I WAKE UP WITH A JOLT, AND MY HANDS FLY TO MY hijab. It had gotten tangled and nearly fallen off during the night. I hold a hand against my head, trying to remember what’s going on. Kenan woke me up for Fajr prayer, and then I instantly fell back asleep.
“Ugh,” I groan, rubbing my forehead and quickly adjusting my hijab.
I notice Lama’s little body shifting beside me. I hurriedly crawl over to her and let out a sigh of relief when I touch her cheeks. She’s not as feverish anymore. Kenan walks out of the kitchen with two mugs of hot tea and hands one to me. His hair is ruffled, sticking up from all sides, courtesy of sleep. The sight of the pink blush on his cheeks and his starry eyes makes me feel flustered.
My God, I spent the night here. In his apartment.
“Good morning,” he says.
“Thank you.” I accept the tea gratefully. “Lama is more than fine, alhamdulillah.”
It’s hot and I take a sip. Mint tea. Yum, Layla loves mint tea.
Layla.
I choke on my tea, and Kenan looks up, worried. “What’s wrong?”
“I’m fine,” I gasp, my eyes smarting from the tea scalding my tongue. “I forgot about Layla. I need to leave. What time is it? I need to get to the hospital. My God, how long was I asleep? It doesn’t matter. I need to go back to Layla! Keep an eye on your sister, okay? She’s fine, but make her take the antibiotics. Thank you for the tea.”
I gulp it down in one swig, grimacing as it burns, and jump to my feet.
“Kenan, what time is it?” I say, distracted, when I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror. God, I look horrible. I grab my lab coat, hurry over to the destroyed balcony, and peer outside. Kenan has taken down the blanket
to let the breeze in, and the fresh air is what I need for my overheated body.
“Is it safe?” I put on my lab coat. “Are there snipers? I’m worried about Layla. She better be okay. Kenan, what time is it? I have a shift at the hospital.” I snap my fingers behind my back to get his attention while watching the roads outside. They’re half empty and it seems no one is trying to hide on the rooftops.
I realize Kenan hasn’t said anything for quite some time. Turning around, I see him sipping his own tea, watching my outburst with an amused look.
“Why aren’t you answering me?” I demand. He takes another sip and puts his mug on the floor.
“Didn’t give me a chance there with your monologizing. It was too entertaining to stop.” He grins.
“Glad you’re enjoying this.” I glare. He doesn’t look fazed at all.
“Are you always like this?”
“This?” I repeat, raising an eyebrow.
“Panicky with a hint of control freak?”
“Most days.”
“That’s good,” he says, still grinning, and I don’t know if he’s being sarcastic or not. He doesn’t sound sarcastic. Anyway, I don’t have time to analyze his tone or features.
“Okay. I need to go now. Are there snipers outside?” I pull my bag tighter on my shoulder. I hate that I feel self-conscious about how I look, with my chapped lips and wrinkled hijab.
“How should I know?” he says. “They always change their timing. The
FSA pushes them back sometimes.”
I sigh. I’m going to have to wing this.
“All right, I’ll manage,” I say half-heartedly and move toward the door.
He holds up an arm against the doorway. “Where do you think you’re
going?”
“Um, home?”
“You honestly think I’d let you walk alone? When there could be snipers?”
“Do you have a secret invisible airplane I can take?”
“Ha. I’m coming with you,” he says, putting on his jacket.
“No you’re not. Your sister needs you.”
“I’m sorry, are you my mother?” he argues. “I make my own decisions, thank you very much. Let’s go.”
“You can’t—” I begin, shaking my hands for emphasis.
“Yusuf can take care of things until I’m back. He’s not incompetent.”
He doesn’t give me a chance to answer before he’s out the door.
Dammit! Now I have to worry about his life and whether his soul will be on my conscience.
Yusuf is out of his room, glancing shyly at me before sitting next to Lama.
“Take care of her, okay? And yourself,” I say. He nods, and I ignore the pang in my stomach at the sight of his tattered shirt and narrow frame.
