The Women's Hour
"She goes to the women-only swim session at the local leisure centre—the only hour Somali women can exercise without hijab. The lifeguard is new, young, and clearly affected by what she sees. After hours, they find they're not so different."
Women's Hour is sacred.
Every Sunday from 3-4 PM, the leisure centre in Whitechapel closes its pool to everyone except women. Muslim women. Women who can finally swim without hijab, without modesty, without male eyes.
I come every week.
And every week, I notice the new lifeguard watching me.
Her name is Khadija.
Twenty-four, studying sports science, Muslim like me. She took the job specifically to work Women's Hour—to be part of something that matters to our community.
"Beautiful stroke," she calls from her chair as I finish a lap.
"Thanks."
"You could be competitive if you wanted."
"I just want to swim." I push off the wall, start another lap.
But I feel her eyes on me the whole time.
The pool empties slowly.
By 3:45, it's just me and two older aunties who always take forever to dry their hair. Khadija watches from her chair, absently twirling her whistle.
"You're always last to leave," she says when I finally climb out.
"I like the quiet." I wrap a towel around myself. "And you're always watching."
"It's my job."
"Is it?"
She blushes. Actually blushes.
"I should check the equipment," she mutters, and retreats to the storage room.
I should go to the locker room.
I follow her instead.
The storage room is small.
Pool noodles, floats, spare lane dividers. Khadija is pretending to check something on a shelf, her back to me.
"Why do you watch me?" I ask.
"I told you—"
"Not like a lifeguard." I step closer. "Like something else."
She doesn't turn around. "I don't know what you mean."
"I think you do." I touch her shoulder. "I think you know exactly what I mean."
She turns.
Her eyes are scared. Vulnerable. The look of someone who's kept a secret so long they've forgotten it's a secret.
"This isn't—" she starts.
"Allowed? Normal? What our families want?" I take her face in my hands. "I know. I've been telling myself the same thing."
"You?"
"Every Sunday, watching you watch me. Wondering if I was imagining it."
"You weren't imagining it." Her voice breaks. "I've been—since the first week—"
"Me too."
I kiss her.
She kisses back.
Desperate. Relieved. Like she's been holding her breath for years and finally remembered she can exhale.
"Asma—"
"Don't think." I pull her against me. "For once, don't think."
We stumble against the shelves. Pool noodles fall around us. Neither of us cares.
"I've never—" she gasps.
"Neither have I." I untie her lifeguard uniform. "We'll figure it out together."
We learn each other on a pile of foam floats.
Her body is athletic, strong—swimmer's muscles, lifeguard tan lines. I trace every part of her while she shakes beneath me.
"Is this okay?"
"More than okay." She pulls me down. "Please—"
I give her what she's asking for.
What we've both been asking for without words.
She's responsive.
Every touch makes her gasp. Every kiss makes her arch toward me. When my fingers find her center, she cries out.
"Quiet—" I whisper. "Someone could hear—"
"I don't care—" She pulls me closer. "I've been quiet my whole life. I don't want to be quiet anymore."
I make her loud.
Work her with my fingers while she grips my shoulders, while her body shakes, while she comes with my name on her lips.
Then she does the same to me.
After, we lie tangled on the floats.
"What happens now?" she asks.
"I don't know." I trace patterns on her arm. "This isn't—there's no roadmap for this."
"My family—"
"Doesn't have to know. Not yet. Not until we're ready."
"Are you ready?"
"I'm ready for this." I kiss her softly. "For us. Whatever form that takes."
"Even if it's complicated?"
"Everything worthwhile is complicated." I smile. "You told me I could be competitive if I wanted. Maybe I want to compete for this."
"For me?"
"For us."
We figure it out slowly.
Sunday afternoons become our time. Not just swimming—coffee after, dinners when we can manage, a relationship built in the margins of our lives.
"People will talk," she says one night.
"People always talk." I take her hand. "Let them."
"You're braver than me."
"I'm not brave." I pull her close. "I just found something worth fighting for."
She kisses me.
And for the first time in my life, I feel like I'm exactly where I'm supposed to be.
A year later, we move in together.
Our families don't know everything. But they know enough. And slowly, grudgingly, they start to accept.
"You're happy," my mother says one day.
"I am."
"I don't understand it. But I see it." She pauses. "That's enough for now."
It's enough.
More than enough.
Because happiness doesn't need understanding.
It just needs someone brave enough to reach for it.
And hold on.