“Who do you want to become?” I think the first time someone asked me that, I said I wanted to work as a mailman. Not because I particularly loved wrapped packages. I just liked the idea of headshotting people with their newspapers and magazines.

Back then that was an exciting question. Other children wanted to become astronauts, bakers, football players. One girl in my class wanted to become a princess even though we kept telling her that wasn’t a real job. Nobody really cared about the answers back then.

The older I became, the heavier the question became. By secondary school, people no longer asked it to hear your imagination, but to measure your future. I remember telling my mother once in the kitchen that becoming a veterinarian sounded nice.

“A doctor would be better,” she replied splitting a vegetable in half, “You’ll have more opportunities, In sha Allah.”

And honestly, she was probably right. The strange thing about growing up is nobody was trying to ruin your life. Teachers, parents, relatives… most of them genuinely wanted you secure, stable and respected. So slowly, without realizing it, my life began orienting itself around becoming employable. O how often do I remember my dad seriously sitting me down and asking me what my game plan is.
At sixteen we were already learning how to write CVs and prepare for interviews. I attended tech and chemistry related workshops, internship programs, and university orientation days to fill my resume with content my degree program was paying attention to. Every year someone reminded us how important it was to keep building ourselves before falling behind everyone else. Why should the university choose you? Once you enter that rhythm, it never really stops. There is always another skill, project, something to optimize.

My dreams of becoming a chemist were crushed as the pandemic hit, so I urgently chose to become a software engineer as I liked tweaking my Minecraft server where I headshot people here and there…

“Honestly, for my first intern that wasn’t too bad. He spoke the same way as I once did. Nervous, ambitious, trying to impress, slightly exhausted already.”, I smiled, “Poor guy, I hope he survives the next sprint presentation.”

I walked out of the tall office building into the bustling evening city. It’s 1 hour past my shift but what can you do? These meetings don’t seem to end, and our partners couldn’t figure it out. I looked at my phone, it vibrated endlessly in my pocket with new sprint notifications, bugs and someone asking whether I could review a merge request before tomorrow morning… Subhan’Allah.

I unlocked the car and got inside as I’m reading a friend had messaged earlier asking if I wanted to meet that weekend. I typed back: Can’t. My wife has an event for her abaya launch on Saturday.

Then another notification appeared before I could even lock my screen. Enough, I dropped the phone in the cup holder and drove home.

By the time I arrived the sky had already darkened into purplish blue. The apartment smelled faintly of cardamom and something fried. I heard dishes clinking softly in the kitchen as I took off my shoes.

“Assalamu alaykum,” my wife called out. “Wa alaykum salam.” She appeared briefly from the kitchen wearing one of her loose joggers, phone tucked between her shoulder and ear while adjusting something on the counter. Probably another issue with the abaya launch. I honestly stopped trying to keep up weeks ago.

No towel. I flick the water off my hands and lift myself onto the counter stool. “How was work?” she asked mechanically. “Tiring.” “Mhm.”

I adjusted my belt before pulling my phone out of the pocket onto the counter. The conversation died there, it’s not that we dislike each other, but with everything that’s going on we rather talk in checkpoints.

“Smells good, is that biryani?”. She scoops the rice out of the pot and places a plate with a colourful asymmetric mountain in front of me. Before I could even properly taste it, my phone lit up again. Another notification, then another. I checked instinctively.

“Did you finally help your intern prepare for that presentation?” she asked while pouring tea. “Yeah,” I muttered, scrolling absentmindedly through messages. “Poor guy looked terrified“. She laughed softly. I almost responded properly, but the merge request guy pulled my attention.

“I asked Umm Maryam to help me revise Qur’an tomorrow by the way,” she said after a while. Something in me reacted immediately. Not surprise, more like disappointment.

“Oh,” I replied quietly. “I thought we said we’d do that together.” “We did,” she answered gently. “But you’ve been coming home exhausted lately and I didn’t want to pressure you.” I glanced at her and nodded slowly. Part of me felt guilty. Another part of me felt relieved. And somehow both feelings disturbed me equally.

Later that night she sat beside me on the couch showing me fabric samples for the launch. Sometimes she recorded a voice message to update her friends too, while I worked on a prototype that might finally get me project lead. We were physically close enough that our shoulders touched occasionally, yet the entire evening felt strangely elsewhere. Like both of us had arrived home, but neither of us had fully arrived to each other.

Around midnight she disappeared briefly into the bedroom before returning with her mushaf and a messy notebook full of scribbled tajweed notes. I slightly looked up from my laptop.

“You’re still revising?” I asked absentmindedly, my typing rhythmically. “Mhm. Umm Maryam said she’ll test me tomorrow after Dhuhr.” “Ah okay”, I drive my fingers through my beard. Another unhandled exception popped up in my console, then another. “Ugh noo”.

For a while I played a whack-a-mole with the stack traces, reviewed part of the merge request, and when I finally glanced at the clock satisfied with myself. 2:43 AM.

My laptop screen is glowing beside me. The apartment had gone completely quiet. My wife had fallen asleep next to me some time earlier, one hand still resting near the open notebook. Fabric samples were scattered across the couch beside her. A voice message she never sent remained paused halfway through her phone screen.

For some reason I just sat there looking at her. The tea she made for me earlier had gone cold. I noticed she had dimmed her phone brightness almost completely while revising Qur’an beside me earlier.

She always did little things like that. Lowering sounds, adjusting lights, moving quietly around the apartment when I worked late or was asleep. I don’t know why that detail disturbed me so much. The apartment felt so unbearably still.