Kenan has to leave, I decide, before these children bury their brother too.
I peek outside, equally pleased and scared to see the sun shining down on us. On one hand, it provides warmth against the last traces of winter, while on the other, it provides perfect conditions for snipers.
There are a few men standing in front of Kenan’s building, holding chipped mugs of tea, deep in discussion, while a couple of children zoom about, shouting excitedly. I even hear a few laughs and clutch that shred of innocence that’s still alive and fighting, tucking it safely in my heart.
Loose gravel crunches under our shoes as we make our way to my home. We pass by a run-down bakery still operating. A long line is outside, people warming their hands and pulling tightly on their coats. They wait patiently, although there’s an edginess in their eyes, all worrying the bread will run out and they’ll have to return to their families empty-handed.
With each step we take, I come to terms with the decision I made last night. Enveloped in the darkness and illuminated by feeble candlelight, it was easy to make. It was a secret I was able to whisper to myself. But now in the blazing sunlight that lays my soul bare, it feels like a permanent stain of shame.
I glance at Kenan’s tall form. Not even the baggy jacket can hide the
sharp edges of his elbows or his bony hands. He’s not supposed to look like this. He and his siblings should be healthy and safe and happy. He should be working on his Japanese and trying to get into Studio Ghibli.
He can’t stay here.
“Are you really staying in Homs?” I whisper. “Are you really going to die here?”
He stops walking and turns around to look at me with surprise.
“I’m not planning on getting killed,” he says slowly.
I shake my head. “At the rate you’re going, with your ambitions and dangerous thoughts, that will be how your story ends. Would your parents be okay with that? If you were taken away and your siblings were left alone to suffer and mourn for you? What about the promise you made to your father?”
He stares at me, a deep sadness settling on his expression.
“I was the only girl in my family,” I say. “An older brother, Hamza. He was my world. My best friend. My everything. He and Baba were at a protest, and they couldn’t get away when the military swooped in. A week later, Mama died when a bomb fell on our building.”
“Salama,” he says. His tone is soft, almost frightened of what I’m about to say.
But I continue. “I lost my family and you still have yours. I see it every day at the hospital: People would sell their souls for another minute with their loved ones. I would.”
The backs of my eyes burn, but I stop myself from breaking down.
Daisies. Daisies. Sweet-smelling daisies.
“I tried to visit them in prison. But I wasn’t allowed to see them. I was about to be arrested myself, and it was a miracle they let me walk free.
They warned me not to come back.”
He takes in a shuddering breath and I quickly brush away the tear falling down my cheek.
I remember it all, the stench of oxidized blood, the faint screams echoing against my ears. It was a few weeks before the siege on Old Homs happened. The prison isn’t in Old Homs, and I was able to walk into the detention facility with trembling limbs. The wound on the back of my head was in the early scarring stages and Khawf was beginning to plague my nights. Layla hadn’t the slightest idea of what I was doing because she was
bedridden with grief, her eyes vacant, tears streaming down her cheeks like two rivers.
“Salama Kassab,” the military man said, leaning heavily back in his chair and skimming through a coffee-stained list. I hoped it was coffee.
“Yes.” I gripped the edges of the old leather couch where the stuffing was coming out, all wrinkly and moldy yellow.
He grunted, staring at the list through his silver sunglasses. I couldn’t see his eyes, and it unnerved me.
“Your father and brother have stirred up quite the trouble,” he said smoothly, but I sensed the danger lurking under his tone.
“Please,” I whispered, heart hammering. “Please, they’re all I have. My mother di—my father suffers from hypertension. He needs his medication, and my brother…” I cut myself off. I couldn’t tell them about Layla. They’d use her to punish him.
“Do you know how many times I hear the same sob story?” he said in an exasperated voice. “Please let my mother out, she didn’t know what she was doing. Please let my son out, he’s the only one I have in this world.
