For Mia

Melaka, 2014. A small bistro. A friend of a friend invited me to lunch, and I went because I was a broke student who never said no to a free meal. The kind of afternoon that isn't supposed to mean anything.

And then you walked in.

I remember thinking — not casually, not in passing, but with a clarity that cut through the noise of that room — she is the most beautiful girl I have ever seen. You looked like the coolest person in any room you'd ever walk into. I tried to start a conversation. A question. A comment. Anything to make you look my way.

You wouldn't look at me.

To everyone else, it might have seemed like coldness. Maybe even rudeness. But I didn't know yet what I know now — that your heart races when strangers get too close, that your mind floods when someone unexpected reaches toward you, that your silence was never disinterest. It was the opposite. You just didn't know what to do with it.

Months passed. Our mutual friend left the country. Then one day he called with a small favor — a bank transfer, some cash to withdraw and hand to you. He said you'd pick me up.

You called. You said you were parked by the back door.

I should tell you something I've never told you properly.

When I heard you were coming, I took the longest shower of my life. I drowned myself in the only cologne I owned. I put on my best clothes — which, as a broke student, meant my least-bad clothes. I was a bit overweight, my curly hair was doing its own thing as always, and I stood in front of a mirror trying to look like someone worth sitting next to.

For an ATM run.

I walked out the back door and looked around. And there it was — a silver 2013 Perodua Myvi. MCK 2005. I can still see the plate number. I don't remember what I ate yesterday, but I remember every digit on that car. Because of who was sitting inside it.

A strange rush came through me when I saw your face through the glass. Warm. Unfamiliar. The kind of feeling that makes you pay attention to a moment while you're still inside it.

You were different. Shy. Awkward. Strangely nice. Nothing like the girl who looked away at the restaurant. On the way to the ATM, you bumped the curb with the car. Nothing serious — but you panicked. You apologized five times.

I just looked at you and said: "Are you okay? It's your car that got damaged. I'm perfectly fine."

You smiled. And I think that was the first time you really looked at me.

When you dropped me back home, you said goodbye. But you seemed like you had more to say. Like you weren't ready for the drive to end. I didn't push. I just went inside.

A couple of months later, early 2015. The friend called again. Same favor. Same routine. Same cologne.

But this time, on the drive back — it was night, the kind of night where the dark outside makes the inside of a car feel like a small, safe room — you said something that caught me off guard.

"Today is my birthday. What are you going to do for me?"

I fumbled. Said something about dinner, or coming over to meet my friends. Then I went quiet. And so did you. The car filled with a silence that wasn't empty — it was full of something neither of us knew how to say. Then, after a moment that felt much longer than it was, you gathered the courage to say it again — so what are you going to do for me? — and I realize now, years later, what you were actually saying.

You were reaching. The way you always reach — not directly, not with the words that mean what you feel, but sideways. Framed as a joke. Framed as a demand. Because saying "I want to spend time with you" felt too big and too exposed.

I told you, awkwardly, that you could come hang out at our place if you wanted. You said maybe. And that was the end of it.

Early 2016. A regular evening. My phone rang.

It was you. But it wasn't the you I'd been slowly getting to know. This was a version I'd never heard — raw, broken, crying so hard the words barely formed. A bad breakup. Someone who had hurt you. You were asking if I knew where he was.

I didn't. But I heard something underneath the question. Something that wasn't about him at all. You didn't need to find him. You needed to not be alone.

I told you I'd meet you after my classes. Seven o'clock. You said okay.

You drove us to that road near old Jusco, just beside the blue government office. You parked. And you let go. Everything you'd been holding. I listened. I told you that you were beautiful, that any man would be lucky to have you, that you should never settle for someone who makes you feel small.

That road will always have a heavy seat on my heart.

I meant every word. But the words weren't what mattered that night. What mattered was that someone was there. And I was.

I told you that you didn't look like someone who should be alone tonight. I offered my place. You hesitated. Then you came.

I showed you the room. We sat on the bed. And you started crying again — not the sharp, panicked crying from the phone call, but the slow kind. The kind that comes when you finally feel safe enough to fall apart.

Something in me — an impulse I didn't plan and couldn't stop — made me put my arms around you. And you took that hug like it was the first real thing you'd felt in months. You held on.

You cried on my chest until you fell asleep.

