The Immigration Lawyer
"She's the lawyer who handles his family's visa cases. He's the client who keeps finding reasons to visit her office. When his brother's application is approved, he shows up with champagne. She doesn't drink, but she's thirsty for something else."
"Your brother's visa is approved."
I watch Yasmin's face light up as she delivers the news, and something in my chest tightens. Three years of work. Three years of visiting this office, filling out forms, pretending the only reason I keep coming back is for my family's cases.
"Alhamdulillah." I stand, not sure what to do with the relief flooding through me. "I can't thank you enough."
"It's my job."
"It's more than that." I step toward her desk. "You fought for him. When the Home Office kept finding excuses, you kept fighting."
"That's what immigration lawyers do."
"Not like you." I'm too close now. Can smell her perfume—something subtle, professional. "I've heard the stories. Other lawyers give up. You don't."
She looks up at me. Something shifts in her eyes.
"Mr. Hassan—"
"Khalid."
"Khalid." She says it carefully, like she's testing a boundary. "Your family's cases are closed. All approvals. There's no reason for you to come to this office anymore."
"What if I find a reason?"
The first time I came to Yasmin Farah's office, I was desperate.
My mother needed a visa extension. My brother was stuck in limbo. Everyone told me immigration law was a dead end, that Somalis didn't have a chance under the current government.
Yasmin took the cases anyway.
"I don't accept lost causes," she told me. "But I don't accept easy ones either. Your family has a chance. I'll find it."
She found it.
One by one, she unraveled the bureaucratic tangles, fought the appeals, got my family legal and safe. I told myself my gratitude was professional. But every time I sat in her office—watching her brilliant mind work, noticing the way she bit her lip when she was thinking—I knew I was lying.
"I've been finding reasons for three years," I tell her now. "Every time I didn't need to come, I invented something."
"Why?"
"You know why."
She stands.
Walks around her desk. Stops in front of me.
"This is highly inappropriate."
"I know."
"You were my client."
"Was." I take her hand. "The cases are closed. You said so yourself."
"That doesn't make it—"
"Make it what? Two people who met professionally finding something else?" I pull her closer. "That's not inappropriate. That's human."
"Khalid—"
"Tell me you never thought about it. Tell me every late-night call about documents was just business. Tell me honestly, and I'll walk out that door."
She's quiet.
Then: "I can't tell you that."
I kiss her.
In her office, surrounded by case files and legal books and everything professional. She kisses back—hesitant at first, then hungry.
"We shouldn't—"
"The cases are closed—"
"Still—"
"Do you want me to stop?"
She answers by pulling me toward the couch.
Her office couch has seen consultations, negotiations, clients crying over denied visas.
Now it sees us—tangled together, pulling at each other's clothes, making up for three years of denied attraction.
"I've wanted this—" she gasps as I kiss her neck, "since you argued with me about that appeal—"
"The one I was right about?"
"You weren't—" She pulls my shirt off. "You're still not—"
"Then prove it."
She pushes me down. Climbs on top. Her suit jacket is gone, her blouse undone, and she's looking at me like I'm a case she's determined to win.
"I always prove it."
She rides me on the couch.
Still half-dressed, skirt hiked up, taking what she wants with the same determination she brings to everything. I watch her—this brilliant, fierce woman who's spent three years being professional—finally let go.
"Khalid—"
"Take what you need."
"I need—" She speeds up. "I need you to stop being so—"
"What?"
"Perfect." She grabs my shoulders. "Every meeting. Every call. Always polite, always appropriate, always making me want to be inappropriate."
"I didn't know."
"Liar." She kisses me hard. "You knew. You just didn't push."
"I'm pushing now."
I flip us over.
I take her on her own couch.
In her own office. With her nameplate visible on the desk and her law degree watching from the wall. She wraps her legs around me and stops being a lawyer—becomes just Yasmin, gasping my name, begging for more.
"Yes—yes—Khalid—"
"You're so—"
"Don't stop—please—"
I don't stop.
I push deeper, harder, feel her body respond to every thrust. Three years of tension exploding between us.
"I'm going to—"
"With me—" I reach between us. "Come with me, Yasmin—"
She shatters.
Cries out my name as she falls apart, pulling me with her, both of us collapsing on the couch in a tangle of clothes and satisfaction.
After, we lie there, catching our breath.
"This can't happen again," she says.
"Why not?"
"Because I have a reputation. Because clients can't—" She stops. "You're not my client anymore."
"Exactly."
"But you were." She sits up, starts fixing her clothes. "If anyone found out—"
"They won't." I sit up too. "Unless you want them to."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean—" I take her hand. "This doesn't have to be a secret. We met professionally, sure. But professional relationships become personal all the time. People will understand."
"My colleagues—"
"Will be jealous." I kiss her palm. "That the most brilliant lawyer in London is dating the most persistent client."
"Dating?"
"If you want." I hold her gaze. "I didn't wait three years for one afternoon on a couch, Yasmin. I waited for you."
She agrees to dinner.
Then another dinner. Then weekends. Then introducing me to her mother—the scariest case she's ever handled, she jokes.
"You really love her," her mother says when Yasmin's out of the room.
"I do."
"Good." She pats my hand. "She works too hard. She needs someone to remind her there's life outside the law."
"I'll try my best."
"See that you do."
A year later, I propose.
In her office. On that couch. Where it all changed.
"You can't be serious," she says, looking at the ring.
"I'm always serious about you."
"This is where we—"
"Where we stopped pretending." I take her hand. "Marry me, Yasmin. Let me spend my life being your hardest case."
She laughs. Cries. Says yes.
And when we kiss, I can swear I hear three years of waiting finally, fully end.