Journal Entry 25 – A heart that hurts is a heart that works.

They say that time heals all wounds, but I beg to differ. The wounds don’t heal, I guess time just makes you stronger, strong enough to deal with the gaping hole in your chest. Nothing can or will heal the loss of Faris, nothing can ease the chronic, agonising pain that I felt in my entire body. A pain that just won’t go away. A pain that got worse each and every single day.

The 5 stages of grief.

Journal Entry 24 – Gaining Consciousness.

Saturday April 17th 2010, it’s been over a month since he’s been gone…

Journal Entry 23 – The sun in my day, the wind in my sky, the waves in my ocean and the beat in my heart.

Fast asleep embracing him in my arms, my left hand in his, I felt a slight tap on my shoulder.

“Faris?” I said and I instantly sprung up from the bed.

Journal Entry 22 – Lights will guide you home and ignite your bones, and I will try to fix you.

Everyone knew not to wake me, everyone knew my room was off limits. I lay awake, unaware of the world outside my 4 walls. If only he knew what I would’ve done for him, how I would walk to the end of the earth and back for another minute, or even another second of being with him. How much I wanted to hold him, hold his face in my hands and kiss his lips and have him kiss me back. I would give my soul for him to open his eyes, I wished that I would die and he could live. I could deal with a lot of things, but I couldn’t deal with Faris dying.

Journal Entry 21 – When you love someone but it goes to waste, could it be worse?

”Why are you giving me your car keys?” I asked.

“You’re driving, I’m beat” He replied.

“Okay, let’s go” I said and stood up, I stretched my hand in front of me to help him get up. He stood up on his two feet and fell back to the ground again after I had let go.

“FARIS!” I exclaimed. “What’s wrong 7abeebi?” I knelt at the ground beside him.

Journal Enty 20 – More than just friends.

(Note: the paragraph in red is Faris, not Dana)

“… My fiance” she finally spoke after a long pause.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you” he said, putting his hand out in front of him, for me to shake it. I felt my heart fall into my stomach as soon as I heard his voice. It hurt me to think that he had to act like he didn’t know me.

“Dana, the pleasure is all mine” I turned my back to face Latifa to talk to her. I completely ignored his existence, like he ignored the fact that he knew me, probably better than she did.

Journal Entry 19 – Countless lovers under cover of the street.

“Come on, get up… Put some warm clothes on, we’re going somewhere” he said and pulled me off the floor.

I wiped the tears from my eyes and the remainder of my make up, put some comfortable clothes on and left the hotel. With his arms around me, I never felt safer. I felt like I was immune from all pain and hurt in the world.

“How did you know I was here?” I asked between stray tear drops.

Journal Entry 18 – And when the sun rises he watches over me.

He stood up from his chair, put the phone down and handed me a bouquet of white lilies, I looked at them and smiled, I liked lilies, but they weren’t roses. I thanked him and smiled although he saw the dismay in my eyes, but I concealed it with a fake smile.

Journal Entry 17 – You had me at “Hello”

I spent the rest of the afternoon and night in bed, emailing Yousef. There was something about him, something addictive, I didn’t know what it was. No one has ever made me feel this way about them in such a short time span. He was like a drug, and boy was I addicted.

Journal Entry 16 – You’ve got mail.

I stood up from the cold hard hotel bed and wiped the sleep and tears from my eyes. As I put my dressing gown on, I made my way to the desk facing my large windows, opened up my laptop and began to type an e-mail.

Journal Entry 15 – Dubai’s skyline does not heal a broken heart.

4 days later, 4 mind screwing days later I flew down to Dubai. As I made my way through immigration, lugging my 40 pound carry on bag behind me I heard a voice, a familiar voice. It was him, I mean Yousef. I turned around and saw him, his dark jeans and navy blue blazer jacket, he was wearing a baby blue shirt that he’d tucked into his jeans. I smiled in his direction, he paused and smiled back, dropping his bag at his friends feet and slightly jogging towards me.

Journal Entry 14 – The eye sees things more clearly in dreams than the imagination awake.

approximately 5 weeks ago…

It was a warm Wednesday morning, the 9AM sun beat through my venetian lace curtains and into my eye, practically blinding me. I made my way out of bed and to the bathroom, I perched myself on the side of my bath tub and ran the water, filling it to the brim with blistering hot water.

Journal Entry 13 – Some place only we both know.

I take a deep breath and look down at the hospital bed that I had lived through the best journey of my life in. I packed my things up and let out a sigh as I heard the chatter and bustle of the world around me. In the hall way I heard the buzz of the hospital nurses running back and forth and the constant beeping of the machines through the cheap plywood walls; the loud honking coming from my window, the metal bars that held me prisoner in this room.

Journal Entry 12 – Within you… Without you…

I lay on the uncomfortable hospital bed that screeched and groaned with every move I made. I tossed and turned, I wanted to fall asleep, namely to dream of Rakan; but there was no seeing it. There was no Rakan and I had to acknowledge the fact that he didn’t exist. I had to come face to face with the unchangeable concrete reality, but I didn’t want to.

Journal Entry 11 – My heart is like a jigsaw puzzle, pick it up and fix it for me.

I never tried to commit suicide.
I never drove to the chalet that night.
My father never got terminal cancer.
I never came back from New York because I never went back, because I never failed.
I never ordered won ton soup or noodles, Rakan never met Chuck.
I never went for breakfast with him.
I never ate those omelette’s.
I never spent days on end talking to him.
I never looked into his beautiful black eyes.
I never ran my fingers through his hair.
I never met his mother in the bathroom of Sheraton hotel.
He never winked at me in the ball room.
He never begged me to stay in Kuwait.
He never saved my life.
He never came to visit me in New York…

I never told him I loved him.

He never existed.