." He murmured to the air. "Even the wind returns with more humility."
A familiar voice floated from inside, low as twilight: "Make sure you call me once you get home."
Jamal lingered a little at the door and let out a soft smile. Voice low. "Should I take the cat and trade it for some notes at Pa Jalāl's?"
A beat. Silence.
Then a voice from within, confused, then amused:
"What... Wait... Pa Jalāl?"
Recognition struck like a dropped prayer bead.
A stool scraped. Bare feet slapped across tile. The door swung open.
And there stood Fawas.
Shirt half-tucked, eyes squinting through the porch light like a man confronting a ghost he'd buried but never mourned. His jaw slackened.
"No. Way..." he muttered, breathe cease.
"Yes way," Jamal murmured shaking his head in a playful manner, voice parched, eyes glinting with old, knowing mischief.
Fawas blinked hard, rubbing both eyes as if the motion might shatter the vision.
"Wallahi... Jamal," he breathed, stepping forward slowly, as if the space between them had grown fragile. "It's really you. How long? Five years? Four?"
Jamal stood motionless. Rain-kissed. Soul-burdened. Unreadable.
"Nine," he said finally. "Ten, if you count the one that didn't just pass... but, pressed"
"TEN!?" Fawas exclaimed. "You must've been on a pilgrimage then. I lost count of the years at some point. You disappeared that night like a prayer too heavy to land."
Jamal's gaze held steady. "Some prayers don't land," he said softly. "They drift sideways. Crooked. And Allah sends wind, not wings. I just... followed the wind back."
Fawas laughed, a startled, boyish burst, like an ache long caged in his ribs finally breaking free.
"Still cryptic as ever, wallahi. Like some wandering Sufi trailing riddles and dust. Just like old times."
"Old times never die," Jamal said, closing the distance. "They sleep under the bed. Waiting for night to grow quiet enough to return." He opened his arms reaching for an embrace "How've you been brother?"
Their embrace was rough, wordless, the kind men share when silence holds more than memory ever could. Strength lived in it. Grief. A relief too deep for language.
Fawas pulled back, studying his friend as if time had distilled him into something purer, heavier.
"i've been great actually. Doing great. You look... weighted. Not in flesh. In soul," he murmured.
Jamal's lips curved faintly.
"The world isn't light, bro. It's weighted by the memories of our deeds. Each of us plays our own part, leaving different marks at different times."
Fawas tilted his head, a teasing grin blooming. "Hmmm.. I suppose you met prophet Idris on your pilgrimage."
"Tch. Why assume I met a prophet?" Jamal's tone softened. "I just learned to listen. Listening is the root of knowing."
"Right, right." Fawas winked. "But tell me, you started watering gardens yet?"
Jamal raised a brow. "By watering gardens you mean?"
"Don't play righteous." Fawas's grin widened. "Dunya's blessed little gift." He raised two fingers in mock solemnity.
Jamal huffed a dry laugh.
"Ah. You mean sex right?" He shook his head. "Some master cultivation. Others? Still learning to water the soil." A pause. "I'm still learning."
Fawas clicked his tongue. "Still intact?" He clapped Jamal's shoulder. "Brother, sand's slipping through the hourglass. We ain't seedlings anymore."
Jamal shrugged. "Mmm. True. But maybe you should tend your own field and stop chasing every breeze in skirt or jilbab." His eyes held Fawas'. "Besides... something deeper than desire brought me back. Not this sermon of yours."
Fawas chuckled, eyes glinting. "Mystic mode activated. Don't worry, I still get you."
"Do you?" Jamal's voice came out rough. "The world shouts Fawas. And it echoes. What we need is to relearn silence. Not just quiet, but spiritual silence. Holistic solitude. That's where real listening begins. And with real listening, comes truthful change."
A moment hung, dense, quiet, the air thick with years unspoken.
Then Fawas stepped aside, swinging the door wide.
"Come on in, aboki, Before the cat reconsiders your offer."
Jamal smiled. Crossed the threshold.
Into warmth. Into memory. Into whatever current that had drawn him home.
As the door began to close, Jamal asked softly, eyes down:
"Your father... he still lives here?"
Fawas's hand froze on the handle.
"Not really." His voice flattened. "If he did... would you be at my door? A lot has happened while you were away brother."
A beat.
"We'll talk after you rest. Just come in." He nudged Jamal forward. "It's been ages, good to have you home."
____.
Inside, the room embraced Jamal with soft warmth, incense clinging to corners like ancient prayers. Cold tiles had replaced the rug, but the same framed ayat still watched from the wall. Beside it, a faded portrait of Fawas' parents and their younger selves defied time. More lamps now. Fewer shadows. Less fear.