And I stayed awake. Eight hours. Not because I couldn't sleep — because I chose not to move. If I shifted, you might wake up. If you woke up, the spell might break. The safety you found in that room, on that bed, in those arms — I would not be the one to take it from you.

So I held still.

Eight hours. Watching the ceiling. Listening to you breathe. Feeling your heartbeat slow from panic to peace against my chest.

After that night, you kept coming. Slowly at first. Then every weekend. I became the place you drove to when the world was too loud. And somewhere in that rhythm — the drives, the quiet dinners, the way you started leaving things at my place like small anchors — we became something. Without a label. Without a conversation about it. Without a single official date.

We just "became."

A month passed. You coming to my place. Us going out to eat. Falling into a rhythm that felt less like dating and more like coming home. We never had a dating phase — you skipped straight past the part where people perform for each other and landed in the part where you just exist together.

I should tell you something about me that you already know but maybe never fully understood. I grew up in a home where I never felt safe to say what I felt. Where love wasn't given freely — it had to be earned. Where the warmth of a mother's love was something I always reached for but never quite held. I was not a man who trusted emotions. I was a man who survived by keeping them locked.

One Monday. You were getting dressed to go to work. You kissed me. And then you said three words I had heard before — but never really felt.

"I love you."

I stared at you. Three seconds. The room went very quiet. And then I smiled and said:

"Nah, you don't love me. You just feel safe with me and that's okay. Don't say things like that which you don't mean."

You smiled. Turned around. And left.

The truth — the truth I couldn't say that morning — was that I already felt it too. I felt it before you said it. But I was so afraid of what that word could do, what it could open, what it could cost if I let it in and it left — that I pushed it away with a joke. You see, I was always a cold man when it came to matters of the heart. What made me seem unreachable and "cool" to others, collapsed the moment your presence entered my room.

Next weekend came. You spent it at my place. And again — Monday morning, getting dressed, kissing me goodbye — you said the same words.

"I love you."

This time, you said it twice. I stared at you again. And again I deflected — "I really don't think you feel that way, you have to be sure."

But the moment you turned to walk away — the moment I saw your back and the door and the thought of you leaving without knowing — something cracked in me. The wall I had spent a lifetime building. The one that kept everything locked and everyone at a safe distance.

I said it.

"I love you too."

You were the first person I ever said those words to. And it didn't feel like a risk. It felt like the truest thing I had ever said. Like every word I had spoken before was practice, and this was the real one.

You were the first person who made the risk feel smaller than the silence.

By mid-2016, you had moved in. You just never really left, and neither of us questioned it. You quit your job. I went to classes. And we built something that, looking back, was the purest version of us that ever existed.

I was cheerful. Happy. I made you laugh every day — real laughter, the kind that made you cover your mouth and push me away while pulling me closer. I showed you a side of the world you told me you didn't know existed. Peace. Quiet. Unconditional love. Safety without conditions.

In your eyes — and I am not imagining this, I could see it — I was the coolest guy that ever lived. Your eyes would glow when you looked at me. You felt proud holding my hand in public. Hanging onto my arm like I was something precious.

I had this habit. Every single time I left for classes, on my way home, I would buy you something. It was never expensive. A one-ringgit hair band. Chocolate gold coins. A bag of chips. A muffin. A small toy. A kinder egg. Oh and i almost forgot.. Remember Doraemon?

Every day, you'd wait — not for me, but for the mystery. What did he bring today?

Those were the gifts I could afford. And they were enough. Because they were never about the object. They were proof. Daily, physical proof that said: I thought about you while I was away. Even for ten minutes. Even at a 7-Eleven. You were on my mind.

Life was great.

I mean that literally. Not "life was fine." Not "we were managing." Life was great. The kind of great that doesn't announce itself. The kind you only recognize as the best years of your life after they're behind you.

I had been planning this for months.

I took you to the beach we always went to. Our corner — the private spot with no proper lighting, no crowd, nothing but the waves and the dark and us. All you could see when looking at the sea was the faint light of the moon reflecting off the foam.

We sat and talked the way we always did. Chatting. Bickering. Comfortable in the specific way that only people who've shared a bed and a bathroom and a thousand unremarkable evenings can be.

And then, at 8:36 PM, I told you I felt something buried in the sand.

