A Muslim's Romantic Journey

Chapter 50.

Safia’s POV

Yusuf thought I couldn’t sense when he was thinking about something depressing. But I could. So that day when we came back from Amy’s house, I cheered him up in my own charming ways.

I was already planning out Amy and Hamza’s wedding in my head even though it was them getting married and not me. It wasn’t even confirmed when the planning in my head begun but it was confirmed now. I wasn’t there to see Hamza tell the whole family about his trip to Amy’s house which made me quite sad. I wanted to be there. But I did my part by passing messages through Amy and Hamza. I used Hamza’s trick and made a whatsapp group chat but it didn’t work too well because they both sent me messages separately beginning with ‘tell Amy’ or ‘tell Hamza.’

Thank Allah for that motivation I had earlier to do well in my degree. I had already finished my dissertation and I had completed the essays they had set so far. I only had to submit them now. The year was coming to an end and that meant I had the whole month off for Christmas. It was all spent with wedding preparations.

Amy’s dad agreed to marriage. Well, sort of. Amy told me he said, in these exact words,

“You have my blessings if you want to marry that man but I will not attend your wedding nor accept him as my son in law.” What sort of blessing was that? Amy also added that he only gave in because Mrs Faber was so keen on Hamza. He may not have agreed if Mrs Faber wasn’t so sick. Her speech was getting a little better but she would have to attend the wedding in a wheelchair.

Due to her health, she asked Amy to hurry with the wedding. Amy said Mrs Faber was scared of dying before she could see her daughter settle with Hamza. Amy got really annoyed with her mum for saying that. Mrs Faber had survived the stroke; she was going to get better. But Amy gave in anyway. She also said she had her wedding completely planned out which meant that all my planning had gone to waste. It was fun to daydream about it though.

I so badly wanted a flowing peach coloured dress! But I couldn’t afford it. Instead, I bought a peach coloured fabric which had a beautiful dark peach lace design on a nice lighter peach cloth. I was going to sew my dress.

It had been a while since I sewed clothes. It became a hobby when I was in school and I sewed many clothes for myself. But I grew out of that phase. I only hoped I was still able to sew clothes decently. I cut up the pieces of cloth using my favourite abaya as an outline. I was going to make an abaya styled dress.

After a few days, I put all the pieces of cloth into a carrier bag and went to my parents’ house to use the sewing machine. I was of course questioned about why I wouldn’t just buy a dress and I responded saying I couldn’t find one that was exactly how I liked. It was sort of true. I found one but it was sleeveless. There was another, but it was too tight around the waist.

Getting out the old sewing machine, I cleaned it up and sat down to sew. I tested it out first on some spare cloth, getting used to how it worked. When I felt like I could sew a straight line, I began working.

It took me hours but I finished it. The first time I tried it on, it was too long so I had to cut it from the bottom. It was also way too loose so I tightened it a bit too, not too much so it showed my figure. Then it was too tight and I had to loosen it again. Finally, it fit okay.

“What do you think?” I said wearing it and walking to the living room where everyone was seated. Everyone spoke over each other giving me flattering compliments.

“Ooh, that’s nice! Sew me one!” Hafsa said.

“Go sew yourself one.” I gave a little twirl and it flowed out. Not as much as I wanted to but enough to satisfy me.