The Love of Habib
Chapters 20.1

Aira immediately put away her smile after entering the phone booth. Outside, he was able to cross paths with Dira. To maintain her image, Aira tried to smile in front of Dira's jutek face. At least he would return his smile in the presence of many people, but the end result was very annoying. Let it be completely indifferent to the image of itself in front of many people and instead ignore its smile. She was very shy and tried to maintain her smile to prove that she was a humble girl. Unlike Dira, arrogant and unruly.

Aira picked up the phone and started dialing the home phone number, then the phone was connected. A few seconds later the houseman picked up his phone.

"Hello, assalamualaikum?" His voice is as sweet as possible.

"Vaalaikumsalam. The aira? You, who called?" It was the sound of Mother sounding very excited.

Aira's heart warmed up immediately. In the boarding school he had no one to complain and complain about, his life was not as easy as he had imagined. This makes her miss home a lot, especially Mother. There are many things she wants to talk about with Mommy because the only person who listens the most at home is Mommy. Moreover he did not dare to speak much to the others as he did not want to make them look at him strangely.

"Yes Mother, I miss Mother very much. My life is hard in the boarding house, Bun. Some days I've been thinking about going back home." His voice began to recount his discomfort in the boarding school.

As Aish reveals her identity as a stepmother, Aira tries to restrain herself from seeing Aish again. In addition Aish has also influenced her roommates so she has no time to look for Aish. He had to recover the opinions of the roommates to himself in order for them to trust him again.

"Mother knows you won't be comfortable there. You have never been away from home especially to stay long at someone else's house. Mother also these few days to your mind, son. Mother misses you and wants to call you. But Mommy remembers that the boarding house does not allow you to bring a mobile phone so you have to wait for you to call yourself." Mother sounded uninspired across there.

Mother must have missed him so much. Moreover, this was the first time they separated for a long time and stayed far apart. Aira became sad because there was no one beside Mother for some time. But how else, he's officially staying here and it would be funny if he came back without success.

"Listening to what Mother said, Aira became increasingly upset and increasingly determined to stay in the boarding house in order to make Mother and everyone in the house proud. It takes a lot of time to be comfortable here, especially my room friends are now a bit difficult to get along because they are provoked by Aish. Though at the beginning of the boarding school I had many friends, but after Aish's sister talked to the room friends, some people started to stay away from me."

What Aira said immediately made Mother's heart hurt and worried. He was worried about his daughter who was struggling out there but was still bullied by her own brother. This is what makes Mother had rejected Aira's desire to stay in the boarding house. It's okay to stay in another boarding house as long as you're not in one place with Aish. Because he knew that his stepdaughter would not like Aira and would bother him.

But Aira insisted on moving there. He could do nothing even if he refused.

"Oh my God, son. Mommy already said you do not have to move there but you still ngeyel. Now see what's going on? You're bullied just as much as him." Mother nagged from across there.

"Don't worry, Bun. God will not remain silent to see me hurt by Aish. Someday this crime will be avenged. Oh yeah, Bun. I am again sad because I never saw Habib Thalib in the boarding house. He said he went on some other business out of town, but why hasn't he been back and forth for almost two weeks?" This was what made Aira these few days confused and uninspired.

He tried to search everywhere for the whereabouts of Habib Khalid, but could not find. Until finally he heard from roommates that the habib was traveling out of town. He was very upset after he found out. If he knew from the beginning, then why bother looking up and down here?

"Don't be too hasty. If it is time you will meet too. In addition, you must learn to understand that Thalib habib is busy. Mother has heard from Abah also Umi that this Thalib habib has a lot of busyness outside and inside the boarding school so he rarely appears. This is not good news for you but the key here is to be patient. Remember, people are patient with God. Let God see your patience, son, that Thalib's heart may be turned only for you. Wanna?" Mother's advice to her daughter.

She knew how uncomfortable her daughter was there and that was why she was trying to say nice things to appease her distraught daughter.

"Mother's right, I shouldn't be in too much of a hurry anyway it's about feelings. Oh yes Mother, how are you and the others? Do they all miss me?" The house must have been very quiet without him, and Aira was very proud of it.

Especially for Grandma. Aira is her favorite granddaughter and must have missed her a lot at home.

"Everybody obviously misses you, son. But lately..." Mother hesitates to say it.

Aira felt that something was wrong with Mother's tone.

"What's up, Mother? Is the house okay?" He was worried about his family's health.

Especially Dad and Grandma's health, she didn't want anything to happen to them.

"Well... Something happened to our company. Some time ago after sending you to the boarding house our company ran into trouble. Companies that will cooperate with our company suddenly cancel the cooperation agreement. Their actions put our company at a great disadvantage and require a lot of funds to cover it immediately. Because this is your Uncle and Dad trying to get help from some of the businessmen we know. But days have passed but they still haven't gotten help. The funds needed are quite large... Plus the loss of our company makes it threatened with bankruptcy so that makes them skeptical of lending funds." Said Mother dizzy.

Some days the house is not peaceful. Because the problem of lack of funds and the company threatened to go bankrupt makes people easily offended. A little bit of annoyance will explode and cause many endless debates. Blaming each other and accusing each other, the peace they had once evaporated somewhere.