Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
...
As the city welcomed Summer with unwilling arms, the Fayyads and the Ahmads rejoiced at the prospect of a future union. Both families, as predicted, more than celebrated the idea.
Lily Ahmad, Layla Fayyad and Malika Bashir started discussing who was treating whom and where. When Dahlia questioned them with utter confusion, they replied, "we had multiple bets going on about how this thing will play out."
Dahlia was astounded.
"You too, Layla?" she gasped.
It wasn't only Layla, as it turned out; both Ibrahim and Poppy were in on it too. Dahlia realized her life was truly filled with traitors.
"What? I have a child to feed now," Ibrahim shrugged when Dahlia threw him a look full of disappointment. This was turning out to be his excuse for everything these days.
Their engagement wasn't officially announced due to Dahlia's request, which Kaveh upheld. After this point, the only interactions they were allowed were supervised ones. Ibrahim created a group chat with the duo to allow them a chance to talk, which so far only had the message from him,
You guys, I'll be watching closely.
It was a Friday morning when Dahlia found Layla Fayyad trudging into her bedroom.
The last year had brought life alternating transitions in most of the girls' lives. All of her friends were entering new phases, except for Layla. They couldn't see each other as often these days, and their interactions were mostly restricted to the weekends due to Dahlia's hectic schedule. "The only communication I have with you and Malika these days is when I tag you in memes," Layla often complained.
This lead Dahlia to be nervous about how the girl was going to perceive her relationship with her brother. However, Layla seemed to be more than comfortable about it.
"How are things going between you two?" Layla asked her, indicating to her relationship with Kaveh.
"I don't know," Dahlia said with an exasperated sigh, contemplating how much she should share. "He's so... reserved. Sometimes I don't know how to speak to him. All he does is sends me headlines of numerous newspapers every morning." She shot Layla a look.
At that, Layla burst out laughing. "Oh my God. No way!"
"He has this habit of sharing news headlines to every family group chat he is a part of," she explained. "I can't believe he is weird enough to send them to you too! This has to be the most Kaveh thing I've ever heard."
