Chapter 30: B

Na im was dumbstruck, he had never imagined that s what she thought of his absence. She thought that he hadn t come to the house because he was scared of her eyes and that she was a witch too in his eyes? He had never imagined that was the reason of her anger that day. That was why he found her crying in the kitchen and when Hafiz asked, she said he was the one that made her cry. And maybe, she thought asking him to take her home would make him safe from her? It would make everything hurt less for her?
He lifted her and had her sitting upright as she faced him and no matter how she wanted to look away from his eyes, Na im held her shoulder and firmly made her stare at him. They stared into each others eyes for a few minutes before she took her eyes off and looked away, "Stop staring into my eyes, you ll be scared." She repeated and he felt as though she had struck a rode into his heart.
"I'll never be scared of looking into your eyes, Mairam. Like I've told you, your eyes are beautiful and I meant it. Your eyes are the most magnificent eyes I've ever seen in my life, so glamorous that I'm certain Allah intended for you to be special in this world. Stop shying away from your eyes, okay? I still don't know what it s called like in the medical world but to me, all I see is beauty, magnificence and exuberance. I love the way your eyes look, Mairam, and in some ways, those two universes you have in there, calm me down."
Since when he started speaking, all Maryam did was stared into his eyes and somehow, his words didn t need much time before her brain assimilated everything and she ended up being so soft upon what she had heard. She didn t know how a smile found its way to her lips, but by the time he had stopped talking, she was grinning and he was too. She didn t want to talk about her eyes any longer, because she wanted to have the words he had referred to her eyes with forever in her mind.
So, when she decided to speak, she tried to change the subject to what she had noticed but didn t find the courage to speak to him about. "That s not how they call my name," she whined as she pouted her lips and Na im unbelievably found her face, the voice, the way her eyes moved and the pout that adorned her lips incredibly adorable. She looked so adorable.
"How do they call it? I'm sure I pronounced it well." He was smiling widely when he said that, he loved the way she was opening up to him. The way she was trusting him with her words and emotions and as the days went by, she seemed to find it even easier to relate him to her feelings.
She shook her head, and even though he still had his hands around her shoulder, she didn t even seem to notice. "It s called Mar-yam. Not Mai-ram, as you pronounce it." She chuckled at the look in his face, as if now that she had told him the correct way to pronounce her name, he looked embarrassed and it looked cute to see him flushed in her eyes.
"I think I pronounce it correctly and even if I didn't, I'm far better than you are. At least I know your name and call you with it." She chuckled again while she shook her head stubbornly, with her hair dispersed all over her shoulder as she grinned beautifully at him.
"It hasn t been a week since you first called my name, it was always 'Hey! Or 'Are you there? Or 'You! And the one you love using which terrifies me the most is whenever you refer to me as, 'Look here! Because I know you d always yell at me when you say that." She was laughing so hard when she had stopped talking and Na im couldn t believe that she tried to mimic the way his voice sounded whenever he called her. That was funnier than seeing the way she was laughing, so he just had to laugh along with her.
It took them minutes before they were able to sober up and she looked him dead in the eye before she argued, "But I don t call you like that, and I know your name."
"Then what s my name, if you really know?" He asked, he wanted her to say it out loud. He knew she knew his name, she had even called his full name that day but he wasn t going to show her that. He wanted to hear her call him again, because his name sounded so well and melodious on her lips.
She shook her head as she gently took his hands off her shoulders, "I can t make the mistake of calling your name again, I don t know who you are here but you re certainly someone important. Those guards will kill me if I do, they refer to you as your highness, Bilkisu does that too. She bows her head at you and when I asked her who you are she said you d have her head cut off if she tells me and it s also prohibited to say your name. So..." She shrugged up her shoulders and when she turned to him, her grin was back, "But that your soldier friend calls you Captain, at least I can say that, right?"
He shook his head, he didn t know why but he didn t want her to find out about his royalty, he wanted to just be him to her. Just a soldier she randomly married on a war field. "But you re my wife, you can call my name; I won t have you punished or killed." He saw the hesitation in her eyes before he added, "Trust me, I won t."
"No, I love my life." He laughed at that. He had never known she could be stubborn in this way.
"Maybe I should punish you for not doing what 'His Highness asked you to, should I?" She immediately shook her head and he watched as she debated whether to call his name or not.
"Your name is Na im." She voiced out, and he couldn t help the grin that surfaced on his lips upon hearing his name and to his surprise, Maryam shyly covered her face while she giggled like the little girl she was. He chuckled before he pulled her to his body and she hid her face on his chest, not panicking, not gasping for the touch or the embrace, yet she felt safe and comfortable with the duo.
...
He didn t know how he had spent the whole day with her, and he had never felt like he had had a fruitful day in a very long time. He was sure Bilkisu must ve heard their laughter at some point, and even he himself was surprised at how comfortably Maryam laughed with him. Because for him, he had never thought that she could laugh and be this free, he saw her as someone that kept to herself, always. But maybe like Nafisa had said, he might bring her out of her shell if he tried so hard.
It took them the rest of the hours of the day and he had only went out to pray and come back before they were done with her hair and she had a way of getting it into a bun without a ribbon, which had amazed him. Because she used the hair in tying the hair, it was funny to him though. He washed his hands when he was done with the hair while he joked about how dirty her hair was and if he didn t wash his hands, he might go out and someone would smell her dirty hair, she was annoyed, of course, but it felt so good to see that pout on her lips.
Na im was sure they had never been this way before, the bond they were able to create today had never surfaced in them before and all in all, it was a good feeling to have a friend in someone a decade younger than he was. He knew she wasn t his friend yet, because with himself and her mental health, they might meet tomorrow and she wouldn t be all this friendly to him. But just for today, he was going to have a good laugh with her, and he did.
Bilkisu brought dinner to them and even though Na im knew deep down there was a limit to how much time he was allowed to spend with her, he didn t leave. They ate their dinner together, even though at first she was a bit shy to eat while she sat that close him, she eased up later and even joked about that huge table with big chairs they sat and ate on. He told her it was called a dining room and that 'Yan gayu as he referred to name of aristocrats and average family people in Hausa-all had that in their homes and they ate on it. How it was considered so local to eat on the floor.
She had looked at him squarely and slowly pointed at him, 'But you re sitting on the floor together with me, when you're His Highness and a Captain, isn t it too local for you? She had asked and he chuckled before he nodded.
'Yes, it is. My father might even scold me when he finds out, that s why I won t eat with you again. She had scowled but said nothing after that and he knew she might bring that up, but someday. He was beginning to understand her after all.
A few things he had realized about her after he had spent the whole day with her today, Na im thought as he got on bed with a lazy smile on his lips. It was good to have something good and not in anyway related to the horror he was used to thinking about before he fell asleep. For today, as his night tour, he was going to think about a girl; if he was going to do justice to her physical appearance, he could even refer to her as fairy, for she was one. So, today, he was going to think about a certain fairy in the name of Maryam Bukar Ibrahim before he slept.
He realized she loved Intisar, and when he asked who she was, he was aware of how her mood had changed when she told him it was her sister and there was this thing about her, how she acted rather surprised that he didn't know how Intisar was to her as if whoever saw her had to know who she was. And then he remembered her father calling two names that day, so other was the Intisar she said she had lost.