The notifications, sprint deadlines, endless meetings, I barely have time to live inside the future I’ve been building. All of it feels strangely weightless, almost hollow right now. Not meaningless, just incomplete. People always prepared me for this version of adulthood. But nobody ever really sat me down and warned me how easy it is to wake up one day and years have slipped into routines.

I looked back at her. When was the last time we revised together? I tilted my head.

She memorized which tea I preferred when I’m stressed and reminded me to pray when deadlines swallowed entire evenings. She would quietly unload the dishwasher because she knows my sleep is light. She probably did not care half as much about the next sprint presentation as she pretended to.

Well, at least I provided, worked, answered when spoken to, I attended abaya launches, paid bills, took her out for a nice dinner every once in a while. Things a good husband was supposed to do… … right?

The apartment remained silent except for the low hum of my laptop fans. Somewhere outside, a car rolled through the wet street below before disappearing again into the night. I glanced toward the kitchen. Her untouched teacup still sat beside mine near the sink. One of the fabric samples had slipped from the couch onto the floor earlier without either of us noticing.

2:57 AM. Subhan’Allah.

I rubbed my eyes and looked back at the notebook resting beside her hand. Half the page was filled with Madd rules and small reminders written in different colours. One red line near the bottom had been circled twice.Revise together after work.

My chest tightened painfully. How many times had we said later? After this sprint. After this launch. After things calm down a little, but things never really calmed down.

There was always more to grind, more tickets waiting at the edge of the week. Another meeting. Another problem demanding urgency while the quieter things in my life slowly learned how not to interrupt anymore. Funny. People always kept asking me what I want to become, don’t think anybody ever asked me what kind of husband I wanted to be.

I looked at her sleeping there curled up beside the scattered fabric samples, her phone screen turned off. When was the last time I actually sat still long enough to notice any of this properly?

The laptop screen slowly dimmed beside me. 10%. For the first time that entire night, I closed my eyes instead of reaching for another thing that needs to be done. I leaned my head back against the couch. Then everything dissolved.

Warmth touched my face. Not the artificial warmth of apartment heating or the cat lying on my face, but sunlight. Real sunlight. Something brushed lightly against my nose, it tickled. I frowned slightly before opening my eyes.

Blue.

An endless soft blue stretched above me, interrupted only by slow white clouds drifting across the sky. The garden trees swayed gently overhead while somewhere nearby water clicked rhythmically from the sprinklers. The aroma of freshly cut grass and wet stone lingered in the air.

For a few quiet seconds I simply stared upward, disoriented. Then her shadow crossed over me. My wife leaned slightly over the garden swing, deliberately blocking the sunlight from my eyes with her khimar as she smiled.

“It’s almost Dhuhr,” she said softly. I blinked at her for a moment without answering. The sunlight curled around the edges of her silhouette while the breeze moved loose strands of fabric near her sleeves. Somewhere near the terrace fence, one of the sprinklers hissed quietly across the grass, leaving tiny droplets clinging to the wooden boards below.

“You left your shoes by the door again,” she sighed gently, holding them up slightly. “The terrace is wet.” Only then did I notice the faint dampness beneath my bare feet.

“I rescued them before the sprinklers attacked,” she added proudly, smiling. I laughed quietly through my nose.

For some reason my chest hurt. Not painfully, just strangely full. The shoes, the way she thought ahead of me before I realized the terrace would be wet, her standing there blocking the sunlight from my eyes. Small things.

Things I probably would have once walked past half-distracted while thinking about deadlines, meetings and whatever notification waited on the other side of my phone screen.

But standing here now, alhamdulillah it feels like Allah is allowing me to notice them properly. I suddenly realized how much love quietly lives inside these small things. They aren’t grand gestures, just consideration.

“The cake is ready by the way,” she continued. “And if you keep escaping Qur’an revision for garden swings, I’m telling Umm Maryam.”

Subhan’Allah. I looked around slowly. The sky, the moving grass, the warmth resting across my arms, the faint scent of vanilla drifting from inside the house, her standing there waiting for me.

Everything felt so unbearably alive. As though I had spent years staring into glowing screens only to suddenly remember Allah created mornings like this too.

I stood up slowly while she handed me my shoes. “You nervous about the launch?” I asked as we walked toward the terrace door. “A little,” she admitted. “What if nobody likes the new designs?” “They will.” “You didn’t even see them properly yet.” “I saw enough.” She narrowed her eyes suspiciously before laughing softly under her breath.

Inside the house she disappeared briefly before returning with her khimar folded carefully over her arm while I rolled my sleeves for wudhu. The sunlight stretched quietly across the kitchen tiles.

And for the first time in a long time, nothing else felt urgent. No notifications, meetings or deadlines. Just water running softly over my hands.

She stood beside me adjusting her sleeves before prayer while the adhan echoed faintly from someone’s phone deeper inside the house.

We rolled out our prayer mats, “Ready?” “Mhm”, I heard the smile in her voice. I raised my hands. Allahu Akbar.

Strange, isn’t it?

Entire institutions prepare people for professional environments. We learn how to negotiate salaries, soft skills and navigate competitive systems. Some spend years pushing themselves through exhausting days because they understand what is at stake. Networking, improving, adapting and continuing to show up even when motivation disappears.

Yet when it comes to marriage, something that shapes a person’s entire life and akhirah, often it is assumed closeness will sustain itself naturally. As if companionship, softness, patience, consideration and being present do not also require intentional effort.

Sometimes spouses drift apart while technically remaining together because they are simply tired, distracted and constantly thinking about the next thing on their list long enough that the closeness slowly fades into the background.