Beautiful Nightmare
part 6
Congratulations! Lana’s
aunt had already taken her by the cheeks the minute she put down the pen and
tightly suffocated her instead of hugging her, while a whole long queue of women
was forming to do the same. Lana could not feel anything. No matter how tight
they held her or wished her a happy life together, or told her how beautiful
she looked, she couldn’t feel anything. All she could feel was a stabbing pain
in her heart, a shock of electricity, like she was the centre of the voltage;
she was in the wrong circuit. She feared to look to her ...to ...Sam who was
doing the same thing as her, shaking hands and welcoming hugs from fathers,
friends, uncles and other random strangers. All Lana wanted to do was run. Run
as far as she could. Maybe if she ran far enough this beautiful nightmare would
turn historic. But instead all she could
do was obey the crowd who was now leading Sam and herself to their first
wedding dance. C’mon! It’s time for you two to dance together! She could feel hands
holding her dress, arms, and veil as if to magically whisk her onto the dance
floor, or was it as if they knew she was not going to go voluntarily? Sam stood
up with a soft smile on his face, fixed his suit quickly and put his hand out towards
her waiting for her to take it. Lana looked at his face, then his hand and did
not look at his face again until the dance was over. He brought her to the
dance floor where suddenly a hush entered the room like a new important guest
had just arrived and the soft music started. All Lana could do was let Sam lead
for she wasn’t even listening to the music she didn’t even know what song it was.
Suddenly she was jolted into a space in time that shook her..... ‘’When we get
married I’m going to choose our wedding song’’....’Excuse me? And you expect me
not to know what wedding song we’re dancing to, until the day? Uuuuh, I don’t think
so MR! In your dreams, besides I don’t trust you at all! You’ll put a rap song
for all I know!’’ Lana continued to whirlpool into memory even though it was
doing nothing but damaging her – She remembered everything, the cafe, the coffee
in front of them the way Ahmed’s eyes glistened with care, love & laughter –
she remembered her smile, her happiness,
her strength when she was near him . He had pulled his chair nearer and held
her face staring into her eyes and said, ‘’Yes you do trust me, you know I
would never let anything bad happen in our wedding day and I just want it to be
a beautiful surprise’’. Lana’s feet stopped moving. Sam had been almost
carrying her up to this stage. She kept looking to the floor and praying the
song would stop any second now.’ ‘What’s the matter with you? You’re so stiff’’
Sam whispered. The words barely made any difference to her dying dance instead
of wedding dance. If the song didn’t finish soon she could just see herself
stop before the music did. Ahmed’s words were still pounding in her head. She
ached to know what song he would have chosen, how it felt like to dance with
him on a night like this, a night like their wedding night, how his eyes would
have been like and how far her smile would have stretched - now she would never
know, she would never know any of that. Her anger towards him for what he did
was beating her heart; her undying love for him that she couldn’t stop or
control was killing her, and the fact she just married the wrong man begged her
to scream.
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