You said — excitedly, instantly — "Where?!"

I said: "There."

You carefully brushed off the sand. Underneath it — a red jewelry box. Strange-looking. Out of place. You picked it up. Opened it slowly.

"It's a ring?"

I went dead silent. And then:

"Yes, you idiot. I'm proposing. Will you marry me?"

You stared at the ring. Then you looked at me. And you said yes. With the kind of smile that doesn't need a photograph to be remembered — but I took one anyway. 8:44 PM. You, holding the ring and the box, the ocean behind you, the dark everywhere except your face.

You wanted me to meet your family. To see the place you came from. I'd never been to a village in my life and couldn't imagine what to expect. But I said yes — because you asked, and because wherever you came from was somewhere I wanted to stand.

From Kuala Lumpur to Kota Kinabalu. Your brother drove from the airport to Kota Marudu — then almost another hour and a half of unpaved jungle road to Kampung Mandawang. Your village. No phone signal. Almost no electricity. Water from old pipes that worked when they felt like it.

You took me to your father's house.

He passed away on your birthday. A wound so deep it shaped everything about you — the way you love, the way you fear, the way you look for safety in people because the first man who was supposed to provide it left before you were ready.

His house was beautiful in a way that expensive things never are. Old. Wooden and half cement. In the middle of the jungle. A huge lemon tree next to it. And a few meters away — the most stunning mango tree I had ever seen. Both planted by his hands. Both still growing long after he stopped.

2017 was one of the best years of our lives. The kinder eggs. The laughter. The engagement. Your village. The trees your father planted. Everything felt like it was building toward something true.

And it was. Just not in the way we imagined.

By mid to late 2018, something shifted in me. Graduation was coming. Fast. And graduation meant one thing that my mind and heart could not stop circling — I would have to leave Malaysia. And leave you behind.

For the first time in four years, I would have to be away from you. It scared me more than anything ever had. You had moved in with me two months after that first night. You had no job — we agreed together that I would work and you would take care of the house. It was the life we both wanted. But it meant that when I left, you'd have nothing to fall back on.

I wanted you to go stay in your village while I was in Saudi. You agreed. But then you told me — your father's house had been taken by your brother and his wife and their children. There was no room for you.

You had no place of your own. In your own village. In the place you came from.

And in that moment, I asked you a question that changed everything.

"How much would it cost to build a house there?"

You told me. And I said: I think it is doable.

What business does a student have building houses? I was on a scholarship. Monthly allowance, but still — a house is not a small thing. But in my mind, it was never about a house. It was about safety and stability for you. And interestingly enough. For you it wasnt about just building a house. It was about building something together. For "Us".

I started funneling most of my allowance into the house construction. Your brother Japarun agreed to build it — a small, cute thing. Twenty by twenty-two feet. Nothing grand. But it was yours.

And it was enough. Until it started costing more than money.

The small gifts — the kinder eggs, the hair bands, the chocolate gold coins — they lessened. Going out lessened. Trips lessened. The daily proof that said I thought about you while I was away started to lessen.

It made me sad. And my sadness made me withdraw — not from you, but into the weight of what was coming. Every day that passed was one day closer to the moment I would have to leave you behind. And I didn't know how to enjoy the present when the future terrified me that much. So instead of going out, instead of living in the time we still had, I buried myself in preparation. In making sure that when the day came, you would at least have walls around you. A place that was yours. I traded our "now" for your "after" — and I didn't know how to tell you that.

What can i say? i never loved someone the same way i loved you. Not a Parent. Or a sibling. or a Friend. or even a lover. The idea of being away from you terrified me. and my brain being wired the way it is. I tend to over obsess over things i cannot control.

But you didn't see the house being built. The house itself was not your priority. You were always more focused on the "Us". And i was always more obsessed about "You". You saw the man who used to bring you surprises every day slowly stop bringing them. You saw the dates disappear. You saw the light in me dim. And you might have interpreted that as a reduction in my love, my excitement, my desire to be with you.

It wasn't. I am just horrible at communication sometimes. And i am very good at hiding my fears.

Mid 2019. Graduation was a month away. I told you we should start preparing. We packed your things. I sent you to the village ahead of me. Then I took my certificate — skipped the ceremony, didn't care one bit about it — flew to Sabah, and your brother picked me up at the airport.

