Tous les chapitres de : Chapitre 41 - Chapitre 50

The small living room was more alive than usual, to the point that the space seemed too narrow to contain all the joy spilling between its walls. None of them had been able to hide their excitement since Asia and Mazen returned from the clinic and told them that they finally knew the sex of the baby. Mrs. Fatma was the first to turn the news into a full-blown celebration. She had arrived a little while ago carrying bags filled with cakes and sweets, as though her grandson had already been born instead of still being months away. She moved between the seats with a wide smile, her eyes shining with pure, untainted happiness. Asia's mother was quieter, but no less happy. She stood in the kitchen arranging the plates and carefully setting out the sweets, turning toward her daughter every few minutes with a long, tender look, as though she still couldn't believe that her little girl would become a mother in just a few months. Salma, on the other hand, moved around the room like a tiny

She found him waiting for her downstairs, exactly thirty minutes later, just as he had promised. She descended the stairs in slow, measured steps, her blue dress swaying softly around her slender figure. Fitted at the top, it revealed the gentle curve of her pregnancy beneath the delicate fabric. Every now and then, her hand instinctively settled over her belly, as though reassuring herself of the little one growing inside her. The soft click of her sky-blue heels echoed lightly against the polished floor, making him turn toward her at once. The moment his eyes fell on her, he quickly stepped out of the car. A broad smile lit up his features, while a few strands of his lightly graying hair fell across his forehead, giving him a distinctive kind of charm. For the first time, she realized Salma hadn't been exaggerating when she'd talked about how handsome he was. The years were evident in his hair, but they had taken nothing away from him. If anything, they had given him an appealin

"Where is Asia?" Salma rushed into the apartment the moment Asia’s mother opened the door for her. Her breathing was ragged with worry as her eyes swept frantically across the place, searching for her. Asia’s mother looked up at her, and a tightness immediately gripped Salma’s chest. The woman looked as though she had been crying for hours. Her eyelids were swollen, her eyes red, and her face was painfully pale, worrying Salma even more. She spoke in a trembling voice: "In her room..." Then she swallowed a painful lump in her throat and added: "She hasn’t stopped crying since this morning... Please, go in to her. I don’t know what to do with her." Salma didn’t wait another second. She hurried toward the room, and as soon as she drew closer, she heard continuous movement coming from inside. She pushed the door open. And froze for a moment. Asia was pacing back and forth across the room, leaving Salma utterly bewildered. From one end of the room to the other. Then back agai

The glass emergency doors burst open as the medical stretcher was rushed through the white hospital corridors at full speed. “Make way!” One of the paramedics shouted as Asia lay motionless on the stretcher, her face frighteningly pale and her eyes tightly shut. Mazen ran beside her without being aware of anything around him. He could hear neither the sound of the machines nor the doctors moving around them, not even his own ragged breathing. All he could see was Asia’s hand dangling over the side of the stretcher. Cold. Far colder than it should have been. “Her blood pressure is dropping.” “Prepare the examination room immediately.” “We need the gynecologist now.” Orders followed one another so quickly that they seemed to overwhelm everyone around them. They reached the door of the examination room, where one of the nurses stepped in front of Mazen. “I’m sorry, sir. You can’t go inside.” He froze. He watched as Asia was rushed inside, the doors closing f

The perfume bottle crashed onto the marble floor, its glass shards scattering in every direction. Then came the powder case. Then a picture frame. Then everything else within reach of her hand. She hurled the objects violently as she screamed, her chest rising and falling rapidly with rage. For the first time in years, she felt this humiliated. Mazen. Mazen himself. He had stood before her and defended her. Defended Asia. That girl she had always considered beneath her. Less beautiful. Less important. Less worthy. How dare he? How dare he look at her that way? And how could he have said those words? “She is his mother.” The sentence echoed through her mind again. She grabbed a glass container from the table and hurled it against the wall. The glass shattered on impact, scattering across the carpet. “Liar…” She whispered the word through clenched teeth. “Liar…” But she wasn’t sure whether she was describing Mazen or herself. She stood before the mirror, starin