That realization did not make her strong, but it made her a little more honest with herself. She had been demanding perfection from herself in a world Allah Himself had said would end. She cursed herself for being cracked in a universe that had been created to collapse in its own time.
One night, Humaira returned to the living room and sat down again. Not to meet Anjar or Zura, but because the long sofa now felt like a witness to a conversation that had never been finished. And when she sat there alone, she finally dared to do the thing she had avoided all this time. She truly looked up without expecting anything.
The night sky was being unkind. There were no stars, no moon—nothing that made anyone want to write poetry, or even scratch out random doodles.
Yet she remembered Anjar's words clearly: direction was not always found by looking around. And that was when she realized something that made her chest tremble softly: all this time, she had been searching for certainty in a world that kept changing, in fragile people, in achievements that could collapse at any moment, while Allah had told her to look upward, toward something He Himself held back.
Humaira exhaled, something loosening inside her as she remembered the verse in the Qur'an about that mighty oath, about the positions of the stars. For the first time, she did not read it as a threat or a judgment, but as a bitter yet honest reminder: her life was not chaotic because she had been forgotten, but because she had not yet finished being placed where she belonged.
And perhaps, she thought with a trembling breath, this position really was uncomfortable, truly silent, truly dark. But that did not mean it was wrong. Not every position was the center of the light, not every orbit was close, and not every role could be seen.
At last, Humaira cried that night—not because she was sad, but because she was tired of demanding that she arrive somewhere before it was time. All this time, she had blamed herself for a delay that might not have been a delay at all, but simply part of her trajectory.
She knew she was still afraid, still uncertain, still often tempted to give up. But now there was one thing that had changed. Whenever her mind began telling her that her life was meaningless, she remembered the sky that would one day collapse, and because of that, every second still being held in place today became meaningful—including her, with all her chaos and unreadiness.
I don't know whether her life will get better. I don't know whether she will make it. But for the first time, she was no longer certain that she was in the wrong place.
Maybe she was simply in a position that demanded she endure a little longer, look up a little more often, and stop measuring her life by a clock that did not belong to her.
And if one day the sky truly collapsed, if order was truly released, then at the very least she wanted to stand before God with one honest confession: she had once nearly given up, but I chose to look up and endure for as long as the sky was still being held back. Pak Harun's words, which she had overheard by accident, had changed her, teaching her to accept God's arrangement.
Humaira was about to return to her room when she heard a knock at the door. She turned warily. Who could be coming this late at night? Anjar was already in his room with Zuraida, and he had not mentioned that anyone would be visiting. Slowly, she rose and approached the door, peering cautiously through a gap in the curtain. Her eyes widened the instant she saw someone standing outside, carrying a large bag.
"Sahara..." she cried when she opened the door. It was the first sentence to leave her lips after remaining silent for so long.