I offered to help build the house myself. Your brother agreed. I had never done construction in my life. They had no proper tools — just a shovel to mix concrete. Mixing even one bag reduced me to my absolute physical limit. But I did it. Many times, for months. It was the most tiring thing I had ever done. And the most rewarding.

But the house wouldn't be finished before my visa expired. So we agreed — you'd stay with your brother and his wife in your father's house, and I would keep sending whats needed for the house from Saudi.

The day before I left, you organized a party for me. Your sisters each cooked a dish. Dessert. Drinks. And you prepared a cake that I will never forget. On it — the Saudi flag and the Sabahan state flag. Four candles, two on each side. And a small toy airplane in the middle.

I stood next to you for a photo. And I had tears in my eyes. I still have that picture.

That evening I promised you I would always love you. That we would be married soon.

Next morning. Your brother drove us to the airport in Sabah. You came along.

At the departure gate, we hugged. Hard. You cried. I was hiding my tears, suppressing everything so I wouldn't make you sad. I turned away after the goodbye and walked straight into the immigration area.

At that point you couldn't see my face anymore. But tears were flowing. And I could hear nothing except my own heartbeat.

You told me later that you were calling my name. Yelling for me to turn around. But I didn't respond. I told you I was just nervous from airports.

That was a lie. I heard nothing because my body had shut everything out except the act of walking forward without breaking.

A month later. Melaka. I had packed everything. Cleaned out the room we had lived in for four years.

Before leaving for the airport, I took one last turn to look at the room.

It shocked me. Our room — the one that was once filled with love and laughter and chocolate gold coins scattered on the bed and your things mixed with mine in every corner — looked so empty. Devoid of anything that was "us."

I cried like I had never cried before.

Then I took a piece of paper and a pen. And through tears that stained the page — three or four visible drops that smudged the ink — I wrote you a love letter. Everything I felt. Everything I couldn't say at the airport. Everything I needed you to know.

I folded the letter and stuffed it into the front pocket of Doraemon. The big one. The first gift I ever bought you, back in 2016. My brother was supposed to ship it with the rest of your things to the village after I left.

In my mind — that letter would reach you inside the first gift I ever gave you. It would travel from Melaka to Sabah, across the country, and find you in the house I was building for you with with what used to buy kinder eggs. Who would have known that kinder eggs could represent so much?.

And I went to my flight back to Saudi Arabia.

November 2019. I was in Jeddah. Living in my family's house. We talked from time to time over Skype. Things felt manageable.

I bought you an iPhone X online and had it delivered. It made you happy. But it sparked jealousy in the family around you.

Then late November — your brother's wife started to act aggressively. Passive. Calculated. She would do things that she knew would hurt you, then act as if she was innocent. You are direct when it comes to that — you would explode verbally, cry. Your mother blamed only you. You ended up looking like the villain. Your mother threatened to kick you out of the village.

And then you called me.

You were hysterical. Screaming and crying in a way I had never heard before. Raw. Intense. Emotionally explosive.

Something shifted in me. Not a thought. Not a plan. A core structure of my consciousness rearranged itself around a single truth:

I can never let this happen to her again.

The house was still months from being finished. I had no job yet. No income. A fresh graduate with no means. But none of that mattered.

You cheered up. And you did exactly that. But even with all the support, you felt heartbroken and betrayed by your family. A wound that took you years to even begin to process. Safe to say — you never truly healed from it.

When you moved to the Melaka apartment — just a block away from where we used to live — you were given the rest of your things. Including the Doraemon.

You checked his pocket. And there it was. The letter. Written in my terrible handwriting. Stained with three or four drops of tears that had fallen while I wrote it. You could see them — the paper was warped where they had landed.

You called me that same day. "I saw the letter!" I felt shy. But we talked that night and it was nice.

A small moment. A letter finding its person. But it meant more than either of us could say at the time — because it was proof that even in an empty room, even in the worst goodbye of my life, I was thinking of you.

I needed a job. Desperately. To pay thing, daily expenses. To keep you less lonely by ordering you food, sending you gifts, buying you things — so you would feel less alone in a city where you had no one.

I almost applied as a McDonald's cashier. A fresh graduate with a bachelor's in IT Management, willing to work a register — that's how urgent it felt.

