x
I'd been on edge since Fajr.
When the email came in last night, I thought it was a mistake. A glitch in the scheduling system. An error someone in HR would correct by morning.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPjN29vjDW0
But then the revised weekly schedule hit my inbox a few minutes later. Every meeting with Imran—gone.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8CLVed4eC5
Replaced with joint sessions, team strategy reviews, and onboarding syncs... all with Lamija Begović.
I stared at my calendar for a full five minutes, just waiting for it to shift back.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ3oAGXjcd2B
It didn't.
I prayed Fajr at the masjid near my apartment, the one with peeling blue paint and a heater that hummed too loudly.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡa8Z9AYeqaz
I needed the quiet. I needed the grounding.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡfInKBbNnAb
I tried to focus during sujood, whispered du'a between breaths.
Ya Allah... make me enough.
On the drive to the office, I didn't play Qur'an like usual.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgygNptPtDp
Just silence.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDi834ODbpD
Sarajevo was still half-asleep, the city bathed in that cold, pre-sunlight stillness.
Zehira texted me just before I pulled into the lot:
Zehira: Good luck, ljubavi. You'll be brilliant.
It almost made me smile.
Even her mother knew what a difficult woman she'd raised.
I should've gone upstairs.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmQ5P7FhNlD
Should've taken the elevator straight to the top floor and stepped into whatever version of hell this week would be.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡY9q6g3V12y
But instead, I turned left.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2SptShPj7o
Down to the garage level.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmM0B68cEP1
To the drivers' lounge.
The room was empty, but warm.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡdxUIgSty5O
It smelled like diesel and stale coffee and those cheap Bosnian cigarettes my father used to chain-smoke.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHbIuq0i5zr
I closed the door gently behind me and leaned against it.
This place had barely changed.
Same cracked leather couches.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPQTnIQ99Gs
Same humming vending machine.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQgNEmON02i
Same half-faded poster about snow chain protocols.
I walked over to the corner where the lockers used to be.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡW5Z7hkJ6Lj
My father's would've been three from the end.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTKaVbSwUXT
He used to let me sit in his truck while he checked in with dispatch.
That's where I first saw her.
Lamija was fourteen.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGv3Gf0OECT
Bright scarf knotted under her chin.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡyTbrXYBTPY
Boots too clean for the garage.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡLOjPrtuRsf
She walked in with a box of new company merch to hand out to the drivers—hats, hoodies, branded mugs.
I was gone the moment I saw her.
She handed a jacket to my father.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡp3w1ZRMWMB
Then looked at me.
"You're Ibrahim's boy?" she asked.
I nodded, ears burning.
The cap she put on my head was comically big.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7eJWmxtkgg
I could barely see past the brim.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡNVs03dCYcz
She grinned anyway.
"Looks good on you."
My father chuckled as she walked away.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7Mq1luqW3K
"Little boss got good taste," he said, ruffling my hair.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2Jhhdxdu7A
"Careful, Ayub. That one's trouble."
I still have that cap.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgUregeRNZp
Buried in a box in the back of my closet.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4KzMO29uX8
Never wore it again, but I couldn't bring myself to throw it away.
My father died a few months later.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡsPOKwn07N0
Rain-slick road. A sharp turn just past Visoko.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgWZMjAo67n
They found the truck wrapped around a concrete barrier.
I still remember the knock on the door.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡnTzXnf2SMs
The way my mother cried without sound.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡLn5IvNcnp7
The way she remarried four months later like my father was a chapter she could close and shelve.
Her new husband didn't want baggage.
I was the baggage.
She left me with my uncle, a man who only tolerated me because he shared a last name with my father. The house was cold even when the heaters were on. I ate alone. Slept with the door locked. Did laundry by hand because no one thought to show me the machine.
Zehira Begović started asking around.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡukScNpbU5H
In the masjids.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡrusjyVIWuo
At the community center.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡVfsiul1goW
Where is Ibrahim's son? Who has him?
She showed up at my uncle's door like a storm in a silk hijab.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡAqF1xJBYXZ
I still remember the way she pushed past him without waiting for permission.
