Yasmeen Abdul Kareem | The Non Hijabi

y a s m e e n | a b d u l k a r e e m

"Yasmeen! Wake up!", a deep voice shouted at me, slightly waking me out of my sleep, "It's Fajr time.", the voice belonged to my twin brother - ‘Esa. A groan emitted from my lips in response as I pulled my blankets over my face, not wanting to wake up.

"Yas! Wallah, I'll pour water on your ass.", he threatened me. Let me tell you one thing, whenever ‘Esa threatened me he was always serious and it slightly scared me. "You wouldn't.", I growled at him, sitting up immediately, that wasn't such a great idea since I immediately became dizzy from moving so quickly. Rubbing the sleep out of my eyes, they slowly adjusted to the light which came from the hallway just outside my bedroom.

‘Esa was standing in front of my bed with a sly smirk on his face, oh how I wish I could just slap it off, "Oh, I would twin. And you know it.", he winked at me like the jerk he is. "I can't pray so go do Fajr.", I mumbled under my breath, lying back down. You would think this curly head boy would leave, right? Nope, he stood in the same exact spot and stared at me for a few minutes before finally speaking, "I don't believe you."

"I don't care if you don't believe me. Leave me alone and let me sleep.", I groaned, banging my head on my pillow in frustration, "and don't you even think about harassing me anymore this morning, pendejo.", I cursed in Spanish as he rolled his eyes and exited my room, closing my door behind him. Good boy.

Maybe I should give you a little back story on who I am? Yeah, I'll do that. My names Yasmeen Abdul-Kareem. I'm a teen muslim living in LA. My dad, Ali Abdul-Kareem is yemeni and has been muslim for his entire life, but just started practicing the religion of Islam fully when ‘Esa and I were first born. My mom, Eleena, on the other hand, accepted the religion when I was two years old. I guess you could say I was sort of born into the religion anyhow.

What can I say about myself? I'm obviously a female, in case you haven't guessed that yet by my name or the conversation both my brother and I had about me being unable to pray due to my monthly issue. I have no idea how to explain my looks, if you left it up to me I would say I looked like freaking Big Mama-not really, but you get what I’m saying right? I don't really know what else to say though so um, buckle up and enjoy this bumpy ride - that is my life. - "Yasmeen, mi amor, it's time for school wake up.", an angelic voice filled my ear drums as my blankets were pulled from my body making my body cold, immediately. You see, I'm anemic and I get cold very easily - even though I live in a city where the coldest it ever is, is 78 degrees, I'm exaggerating but whatever.

"Ma!", I whined, attempting to grab the covers back from my mother but she was too fast and had them off of my bed within seconds, "Nope, not today, get out of bed and get ready for school. Now.", she said in a rather stern voice before exiting my bedroom, taking my blankets with her.

A sigh emitted from my mouth as I crawled out of the comfort of my queen size bed, I lazily dragged myself to the bathroom where I stripped from my clothing to nothing. I turned out the shower tap and adjusted the temperature setting too hot, but not too hot and got into the shower, allowing my muscles to relax as the water hit my body. After taking a 20 minute shower and washing my hair, I exited the bathroom with my camp rock towel wrapped tightly around my body and went into my bedroom to find an outfit to wear for today.

After slipping on a pair of undies and a bra, I made my way over to my laptop and opened it up to see that I never logged out of my Facebook the previous night. Laughing lightly to myself at my silly mistake I posted a quick status that read: 'up for school. blasting big sean as i get ready. <33'. After posting it, I went to my iTunes and began to play 'Beware' by Big Sean, himself. My parents weren't the type of parents to yell at me over my music, like some Muslim parents that I know, as long as they never heard the curse words than they were cool with it. I approached my walk-in closet and searched for an outfit.