Night Notes: Some nights break you. Some nights write you back.

It's 12:43 a.m., and Murad has told himself the same lie every night this month: this is the last time.

He's a pre-med student with a highlighted textbook, a presentation due Thursday, and a phone that keeps glowing in the dark long after he's promised himself he's done. He knows the fiqh. He knows the du'as. None of it has stopped him from reaching for it again.

Night Notes follows Murad through one semester of trying — really trying — to close the gap between the young man he prays to be an...