"Get your things, Ayub. You're coming with me."
And just like that, I did.
I was sixteen when I moved into the Begović house.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡupav1OGoj3
I stayed for two years.
Imran took me in like a brother.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6em6oTak0X
But what their parents gave me—that was something else entirely.
They gave me status.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ1GvxQVLev0
Access.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡoLZMqHG1w2
An education I never dreamed of affording.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡoXZt31o9Uc
Tutors. Travel.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDzkqhWr0j4
A desk in the corner of the estate library stocked with everything I needed.
They treated me like a son—not just with warmth, but with investment.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8IRQSoNLaM
The kind you pour into a future you believe in.
Even now, they're the closest thing I have to parents.
And Lamija...
Lamija was fire and gravity and sharpness in human form.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡFGeEcNzU6n
I learned quickly to keep my distance.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡr8o9cN5LK2
To look, but not linger.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5cNccXhZeY
To admire quietly and never, ever want too much.
I sat down on the old couch near the window.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡieMREL39hG
Closed my eyes.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEcLRO2yJVR
Spoke softly into the space like I used to do when I was a boy sitting in the truck.
"Babo... they want me to work under her now."
I swallowed.
"She's not that little girl anymore. She runs an entire division.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡr05CESq5ud
And I'm terrified — not of the work, but of falling short of the man they believe I am.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡz1L5tuu7my
The one she expects."
The silence pressed against my chest.
"I miss you."
I sat there a little longer, until my throat stopped burning.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡrWwOlhdhnC
Then I pulled my shoulders back and headed for the elevator.
The executive floor was mostly dark when I arrived.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxYIBqnLoDw
No chatter. No phones ringing.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡI5boBX6fnj
Just the soft hum of the lights and the faint click of my own shoes.
Everyone knew Imran started early.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡVq3crEsbmw
Too early.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2HmQhQQluL
He was probably already in his office, sipping bitter coffee and reviewing shipping reports.
I wasn't ready to face him yet.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7HLgOQ2b6U
Not until I figured out how to say it without sounding like a coward.
My new desk was in the operations wing—closer to Lamija's glass-encased office.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡwDDUVmhf5W
Front row seats to the storm.
I dropped my bag onto the desk and pulled out my tablet.
The welcome packet was already open—color-coded folders, division performance graphs, open contracts.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡATSImxhJYB
She was nothing if not thorough.
There was a note at the bottom of one file:
Review before the 10am sync. Come prepared. –L.B.
Short. Sharp. Efficient.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡczBLqTZ69F
Pure Lamija.
I opened the file.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡpK5ov2Dx3g
My stomach knotted.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡm5eT5DBc6s
Not because I couldn't do it—but because I'd spent years trying to keep my distance.
And now I was being asked to stand beside her, hold my own, and pretend I wasn't still the boy who remembered the way she said,20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡzdoMnj8UQr
"Looks good on you."
I stared at the screen until the lines blurred.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡzqXj8LPFQ0
Then I stood. Slowly. Quietly.
And turned down the hall toward Imran's office.
I didn't knock.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPVIJ92FEzZ
Not yet.
I just stood outside the door—20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡzyqGbf4Mfw
trying to figure out how to ask the one question I already knew he wouldn't want to answer.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Notes from Ash&Olive:
So. We met Ayub.
He prays, he panics, he trauma-bonds with diesel fumes.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhs6o0KgpwV
Very on brand for someone who's about to work under a woman who could shatter him with a sentence and then move on with her day.
Is he emotionally prepared for this transition?20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJaFYNMd9md
No.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZSuRgQxvS3
Did he try to spiritually process it before opening an Excel sheet?20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTUvBGSmbwQ
Absolutely.
He's doing his best.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQDy67nzB4F
Unfortunately, his best is now being measured against Lamija Begović at 10am sharp.
Pray for him. Again.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5AiLElvOMQ
Or better yet—leave a comment telling me who you think is going to break first.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡb4nLk4g5H4
(It's fine. I already know. I just want to see where your loyalties lie.)
20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTHsnk7bvWN
