Chapter Twenty-Eight

——Maryam's POV——

Noor tapped her long, neon green fingernails on the wooden table. She stared at me with an apparently bored expression but her eyes held a lot of questions and a hint of irritation. "Well?" she asked coldly. I looked at my phone placed on the table and revised my words in my head.

I was waiting for that moment but weirdly, had my tongue tied when it actually came.

"I wanted to meet you, Noor." I started after taking Allah's name and quickly reciting the dua:

رَبِّ اشْرَحْ لِي صَدْرِي وَيَسِّرْ لِي أَمْرِي وَاحْلُلْ عُقْدَةً مِّن لِّسَانِي يَفْقَهُوا قَوْلِي

“O, my Sustainer! Open up my heart and make my task easy for me, and loosen the knot from my tongue so that they might fully understand my speech.”

I felt much better after that as if a wave of newfound courage had overcome me. That Du'a always helped me when I was nervous and couldn't find the right words to express myself correctly.

"I wanted to