Abbas stared into his Turkish coffee, a faint smile tugging at his lips. The evening crowd at Café Al-Noor buzzed with gentle chatter, cups clinked against saucers in a soothing rhythm that matched his wandering thoughts.
“You’ll get stuck with that dreamy face,” Tarek said, dumping sugar into his own cup. “I haven’t seen you this pleased since your promotion.”
The young man sat up straighter, forcing his features into what he hoped was a dignified expression. “I do not know what you mean.”
“Sure, you do.” His friend’s eyes glinted with mischief. “Everyone’s talking about how you finally met the famous Salwa El-Masri yesterday.”
The coffee cup froze halfway to Abbas’s lips. His heart skipped. “Everyone?” His aunt Samira’s face flashed through his mind – no doubt she was already sharing her matchmaking triumph with every relative who would listen.
“It’s Cairo, my friend,” Tarek chuckled. “News travels faster than the morning traffic.”
A shadow fell across their table, cutting off any reply. “Abbas? I thought that was you.” Hassan’s shadow engulfed their table as he gripped his briefcase, his features hardening when he caught Tarek’s glance. “Mind if I join?”
The seated man gestured to the empty chair, his stomach tightening at his aunt’s far-reaching enthusiasm. But years of ingrained courtesy took over.
The waiter approached, and the newcomer held up two fingers. “Turkish coffee, make it medium sweet.” His casual tone couldn’t mask the tension in his shoulders as he glanced between the two friends, suggesting this chance meeting was about to become something else entirely.
Steam curled from the fresh cups the waiter set before them. The three men exchanged the usual pleasantries – work, traffic, the latest football match. Hassan glanced between Abbas and Tarek.
“I couldn’t help but overhear you mention Salwa El-Masri…” His eyes fixed on Abbas. “Karim El-Masri’s eldest daughter?”
“You know her?”
“My brother proposed to her last year. A
distant cousin the year before.” He set his cup down with deliberate care. “Both successful businessmen, good families. Both rejected.”
“Perhaps it was not Allah’s will,” Abbas said.
The older man’s laugh held no warmth. “Will? She demanded villas in Zamalek, luxury cars, lifestyles that…” He caught Tarek’s warning glance and lowered his voice. “As your Muslim brother, I must tell you – her pride has broken many hearts.”
“Should we not guard our tongues against speaking of others?” Abbas’s fingers tightened around his cup.
“This isn’t backbiting, brother. This is sincere advice.” Hassan leaned forward. “They call her ‘The Princess of No.’ Nothing satisfies her.”
“Hassan…” Tarek shifted in his chair.
His eyes flicked to Abbas’s simple work clothes. “Has she shown interest in you? Because with respect, your means…”
The coffee turned bitter on Abbas’s tongue. “I appreciate your concern, but Allah knows what lies in people’s hearts.”
Evening prayers echoed through the café window as the persistent man pressed on. “Your job, your apartment – they’re respectable. But Salwa?” He shook his head. “She rejected a cardiac surgeon because his villa wasn’t in the right neighborhood.”
“That’s enough.” Tarek’s voice cut through the air.
But he wouldn’t stop. “Ask around. Every proposal ends the same way – either the man’s status doesn’t match her requirements, or-“
Abbas rose, placing money on the table. Each word had chipped away at his earlier joy, leaving only doubt. “I must leave for prayer.”
“No need.” Abbas kept his voice steady as he declined Tarek’s offer to walk with him. “I do not wish to keep you from your coffee.”
He felt their stares follow him to the door. Only after Café Al-Noor disappeared around the corner did his shoulders slump. His hands shook as he loosened his tie, gulping the evening air. The scent of koshari from nearby food carts turned his stomach.
Yellow streetlights dotted the dark streets. Families hurried past toward home or mosque, while heat still radiated from the building walls despite the cooling breeze.
Hassan’s words followed him through the shadows between lampposts. Perhaps they do not see what I see in her. His fingers ached from gripping his coffee cup too tightly.
A darkened shop window caught his reflection – rumpled tie, tense shoulders. An engineer’s salary. A modest Maadi apartment. He tugged at his collar, comparing himself to that cardiac surgeon with the villa. Doubt gnawed at his gut.
Salwa’s string of rejected suitors – doctors, business tycoons – haunted him. Aunt Samira plays her matchmaking games with surgical precision; she wouldn’t waste her reputation on a doomed match. Yet the uncertainty crushed his chest, suffocating like Baghdad’s merciless summer heat.
A child’s giggles bounced through the evening air while Abbas trudged forward, his thoughts tangled around Salwa.
At a quiet corner, a shopkeeper’s metal shutters crashed down. Abbas flinched.
Khāltū Samira knows what she is doing, he told himself. His aunt had guided many matches before. The thought steadied his racing heart.
The El-Masris’ reputation was impeccable. Beauty and a good heart – that is all that matters. But the words rang hollow even as he repeated them.
Jasmine drifted from a garden, sweet and heavy in the evening air. His fingers found his tie again, tugging at the knot as if it could anchor him.
The mosque’s familiar dome rose before him, its minarets dark against the stars. For three years, he had never missed evening prayer within those walls.
Tonight, he walked past.
I will pray at home. Missing the mosque weighed on his conscience.
His hand brushed his empty pocket where prayer beads should have rested. Another disruption in his careful routine.
The entrance light cast long shadows across his building’s steps. 9:15. His mother might still be awake.
He squared his shoulders, straightened his tie one final time.
“Assalamu alaikum,” the night guard called. Abbas returned the greeting with a practiced smile – the same one he would show his mother if she waited up. His footsteps echoed through the stairwell as he climbed, each step reinforcing his choice to believe what he needed to believe.
In the apartment above, Fatima’s prayer beads slipped through her fingers under the corner lamp’s glow. Nine-fifteen. Her son had never missed Isha prayer at the mosque, not in three years. Through the half-open window, she heard children’s voices fade as families settled in for the night.
Her fingers stilled on her prayer beads. Abbas entered, his gaze meeting hers briefly before dropping away. She caught the shadow in his eyes—the same one she’d seen in young men when their dreams began to crack.
“Assalamu alaikum, Mama,” he said, his voice too controlled.
“Wa alaikum assalam.”
She watched him remove his shoes with careful precision. “You are late, habibi. Did you pray Isha?”
“I am about to pray now.” He arranged his shoes by the door. “I do not mean to worry you.”
“You were with Tarek?” She kept her tone gentle, though her fingers tightened on the beads. A mother knew her child’s silences.
“Yes…” His hand found his tie again. “Just coffee with Tarek.”
The steadiness in his voice revealed more than his words.
He stepped toward the prayer rug but stopped, gripping the back of a chair. The stance reminded her of his father in troubled times—that same war between worry and pride.
She waited, prayer beads warm in her hands. The silence grew heavy with words unsaid.
Abbas’ fingers tensed on the chair, then relaxed. “I should make wudu,” he said, turning away.
She watched the rigid line of his shoulders, seeing not the man before her, but the boy who once hid his scraped knees to spare her worry.
“I heard such lovely things about Yasmin El-Masri today.”
He paused at the hallway entrance. “Salwa’s sister?”
“Yes. She’s a hafiz, mashaAllah.”
“That’s a blessing.” His polite but distant tone confirmed her concerns.
As water ran in the bathroom, she clutched her beads tighter then joined her hands. “Ya Allah, ease his affairs and grant him a righteous wife,” she whispered.
The night air cooled, but she maintained her vigil until her son finished praying.
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