But luck was a little on my side. I applied to Jotun — a Norwegian paint company. First job I applied for. Got the interview. Landed the offer. Starting January 1st, 2020. Salary: 13,000 SAR. In the eyes of a fresh graduate — great.

I showed you the offer. And you looked proud. And so was I.

I told you I'd come visit you in Malaysia in a couple of months. Just to see you. Just to be in the same room again. You happily agreed — but told me if it would delay our marriage due to finances, I shouldn't come. I reassured you it was okay.

March 11th, 2020. The announcement. COVID-19 is a global pandemic. Strict lockdown. No travel. No going out. No nothing.

And all I could think was — I can't travel to her anymore. And she can't travel to me.

Saudi Arabia at the time had no tourist visa. Only religious pilgrimages — Umrah and Hajj. And you were Christian, not Muslim. There was no legal path to bring you here.

It made me feel dark and hopeless. But I thought — if I could rush the marriage approval, you could come officially. As my wife.

For a Saudi Arabian to marry a foreigner, you need to apply and go through a long government approval process. That became the third boulder on my back. Government bureaucracy. I applied. I was met with people who didn't care. Whats worse than bureaucracy? lazy and careless employees on top. But I continued.

By late 2020, I realized that chasing the Saudi government process would destroy us both mentally. So I took on a fourth boulder — investigate the possibility of living in another country. Taking you with me.

Jotun is a Norwegian company. And Norway is open-minded about couples who aren't legally married. I saw an opportunity.

But as a fresh graduate, I needed to do something so spectacular, so impossible, it would let me skip the entire career chain — from local unit in Saudi to the headquarters in Norway. People normally spend years working their way through regional offices. Getting to HQ is a dream most people never reach.

But it is me. And I love you. And I love deeply. So I worked harder and smarter than anyone possibly could. I would leave the office at 11 PM some nights. Not because anyone asked me to. Because I needed to go way ahead of the curve.

I built systems. Challenged directors who outranked me by ten levels and were paid six times as much. I saved the Saudi unit five million SAR a year through clever technology. Built a system for the whole middle east region. And biggest of all — built a big global system for IT that caught the attention of management at HQ.

All of that. In a year and a bit more.

Everyone was impressed. Inspired. They looked at me like I was untouchable. They wondered how a young man could be that determined and smart.

No one knew my true motif. It was never about career or money.

It was always about a room where we could both exist at the same time.

By August 2021, I had the offer. Norway. HQ. The impossible door had opened.

But behind all of this — behind the systems and the promotions and the five million SAR — you were alone. Insanely stressed. In a city where you had no one. During a global lockdown. For two full years.

We had many fights. Many cries over Skype. Many sleepless nights.

Countless nights where you would fall asleep with your laptop still on the Skype call so you wouldn't feel lonely. And I would sit on the other end — 7 PM my time, midnight yours — doing my daily routine on my PC while listening to you snore. Thinking about all those boulders on my back. Thinking about how to make you happy and safe. Thinking about whether any of this was going to work.

When I told you about Norway, you seemed happy. But scared. On October 15th, 2021, you flew back to the village to see your family before leaving Malaysia to come with me.

Late October 2021. Malaysia was still blocking international tourists. You couldn't come to me. But Saudi Arabia did something completely new and unexpected — a new tourist visa, open to all, including Malaysians. Ninety days. Multiple entry.

But we weren't married. And in Saudi, unmarried couples checking into a hotel could be questioned. I wasn't sure what would happen. So I decided we should meet in Dubai instead — neutral ground — while we waited for our Norwegian visas to come through.

Early February 2022. You were on a plane to Dubai. And so was I.

When we met — after two full years of Skype and snoring through laptops and fighting across time zones — the tension was unbearable. It was as if we didn't know how to greet each other anymore. The longing was too big for a hug. Too heavy for a joyful jump. We stood there like two people who loved each other but had forgotten the choreography.

I was waiting at the wrong gate. You were angry about it. And I stood there quietly — not because I didn't care, but because the man you were looking at was not the man you imagined. You pictured someone living comfortably with his family, a good job, a car. You didn't see the boulders. You didn't know how thin I had been stretched and i didnt know how harsh life has been on you either.

I was hoping for a pause. A healing. To see and touch the reason and purpose for all my waiting. But I couldn't absorb you the way I always used to. I didn't have the capacity. And you read that as distance.

