56 ??Her answer??

ZAYN

There was only silence.

I would've asked on my knee with an overly expensive ring but Abdar Rahman was in my arms. And this was quite sudden.

"I . . ." She fiddled with the material of her scarf, looking at me from beneath her thick, dark eyelashes. "I—Are you sure?"

"Me?" Honestly, I was offended. "There's nobody I could ever want other than you, my sweet Leia. You've ruined me."

The tension was so thick in the room, it could've been cut with a sharp knife. Leia's breaths were laboured, coming in short rasps and I could see her getting agitated.

"It's okay," I said, though my chest tightened with worry. "You don't have to give an answer right now."

There were many reasons she could deny me but there was one I was most anxious about: I wasn't religious. Only a few months ago I had started performing my daily obligatory prayers and that was all. I was no way near her level.

"No," she said suddenly.

My heart broke. It was so shattered that I thought, this is it, this is the last time it ever beat. I would die after this. I would drown and I would—

"No, I can give an answer now,"

My head swiveled up. "What?"

"Look, Zayn," She gulped in a deep breath. "Even when we were children, I saw the real you beneath all the glares and the darkness you surround yourself with. So, I have never cared what other people said of you. Because they had never even known you. I see now, just as I saw then. There's so much more to you than you let on. Even more than you think." She closed her eyes to take in a breath. I wasn't breathing at all. "I guess what I'm trying to say is: yes. A hundred times, yes, yes, yes. It would be an honour to become your wife, Zayn."

"What?" I said, almost in a daze.

Leia grinned, though her eyes glinted with moisture. "You want me to repeat the whole speech?"

Her smile was infectious, immediately causing my own lips to curl up. I shook my head. Then nodded. So, she repeated. Yes, yes, yes. In every word, I found joy. They hit my heart like splinters of fire; like shards of ice. The latter just as meaningful as the former.

Those three words were at the tip of my tongue but I swallowed them in. Soon, I would tell her how much I loved her.

Very soon.