Act One: Part 1: The First Moments Between Ahmed and Maryia

In the dawn darkness, Ahmed, who has black hair and white skin, stretches his arm to turn off his phone alarm. He adjusts the alarm for Fajr prayers every night as he is Muslim in the United States. He performs ablution, puts the mat on the floor, and starts to pray Fajr. The weather is a bit cold. It's September of 2015. The room with white walls and wealthy equipment is dark, which makes him focus on praying. After saluting, he prays, sitting on the mat. "Allah, I don't want anything but your blessings and forgiveness. I'm.. I'm trying to keep your guidance as I can.. Please, save my family and me from any crisis. Amen." He wipes his face with his hands. He is spiritual rather than his rioter behaviors. 

As he is a second-generation Egyptian-American, Ahmed had some problems coping with the world. Different cultures and people. However, he doesn't know a lot about Egyptian culture except some things he knew from Egyptian movies he watched when he was curious about his ancestors. His mother, Sarah, taught him the Quran and prayers. His father, Magdy, wasn't very religious. In this cruel world, it was a beautiful thing to see Ahmed commit to his prayers. 

At the same time, Maryia, who has the same appearance and features as Ahmed, was praying in her modest room, and crying. "Allah, I know I have to be patient but.. I'm tired of these thoughts.. I can't resist it anymore.. Please Allah, let me get healed from this soon". She wipes her tears and stands up to continue sleeping before school in the morning. Maryia is suffering from psychosis. She has been suffering from delusions and dissociation for a while. That's why she asks for God's help.

Maryia, who is a second-generation Egyptian-American as well, chose to be religious in teenage as she developed a strict personality and a distant one from her family members who adapted to the country's cultural background. She chooses to wear the hijab although her mother, Yousra, and sister, Leyan, don't wear it. The challenge was higher for Maryia to adapt to the differences of the cultures. She had no personality and a cold face, although she had volcanoes deep inside. She needed love and support from her parents who were distant and cold. However, she could give what she missed sometimes.

Hopefully, Maryia and Ahmed's families decide to let them get into an international high school, where bullying can be manageable as all students are already diverse, which will help them be open to different cultural backgrounds and it can enhance their communication skills. Their Arabic speech was rare as they had to adapt to the daily conversations with the Americans. As a result, Ahmed and Maryia didn't know much Arabic. All of these messy cultural changes were

the reason for their suffering from mental illnesses. It is not the same for all international students to suffer, but as in the case of Ahmed and Maryia who had parental issues, they had a worse experience.

The morning comes, and Ahmed gets out of his room, holding his school bag. Suddenly, he remembers that he forgot something, his books! Ahmed has a history of ADHD but he doesn't remember about it. His medications were taken at the age of 6. He didn't know what ADHD meant. He was a child. Hopefully, he got healed from it, did well in studies and socials, and stopped medications, until he started to suffer again with a different pain.

He passes beside Sarah having a short warm conversation. "Mom, I'm getting out. Bye," Ahmed said. Sarah raises her voice. "Eat something before leaving, dear!" Ahmed after opening the door, hurrying to school. "I'll eat something outside." Sarah smiles reacting to his teenage behaviors. Ahmed is the only child of his parents, so his mother loves him a lot. She also has felt sad for him in his childhood for his suffering from ADHD.

At the same time, Maryia was holding her school bag tightly. She has a serious personality. No boyfriends, no jokes, just studies! She passes beside Yousra quickly, her mother, having a usual stiff conversation. Maryia says in a rough voice. "I'm going to school. Bye!" Yousra, who is watching the TV, looks at Maryia. "Did you eat something?" Maryia replies sharply. "I did!" Maryia leaves the house, and Yousra looks surprised. Maryia has been very distant and staying alone a lot. This habit gradually increases.

In the school corridor, Ahmed and Maryia are walking on the same floor. On the first days of the first semester of senior high school year, the class started minutes ago. That's why Maryia was in a hurry. Ahmed and Maryia exchange glances. Maryia looks interested in him, while Ahmed looks cold and prestigious, which makes Maryia adopt the same attitude and look her way to the class. Maryia gets into the class quickly before him. She sits beside her friends after coldly warming them as a serious, perfect, good girl. Ahmed comes after her. The class boys (they are men as they believe about themselves) salute Ahmed warmly. One guy asks him. "How are you, man?" Another one asks about his health, and Ahmed waves at each of them and shakes some of their hands. "I'm good, guys!" Maryia is somewhat introverted, while Ahmed is extremely extroverted and talkative.

Maryia looks at him with narrowed eyes. Ahmed sits beside one of his friends and starts talking and laughing. The teacher suddenly. "Ahmed! Keep silent!" Ahmed waves at the teacher, showing apologies. Girls looked at him with interest as he was handsome and had a powerful personality. Maryia, who is still looking at Ahmed, looks back at the teacher again who resumes the lesson. She doesn't forget to drop her eyelids, showing an uncaring attitude, although she showed the opposite a few seconds before.

****

Maryia is a talented guitarist. Although she is serious, she believes in the arts and has a sense of beauty. She always had feelings to express, but her psychosis prevented her from effective communication with people. She needed strength and believed Love is a weakness. When she was playing guitar outside the classroom, Ahmed was sitting and watching her with curiosity. He didn't know if something was growing inside him or just her beautiful fingers caught his attention. She strums the guitar and plays advanced notes and chords. With every strumming she does, Ahmed's heart bounds. Her classmates give her a lot of attention just for her talent, not for herself, as she is rarely conversational. They look amused and enjoy her music.

When the teacher gets in the classroom, Maryia stands up with her friends to get into the class, as well. She puts the guitar in a safe place in the classroom and walks to sit in her seat. Ahmed monitors her when she comes inside. As the teacher started writing the lesson on the board, Ahmed peeked at Maryia. He is doing something against his charismatic personality. He is not used to giving that attention to a girl. He looks at her with wide eyes and a dumb face. Suddenly, a girl asks Maryia to explain a question in a notebook. Maryia looks back at her. When Maryia looks back, Ahmed looks away quickly like he wasn't looking around her. Maryia noticed him but didn't care. She thought he didn't care about her as she was not that attractive.

As the teacher started explaining the lesson, Ahmed peeked at Maryia again. He was monitoring all her eye movements. He was stressed about his appearance and whether she liked him or didn't care as she always shows. When Maryia looks around him, for instance, he quickly adjusts his t-shirt. Something was seriously growing inside him. He wanted to look amazing in her eyes as she also did. Suddenly, some girls in the class catch Ahmed looking at Maryia and adjusting his t-shirt. They whisper in each other's ears and laugh. As Ahmed noticed this, he felt embarrassed and covered this with a serious face and threw it in the book, acting as if he was attentive to the teacher.

The break comes, and the students are in San Francisco's International High School campus. The atmosphere is full of youthful actions. As Maryia was sitting on a seat, she was monitoring Ahmed, who was playing football, or as he was supposed to focus on. He was coming and going everywhere in the playground, talking, joking, running, joining a football match... He has an ADHD history! Maryia, who was curious about mental health, was surfing her phone searching for psychosis, her disorder, and... ADHD.

She had a feeling that Ahmed had ADHD and a past suffering with it. Her sense of mental health and the huge amount of knowledge she acquired from reading made her very aware of the cases and what they may suffer. However, she failed several times to put down a diagnosis. Her phone showed information about Psychosis and ADHD. When she was reading about ADHD, she was monitoring Ahmed's movements more and more. She was analyzing everything. The hyperactivity, the talkative characteristic, the inattentive and hyper-focusing attitude, and more symptoms she was curious if he had or not like daydreaming.