A Muslim's Romantic Journey

Chapter 7.

Yusuf POV

I was in the car, on my way to Sheikh Khalid Yasin's lecture with Hamza. He had asked me earlier in the week if it was okay for Safia and Hafsa to come with us and I told him it was fine. He called me later and told me Safia doesn't want a non Mahram to drive them so she was going to take a bus with Hafsa, Samiya and Sara. I'd seen Sara; it was Hamza and Safia's niece. When I visited Hamza's house, she had come up to me and began asking questions like, 'are you my uncle?' 'Why have I never seen you?' 'What's your cat's name?' She was adorable.

I still hadn't found out what happened the day I had called Hamza. I'd asked him a couple of times and he just replied 'everything's fine.' I decided to ask once more. I didn't even know if Safia was marrying this guy whose family had come to see her.

"What happened on Saturday then? You still haven't told me."

"Doesn't matter what happened. What matters is that I was right. I had a bad feeling about Abubakar and I turned out to be right." He looked a bit smug about that.

"So that guy's not marrying Safia?" I asked. I must have sounded hopeful because Hamza gave me a strange look. It was ridiculous to have sounded hopeful. I barely knew the girl! I had told myself this hundreds of times already.

"No, he's not coming anywhere near her." This invoked my curiosity but I didn't question him further. There was a silence again. It then occurred to me that Safia and I would be in the same place. I might see her. I'd tried to stop thinking about her over the week. I was convinced she would be getting married to that man, whose name I had just learnt was Abubakar. All I knew about Safia was she was practicing, polite, smart and a little crazy. Kind of the attributes I associated with my future wife even before I knew of her existence. 

"Do you even think my sister is pretty?" Hamza asked. I didn’t expect him to ask me that. I was actually hoping he wouldn't ask me this question. Now I had to tell him I hadn't even seen her.

"I don't know." I replied, feeling uncomfortable.

"What do you mean you don't know?"

"Well, when she walked into the room, I think I may have just seen a bit of her hijab. I then looked down without having even really seen her. So I don't really know how she looks." I kind of shuffled in my seat feeling stupid. I abruptly changed the subject. "Great! We're here. Where do we park up?" I asked as we approached the Dar Ul Loom. Now Safia should have been the last thing I wanted to talk about. I was about to see the great Sheikh Khalid Yasin. He had flown over all the way from the US.

"There's a parking space there." Hamza pointed to an empty space and I parked up. “So you never even saw Safia?” I nodded an awkward no. “She hasn’t seen you either. She said she was also looking down when she came in the room. You guys are like a match made in heaven.” I raised my eyebrow at Hamza.

“Why are you so keen on the idea of your sister marrying me?” It was rather unusual.

“Because she asked me to look for a husband for her so long ago. She said she wanted him to be an alim, respect his mother and have a brown beard as a bonus. You seem to be ticking all the boxes. She said a bunch of other stuff and I’m sure you have those qualities too. I’m a good judge of character. Besides, I’m so grateful that she’s a good girl. She could have easily turned out rude and weird like most of these other girls in society but she didn’t. And I get on really well with her. She says I’m more like a sister to her.” He said laughing. There was seriousness in his tone showing genuine gratitude. I admired their closeness. Their brother sister relationship was sort of the relationship I aimed to have with Maryam. At the moment we were like big kids, playing pranks and teasing each other. But Maryam was growing up. My mum and brother weren’t the most practicing people. It was up to me and my dad to guide Maryam. She was still young and could go either way. This is why I was so careful when giving her dawah. I wanted to maintain our bond. So far, things were going well.

We got out of the car and went inside, exchanging salaams with many brothers standing around.  Hamza knew most of the people there. I didn't really know anyone; I lived on the other side of the city. He introduced me to many brothers and we quickly became acquainted. We prayed Asr then settled down when the imam announced Sheikh Khalid Yasin was about to begin his lecture.

The lecture was truly inspirational. The topic was about marriage. (Youtube video -->). It certainly felt like this was a sign from Allah. Sheikh Khalid Yasin spoke about how a husband should be with his wife and the wife's role in the home. By the end, I had made a vow to myself that I would try to be the best husband I could. I already had great respect for women. I was taught during my Alim course about all the things a woman had to go through. It sounded quite horrific. Their times of the month, giving birth and losing control of their emotions. Yet they tried to be ‘equal’ to men. How could they be equal to men when their status was so high that Jannah lay under their feet after they became mothers? I felt as if this talk was that extra boost I needed in order to be ready for marriage. Every time a woman rejected me in the past, I felt frustrated. I thought Allah might have been punishing me. But it occurred to me, Allah knows best. Allah knew when I would be ready for marriage and things will happen when the time is right.

We got up stretching our stiff legs. I was still in a state of awe. Somehow life had led me to this moment. Life was funny like that. I really felt much closer to Allah. We made our way out with everyone discussing their views on the talk. I, on the other hand, was still speechless. Not at the talk, but at my realization. All these doubts kept coming into my head but everything that happened was happening for the best. My life was leading to something only Allah knew of. All I had to do was trust Him.

"There's Safia and Hafsa with Sara. Why isn't Samiya with them?" I think Hamza was kind of talking to himself as we stood outside. I looked towards the women entrance on my right. I recognized Sara right away. She was between two women who I assumed were Safia and Hafsa. Wait, one of them was Safia! I looked between the two. One of the girls was wearing a floral scarf and the other was wearing a navy blue scarf. I immediately knew which one I wanted to be Safia. Both were pretty but the girl in the navy blue scarf had something about her. It wasn’t just her beauty. It was some sort of unexplainable attraction. I quickly turned around. Never had I looked at a girl and felt that way.

"I'm going to get my car." I told Hamza knowing he was going to call them.

"Okay, I'm just going to go ask when they're coming home. And where Samiya is." I nodded and walked away. I sat down in my car and tried to work out which of those girls was Safia. I shook away the thought. This was bad. I'd just come out of getting some sort of religious awakening and I was thinking about girls. I looked up towards the sky. I'd leave it with Allah. I'd stop thinking about Safia and the girl in the navy blue scarf, whether that was her or not. That's what I told myself. Besides, personality mattered more than looks. Just then, Hamza jumped in.

"They're coming home just before maghrib. Safia said she wanted to take Sara to the park and have ice cream. Samiya was inside looking for her shoes." I thought about asking which one Safia was but stopped myself. I had just told myself not to think about it. "Wanna come around my house?"

"I can't. I've got to take my sister Maryam to buy paint for her room. We had cousins over a month ago and they drew all over her walls." I smiled remembering that I had told them to do that. It was revenge for when she put slime on my pillow. Maryam wanted to paint her walls a different colour anyway.

I dropped Hamza to his house and went home. I tried to distract myself but the image of the girl with the navy blue scarf was still in my head. Was that Hafsa or Safia?