Jamal scanned the retouched familiarity. His bag thudded as he sank into the blue armchair.
He glanced at the door, then fixed Fawas with a sideways look.
"Here's more peaceful now. More welcoming."
"Yeah, right." Fawas' smile was a blade wrapped in silk. "None of this warmth would exist if my father still haunted these walls. He was salt in the wound."
"About him..." Jamal's voice was low as he sank into the blue couch, his bag landing on the floor with a heavy thud. "I want to know everything. I didn't expect your home to feel like this."
"I told you," Fawas said, already moving toward the kitchen, "there's more to that story than meets the eye. We'll talk; after you've rested."
A couple minutes later, Fawas returned from the kitchen, only for Jamal to throw a curveball.
"That woman earlier, the one I met at the door..." Jamal tilted his head toward the exit. "Wife? Or just a neighbor with... convenient timing?"
Fawas scratched his beard, eyes dancing as he dropped into the armchair across from him.
"Her name's Aisha. Came for evening class." A pause. "The rain detained her."
Jamal's gaze sharpened. "Class!?"
"Mm. Nothing serious." Fawas shrugged. "Yet."
"Nine years," Jamal sighed. "I hoped they'd season you. Instead, you're still running Qur'an classes for doe-eyed women 'caught in storms'."
Fawas laughed. "You make it sound haram! She just came to recite..."
"What'd she ree. cite?" Jamal deadpanned. "Surah al-Missionary? Ayah 6:9? I know you so well Fawas, notwithstanding the fact that we've been apart for a while now, I know what you're capable of."
Laughter erupted; rich, raw, exorcising old ghosts.
As it faded, Jamal's face hardened.
"Jokes aside Fawas. I really wished you'd changed before I return. It's not like I'm preaching against your sexual life or something, but brother, you have to Stop chaining your spirit to every woman you share space with."
Fawas' brow lifted. "What do you mean?"
"It's not just flesh," Jamal pressed, voice low as embers. "Souls exchange energy. Every sexual intercourse leaves residue. Lingers. Layers. Either Dark or white."
Fawas stroked his beard, silent.
"Too many ties?" Jamal continued, elbows on knees. "Muddy the heart. Drown the whisper of Allah, and finally lead one lost."
Silence thickened.
"You think this is foolish?" Jamal asked quietly, his eyes fixed on Fawas. "Just dusty words from a ghost who lost touch?"
Fawas ran a hand over his jaw, chuckling, but the sound didn't hold. "What do you want me to say, Jamal?"
He leaned back, then forward again, restless. "This kind of advice? It's the sort you give boys still figuring themselves out. Still green. Still... savable."
His voice faltered, just for a second.
"If you'd told me this seven or eight years ago... maybe it would've made a difference. Maybe it would've saved me from a whole lot of things I don't even have the words for anymore."
A pause.
"I don't know if that's the root of my problems," he added, quieter. "But thank you for the prep talk. I'll try to make some amendments. I just hope... it's not too late."
Jamal smiled, eyes deep with memory and mercy.
"And ask forgiveness of your Lord and repent to Him. Indeed, my Lord is Merciful and Loving. Remember what Allah said In suratul-hud."
His voice was calm, but carried weight.
"It's never too late if you're still breathing, akhi. We break. We mend. We return."
Fawas looked at him, something softening in his gaze. "I missed this sermon of yours. It's good to have you back home." he said finally.
Jamal leaned back slightly, letting the silence stretch; warm, like sunlight across old wounds.
"Good to be back bro. And I'm happy I also met you in good health."
Fawas stood up to check the water in the kitchen.
A muted football match buzzed somewhere in the background, but Jamal's spirit had tuned it out long ago. His mind was elsewhere, drawn again to her.
That woman.
That strange, impossible woman he had never met.
And yet, her presence had followed him. Not in the obsessive way of a fantasy, but in the relentless way of a truth trying to break through veils. A pull that didn't begin in the body, but somewhere much older, and that's the thread he'd followed back to Nur Afiya. Hoping to see his old shaykh. To seek answers to his recurring dreams of a veiled and unknown, yet soulfully familiar woman.
While drifting among his ocean of infinite thoughts,
he barely heard the soft hum of his phone vibrating on the side table.
he glanced over
'Ustaz Hamid.'
A flicker of warmth touched his chest on sighting the name, but it didn't settle.
They had just spoken not too long ago, barely before he alighted from the bus. Why's he calling again? Why now? at this hour.
His brows furrowed, and a knot formed in his gut.
Still, he answered.
"Peace be upon you, my son," came the familiar voice.
Warm as always, but something in the tone cracked under strain.