The first night was rough. But then we both cried. And after the crying, we found each other again — not all the way, but enough.

We spent a month in Dubai. It was heavily expensive — a start of a debt that would follow me for years. Then my family called and begged me to bring you to Saudi. Finally, a place I could call home with you in it.

We stayed with my family for months while waiting for the Norwegian visas. My family was dysfunctional. But they were my family. And you were my guest. And you were not to blame for the dysfunction.

By July 4th, 2022, we were in Sandefjord, Norway. A long journey. A long wait. And excitement from both of us to finally have a place that was ours.

We found a beautiful apartment right in front of the fjord. Expensive, but we thought it was worth it. And i thought we deserved it. We furnished it together. Plates. A cool black clock on the wall. A sofa. A bed. Everything new. Everything ours.

It looked like a fresh start.

My first salary slip in 2023 arrived. And with it, the truth.

I wasn't on a normal employment contract. I was on a mobility contract — salary plus housing and car allowances. It sounded generous. But Norwegian tax law treats anything beyond base salary as "extra income." Taxed at 46%.

The company — filled with Norwegians driven by equality ideals — had underpaid my base salary. In their minds: why should he get extra? We are all equal. But that structure meant the majority of my pay was taxed at the maximum rate. I was worse off than anyone on a normal contract.

Then the Norwegian krone dipped 30% in value. My Saudi debt — 3,850 SAR a month — suddenly cost 12,000 NOK. Add the apartment. The tax. The debt. The math didn't work. The equation that was supposed to be our dream produced a number that meant financial ruin.

You were with me. That made it worth it. But I didn't have the heart or the courage to show you the full picture. So I carried it alone. The way I always carried things. Silently. Behind a face that was trying not to crack.

And then it began. My emotional and mental collapse. Gradual. Invisible to everyone except you — and even you only saw the symptoms, not the cause.

I started to overthink. Overwork. I couldn't sleep at night — guilt, stress, and fear cycling through me like a machine that wouldn't stop. I gained weight. Started feeling unwell all the time. The loan payments in Saudi were falling behind. Some were already flagged at 180 days overdue. Every purchase — every trip to a Norwegian city, every attempt to recreate the feeling of bringing you something small on the way home from work — meant another delayed payment.

I stopped being me.

I was afraid of going out. Afraid of spending. Absent when we were together. You felt it. You felt lonely in a country where you already had no one but me — and now even I wasn't fully there.

You asked me to help you wash the dishes. To do laundry together. To water the plants with you. And I responded with frustration. I told you I was working too hard, that you shouldn't be asking me to share the chores at a time like this.

But that wasn't what you were asking.

You weren't asking me to reduce your load. You were asking me to stand next to you. To do something boring and small and meaningless together — and for that to be enough. You wanted a friend. A partner in the daily mundane. Someone who would dry while you washed. Not because the dishes mattered. Because you mattered. And I was too deep in survival mode to hear it.

And i still remember your cute little efforts to make me understand. showing me that video about the movie "Up"? i didnt understand it at the time. but now i do. you just wanted me to stop for a minute. and look at you. look at us. but i was too focused on getting us out of this situation. to ensure that you and me can have the life that we dreamed of. and that ended up costing me more than i could bear.

In your eyes, I was no longer me. I was anxious. Scatter-minded. Undriven. Unmotivated. The only thing that seemed to drive me was work. No interest in our life as partners. No initiative. No excitement. No warmth.

And that image of me — that version — stuck with you. To this day.

But here is what was happening behind the version you saw:

I was running out of oxygen. Trying to keep us breathing with enough air for one. The Saudi bank was threatening to blacklist me. The Norwegian credit card interest was compounding. Office politics were draining what little energy I had left. Every attempt to move to a better role — to earn more, to fix the equation — was interpreted by Norwegian colleagues as greed. And in their culture, that word is a death sentence.

At times, deep down; i would miss the part of me that was capable of making you smile without much effort. I missed the smile on your face when you excitedly opened the bag i brought to see which muffin flavor did i get you that day? Or whether or not i got you a Kinder Egg. Thats when i would usually jump without notice, and offer to make you tea, or maybe a bowl of korean noodles. And instead of a Chocolate egg. I would surprise you with just a regular boiled Egg.

