Affianced By Force

CHAPTER FIVE - A Trip To The Past

Flash Back

"Let's run away Umamah. Your dad is gone. You can expiate for a desperate promise you made to him. Besides Faisal is too old for you."

Umamah looked at Abdulhameed with tear-filled-eyes. She was tempted to take Abdul's offer. But she thought of her siblings. This was the time to make a firm decision.

"I can't." She finally said. "I need to secure a future for my siblings. Besides, my Father wanted this..." Uncle Faisal also told me I did not have to follow through with the promise. But she did not tell Abdul that.

"Umamah, come on, this is not the 70s. You can choose whom you want to be with. Chose me. You know I will work hard. I know I am just in year 4 in the University now, and my father is just the owner of a dry cleaning agency. But I will work hard for us. That was the plan, remember?"

He made to take her hand, but she moved away from him. It felt wrong now. It was as though she she were cheating on Faisal just by being here with Abdul.

"And what do we do within the time you would be in school? Where would we stay? My siblings and I, I mean."

"That's a ridiculous question!" Abdul was sounding impatient now. "Faisal was your father's only friend. He would not leave you and your brothers to rot. He will still take care of you..."

The way he spat out Uncle Faisal's name... as though it were a plague he wanted to avoid. "So, you mean, I should live under a roof that he provides, eat from the food he provides, clothes with the money he provides and yet, refuse him? Do I not have shame at all?"

"Umamah, what is wrong with you? Do you have feelings for the man? Is it his money, power or looks? Are you willing to spend the rest of your life with a man who killed his wives and daughter? Umamah, do you think he would treat you any differently?"

Ignoring his demeaning remarks and the nagging question even she wanted answers to, Umamah said, "Those are just rumours." She sounded weak even to her own ears.

"Really?" Abdul asked unbelievably. "Next you are going to tell me that we do not know for sure that his daughter was not sick and died, or that his first wife did not kill his second wife and then kill herself." His words reeked of sarcasm.

"Yeah. We do not know for sure." Umamah said in a tiny voice.

Abdul moved away from her, pacing in frustration. Then he returned to her, gripped her by the arm. His fingers digging deeply into her soft arm. "Umamah, listen to me. You are not leaving me for that old man. Whatever he has now, he got with age and time. I will too. I do not know you as a materialistic, self-centered girl. You love me. You said you did. We made our vows to each other..." Her whimpers brought his attention back to his fingers.

The tears were rolling down her eyes so freely now. What was it with these men and gripping her? Did they not realize she had feelings too?

"I am sorry. I am sooo... Sorry Umamah. I did not mean to hurt you..."

Massaging the arm he had gripped lifeless, Umamah turned to him, with a determined resolve. "I am sorry Abdul. We are over." With that, she walked away from her ex. Not looking back for once.

End of Flash Back.

Even now, she did not want to look back. Yet, when she ran away from the house, the only place she remembered was their solitude garden. She sat by the rock. Three years and the place remained the same. Very few people passed by Rocky's Street and even fewer people were aware of the alcove lane that led to the secluded stream, their Creek. It was past Isha'a and it was dead quiet. Umamah had never been one to fear the dark, or what it brought. Her Mother had made certain of that.