"And upon you be peace, Ustaz," Jamal replied softly, trying to sound settled, but his voice was tight, lips stiffened by worry.
"You're home now?"
"Yeah," Jamal exhaled, glancing around the dim-lit parlour. "Just got in a little while ago. How is everyone at your end?"
"All good, alhamdulillah."
A pause.
"So… where are you staying?"
"Fawas's place."
Another pause. Longer.
"Okay, kindly extend my regards to him. I called you for something trivial, Jamal," the Ustaz said slowly, his voice now weighed with something deeper. "I really need you to come back to Al-Mahrak tomorrow. It's very urgent."
Jamal blinked and sat upright. "Come back Tomorrow?" His tone edged toward disbelief. "Ustaz, I just got here. That's thirteen hours back, and I haven't even taken off my shoes."
"I know." The Ustaz's voice dropped lower, firmer. "But if it wasn't critical, I wouldn't ask."
Silence fell between them like a curtain.
Jamal stared ahead, heart pacing.
"What happened?"
A long, exhausted breath filtered through the line.
"She's back."
His eyes narrowed. "Who?"
"…Rofiya," the name came like a weight tossed into still waters.
Jamal straightened, heartbeat hitching.
"She arrived not long ago.." Ustaz continued gently. "but with another news. She has a child."
Jamal's throat dried. "A child?"
"Yes. She says he's yours."
Everything went silent inside Jamal's body.
His limbs didn't move. His breath caught. His mind tried to connect dots that didn't exist.
Not that he's not old enough to have a child, No. But with Rofiya? the dots doesn't connect. they've never crossed that line, not to talk of making a baby.
"Mine!? How!?" he echoed, like the words had no meaning. "We never… I mean, I.."
His voice trailed, his fingers trembling against his thigh.
"I know you're confused Jamal," Ustaz Hamid said, reading the storm in Jamal's silence. "Same as I. But this isn't about past assumptions. The boy is sick and They need his father. She even swore by Allah it's you."
Jamal stood up abruptly.
The room suddenly felt too small. Too suffocating.
He stared at the phone in his hand like it had just cursed him.
"I never slept with her. Not any that I remember."
His voice cracked. "So how… how did she come about the child?"
Ustaz Hamid's voice was calm, too calm for what Jamal was feeling.
"I understand, Jamal. I truly do. But she's promised to explain everything once you arrive. Right now, it doesn't matter whether you're the father or not. The boy's life is hanging in the balance. What matters is that you're a possible match. That's all that counts; for now."
Jamal's voice dropped to a whisper.
"Where is he?"
"Hospital," came the reply. "She showed up this evening, trembling. Said he's in critical condition. He needs a blood transfusion. And only the father's blood might save him."
Silence.
Jamal pressed his palm against his mouth, mind racing.
"Only the Father's blood might save him..." The last line hung like the final note from a piano.
'A child?
His child?
With her?
From a night that never existed?'
Ustaz Hamid continued gently, though his words still struck like stone.
"Whether the story makes sense or not, Jamal, we need you here. If not for her… then for him."
Jamal turned to the window.
Nur Afiya's night wind should've chilled him. But it didn't. Nothing could touch him now; not even the cold.
He'd only arrived in Nur Afiya about an hour ago. Still carrying dust from Al-Mahrak in the folds of his robe.
Still on a mission. Still unsettled.
But now this?
"Is this divine alignment," he muttered, eyes unfocused, "or danger cloaked in a mystic mask?"
He inhaled through his nose letting the air settle the storm.
"I'll do my best, sir," he said finally, voice low but steady. "I'll call you tomorrow."
The call ended. He let the phone slide to the other end of the couch.
Rofiya.
The name hit him like a sharp nail tapped into an old wound: slow, deliberate, cruel.
It had been six years.
Six long years since she vanished with that strange man. A banker, they said.
No goodbye.
No explanation.
Not even her father had heard from her since.
And now, suddenly; she reappears?
With a son?
A dying boy who she claims is his?
How far could a man's fate bend before it snapped?
Just yesterday, he'd thought Nur Afiya was the key to a new path. A higher call.
Dreams had drawn him here.
An estranged, veiled lover had danced through his sleep, pulling him toward something divine.
But now, just hours later, another estrangement pulled at him again.
First, a dream-lover drew him to Nur Afiya.
Now, a dying child was dragging him back to Al-Mahrak.
He hadn't even begun his work here. Hadn't met the Shaykh. Hadn't unraveled the dream.
And already, fate was pounding at the door again.
And this time,
Louder.
Hungrier.
Less patient.
One thing was certain; he had to hear from Rofiya herself.
Because not even in his deepest memories, nor his darkest nights, did he ever recall laying with her.
So how…?
How could this child exist?