Twice Upon Qadr - A Shot At Love **EDITING**

Chapter 54

The hospital waiting room was strangely quiet for a maternity ward. Hana had been sitting in one of the plastic chairs for twenty minutes, and only one pregnant lady had come through. So far no one else was there yet, which on one hand was alarming considering Yusra was in labor, but on the other hand, it was good considering she needed time to think. She had had a long a tearful talk with Abdullah that morning, and he had been very supportive and encouraged her to talk to Houssam about what was going on.

Now if only she could muster the guts to. It was not something she had explained to anyone as of yet, and she knew that it was so unorthodox, so out of the ordinary, that she was afraid of how Houssam would judge her.

The hurt and agony that had drawn his beautiful features had been most painful for her to witness, and she could only imagine what could have been going through his head. She wished with all of her heart that they were together. Then she would go into his arms, and never, ever leave them. Why did things have to be so complicated!? If he hadn’t left her to begin with to go to New York they probably already would be married by now, and he wouldn’t be thinking she had abandoned him for someone else.

Ugh how was she going to convince him of what was really going on!? It still was hard for Hana to believe herself.

She glanced down at her watch, frowning as she realized it was closing in on almost half an hour. She didn’t have too much experience with babies, but she knew that once your water broke, you needed to get to the hospital as soon as possible.

A commotion coming from the hallway caused Hana to look up, and as Houssam came into the room, she watched in amusement as he rushed over to the nurse’s desk, his hair windblown, and his face in a panic.

“Can I help you?” the nurse asked as he skidded to a halt in front of her.

“Hi, yes um my sister is having a baby. Is she here!?”

“What’s her name?”

He began to scan the waiting area.

“Yusra Sha…hey! Hana!” he exclaimed as his eyes landed on her. “Thank you Miss.” he said to the nurse before he quickly turned away from the desk, and came over to Hana.

As he sat down next to her, she studied his face, admiring the way his cheeks were flushed as if he had been running.

“Hey Salaam. Are they here yet?”

She shook her head.

“No not yet. They called me half an hour ago so they should have been here already.”

Houssam frowned.

“That’s odd. Knowing Yusra, she probably paused to make sure the kitchen was clean.”

“You think so?” Hana asked in amusement, and he shrugged.

“Who knows? Pregnant ladies are weird sometimes.” He paused to look her over. “What are you doing here? I mean not that you aren’t welcome of course.”

She gave a smile, turning slightly in his direction.

 “I’m on Kareem duty. As I live closer to the hospital than to Amir and Yusra’s, they are just going to bring the baby here, and I’ll take him with me.”

“Hey how come they didn’t ask me to watch him!?” he demanded in an affronted tone, and Hana smiled.

“Do you remember what happened last time you tried to watch him?”

He glared at her.

“Be quiet.”

She laughed before turning back towards the door.