Norway. Was a light, but it was not the one that was to be at the end of the tunnel. It was not our light. At least not yet. Who knows if we will ever come back in a better shape here?.

And through all of it — the only thing that kept me going was the same thing that kept me going from the very first night. The same thing that made me hold still for eight hours, spray cologne for an ATM run, build a house I couldn't afford, sprint to Norway in a year and a half.

You.

But I couldn't show it anymore. I had enough energy for the fight or for the love. Not both. And I chose the fight — because I thought if I won the fight, the love would still be there when I came back.

I was wrong to lean on the love this hard. Hearts can get hurt. Now i realise that. and i wish...

By late 2024, we had decided to leave Norway. The Saudi marriage approval process had eased. It was doable now. I told the company — either place me in Saudi or I leave. They agreed.

I asked you to pack what you could. To fly back to the village while I finished packing in Norway. I didn't want you to go through what I went through in Melaka — standing in an empty room, looking at the ghost of everything that used to be there. I wanted to shield you from that.

So for two months, I packed our life into boxes by myself. Each plate I wrapped. Each toy. Each decoration. Each small ornament we'd bought together in some Norwegian shop on a day when things felt almost okay. It felt like I was wrapping pieces of my heart. All in the hope that someday soon, these would be unpacked in a place we could both finally call home. A place familiar. A place where I was strong and capable and wouldn't be surprised by things like 46% tax. A place where we could finally have a family — because by then, we would be legally married.

By January 2025, I was in Saudi. I started talking to you about coming. You were excited. I told you to come for three months — as long as the visa allowed — while I finished our marriage application.

I had promised you something. That this time, we would rent our own place. No more living in someone else's house. No more being a guest. Just us. Our own walls.

But my accounts were in the deep red after Norway. Debt that was insane. A close person — someone I trusted — had promised to help me financially until I could stand on my feet. I believed him. I built your promise on top of his.

A week before you arrived, he sent me a message:

"I'm sorry, but I overspent on some things without noticing. I can't help you for at least six more months. By the way, come to think of it — you owe me 8,000 riyals. When do you think you could pay me back?"

That statement shattered me internally like glass. A part of me died. The bank — due to the overdue debt — would not loan me anything. No credit card. No financial support of any kind. The Norwegian credit card was screaming at me to consume any income I had. And you were arriving in a week, expecting the home I promised you.

I had made a mistake. I should never have made a promise based on another person's promise. No matter how close they are.

When you came, I told you the truth — that I couldn't afford a place for us yet. You were very sad. And at that point, something started that had been building for years but only now became visible — the cumulative weight of repetitive failure. It was as if we could finally see and measure every time something was supposed to work and didn't. It felt as if nothing would ever work.

But i assure you. that was not the case. it did look dim. you were not blind. you were not crazy. but it was me, i failed at painting you the picture of the life we will have.

You stayed at my family house with me for three months. And once again — the woman of the house made you feel like you didn't belong.

My mother and her hyperthyroidism — None of us knew it at the time. She had no control over her emotions. She was cold. To everyone, but especially to us. My sisters were depressed because of it in addition to their lack of discipline. We all interpreted it as general hostility. And it felt heavy for everyone — but heaviest for you.

Because you were the outsider. Again. Wanting to be accepted by your other family. Longing for love and containment. You had stood by their son through the hardest years of his life — through the distance, the financial collapse, the emotional breakdown — and this was what you received in return. Coldness.

You started to wonder if they blamed you for the situation we were in. They didn't. My family was just dysfunctional. And especially dysfunctional at the time we arrived. But you didn't know that. All you knew was the pattern — the brother's wife in the village, my mother in Saudi. Different houses. Different countries. The same feeling of being unwelcome in a home that was supposed to be yours.

Three months passed. Your visa expired. My birthday was April 8th — you stayed long enough to celebrate it. My whole family came to the airport to say goodbye. My sisters were crying. My mother was crying. And I was dying inside. But of course, I would not show it.

You left. My sisters in the airport with tears. made me promise that i would do everything i can to bring you back. i nodded at them silently. but within me it was more than just nod. it was a signature i signed on parchment that was relentless. And there I was. In the room in my family house. Surrounded by a huge mess of scattered things. Memories from different places, countries, and continents. All over the floor and the chairs. But all of them had one thing in common. "You".

I had one goal. One goal only. Get the marriage process done. While maintaining a job that I had no mental capacity to continue. But I had to push on.

The Saudi process had improved, but it was still slow. And Jotun was asking me to travel — Dubai, China, Norway, and finally Malaysia. I was under the heaviest stress I had ever felt. I would sleep in random chairs around the house. Join meetings across time zones. And be at the government office at 6 AM to be first in the queue — because they had no proper system.

You were upset that I didn't take you on any of those trips. I told you I couldn't afford it. That I was still bleeding from debt. That if we wanted something real, we needed to be patient — just a couple of months more. And i meant it. just did not communicate it well.

And you, you were battling an even harder battle yourself. family dynamics, village peopel questions and above all else; My distance from you.

October 1st, 2025. I was in Norway for one final business trip — the last one before Malaysia, which I had lobbied hard to make the final trip. Because I could not bear going to Malaysia and coming back without you.

I got an SMS from the Saudi government.

Application approved.

The marriage approval. After years of bureaucracy. After government offices at 6 AM and people who didn't care. It was done.

My happiness could not be measured. But I was unable to express it. It was as if my nervous system had become incapable of accepting good outcomes.

I called you. Broke the news.

But something was different. You didn't seem excited or happy. You started arguing about other things. We hung up. And didn't talk for a while. I was too scared to even call you. not because you would scare me. but because i could not even imagine the thought of disappointing you.

I went back to Saudi. Finalized everything. And by October 17th I sent you a message: Everything is ready. Next week I'll be in Malaysia. I'll finish my business meetings, then head to the village and marry you. We will finally be together.

You saw the messages.

You didn't reply.

A bit of time passed. And then I received the heaviest words I have ever read.

And then I received the heaviest words I have ever read. You told me you had been thinking hard. That your heart was too full of pain to keep going. That you needed to let go of everything we had been building towards.

You said I was the best man and fiancé you had ever known or would ever know. but you were starting to have doubts.

And because you did not want to end up hating me. i should keep my distance.

What I felt when I read those words was strange. I did not feel fear or sadness. I felt normal. Stable. Calm. I replied that if you were sure, I wouldn't hold you back. That you must have thought this through. That it wasn't easy to say. You said yes, you had.

I stopped texting. And so did you.

I went to the bathroom. Came back to the room.

The first thing my eyes saw was the pillow sheets.

White. With Mickey Mouse on them. Different funny expressions. The ones you bought. The ones I used to tease you about — pointing at one of the faces and saying it looked like you.

And in that moment, I collapsed.

I think what happened was this: when I read your texts, my nervous system anticipated a shock that could have been catastrophic. It flooded me with hormones to keep me standing. Stable. Calm. That's why I felt nothing. My body was protecting me from what my mind couldn't yet process.

But those pillow sheets. Those stupid, small, familiar pillow sheets with their Mickey Mouse faces — they bypassed every defense my body had built. Because the texts were information. The pillow sheets were us.

I fell on my knees. My right knee still hurts to this day.

And I cried. Like a child. In a way I haven't cried since I was a child. My body wanted me to cry but I didn't even know how anymore. The sound that came out of me was awkward and broken and raw — the sound of a man who had spent years locking everything away finally running out of locks.

I rushed to the phone. Realized what a massive mistake I had made by accepting her request so calmly. I texted you. You didn't reply that night.

Next day, I called. Video. I cried. You cried. You said you took it back. I felt a happiness so intense it was almost physical.

But something was still wrong.

A day later, you sent the same messages again. Your fears and doubts were still there. still haunting you. and that i should still keep my distance.

I stayed for two days in utter dark misery and devastation. In the room. Surrounded by many things that all screamed the name of You. things that were supposed to be.

Then I decided to go to the village anyway. Three days before my business trip.

When I arrived, you were surprised. You acted okay. But you told me you needed time and space.

And I told you something that I needed you to hear — not as a negotiation, not as a plea, but as a fact:

"You should never feel cornered. Whether or not you choose me, your financial state will not collapse. That is a genuine fear you carry — that without me, you would have nothing. I want you to know: I am not that kind of man. My love for you is not bound by a contract called 'relationship' or 'marriage.' It was pure. It is pure. And it is deeply personal."

And I left.

I really do not want to write this chapter alone.