Please let my daughter out, she didn’t realize how great an offense this is.
Please let my husband out, he’s old and frail.” He slammed the list on the table, and I flinched. “No. No I will not let them out. They broke the law.
They disturbed the peace with these notions.”
A pained shriek reached my ears. I squeezed my eyes shut before opening them to stare at the man who held the fate of my loved ones in his grasp. I hated him.
“I’ve never been to a protest, and I never will. I swear. So please, for me, let them out. They won’t do anything like this again. I promise.” My voice took on a pleading tone, and I began to hate myself too. To grovel to our murderers and torturers. The government had long since promised the consequences if we were to rebel. Everything we had feared for fifty years was coming true.
The man smiled, all yellow teeth, and got up heavily from his seat.
“Little girl.” He stood in front of me, and I dug my nails into my hands, wincing. The wounds were just budding into scars. “You better leave before you join them.”
“I’m sorry,” Kenan whispers, and his voice awakens me from the nightmare replaying in my mind.
“Don’t be sorry for me.” I swallow hard. “You still have your siblings. If you’re staying, then don’t throw your life away.”
His shoulders constrict. And I understand why he’s doing what he’s doing. God, I do. But not like this. Not when I felt Lama’s blood running between my fingers like a spring and heard him tell me about her courageous heart. Not when I know Yusuf can’t talk anymore because of the trauma. They need help that isn’t in Homs. They both need to be allowed to be children.
But it’s clear from the flickering flames in his eyes and the suppressed agony in his words: He knows that a desolate future awaits him if he doesn’t leave. He’s not a fool. But his heart overflows with so much love for his country he’s willing to let it drown him and his loved ones. The thing is, hearing stories about the ocean’s rage is different from being caught in the middle of the angry waves.
“What do you record exactly, Kenan?” I ask, and he looks surprised by the question.
“Uh, the protests, like I told you. The revolution songs.”
“And deaths?”
He grimaces. “When the gunshots go off, I stop and run.”
I consider him for a second before nodding and make to walk past him, an incoherent thought wakening in my brain, but he clears his throat.
“My mom’s Hamwi,” he says in a quiet voice.
I stop.
“She survived the Hama massacre,” he continues, and I turn to look at him. “When the military stormed her city and laid waste for a whole month, she survived. She was seven years old, and she watched her nine-year-old brother get shot in the head. She saw his brain splatter everywhere. She starved with her family. They ate once every three days. I’ve lost family even before I was born, Salama. Injustice is all I’ve ever known.” He pauses, his chest heaves once, and when he looks at me, there’s absolute determination in his eyes. I nearly shiver from the intensity of it. “This is why I protest. Why I record. Why I should stay. All those years before the revolution started. Didn’t you lose family to the dictatorship too, Salama?”
He knows the answer. No Syrian family has evaded the dictatorship’s cruelty. We both lost family in the Hama massacre before we were born, but Kenan’s loss steeled his resolve from when he was a child. It grew with
him. Shaped him. Unlike me. I ignored the loss until it became my reality.
A knot forms in my throat and it’s difficult to swallow without bursting into tears, so instead I walk toward my house. After a second, he follows.
We’re getting closer, which makes me more anxious. I need to touch Layla to know she’s alive and well. I need to make sure the baby didn’t decide to throw a wrench in our plans and come early.
We stay silent the rest of the way, lost in our worries and thoughts.
When my home comes into view, I let out a small breath of relief. My neighborhood is quiet, and Kenan and I are the only ones on the streets.
Everything looks as normal as can be, the faded blue front door still in one piece. I take out my keys, fumble desperately at the lock.
Kenan leans against the wall. “I’ll wait outside.”
“What! Get in before someone shoots you!” I usher him inside and close the door quickly.
The house is quiet. No light filters from the living room’s drawn windows. Shadows dance against the hallway walls and somehow it feels colder inside the house than outside it.
“Stay here,” I mutter. He nods and turns toward the front door in case Layla makes a sudden appearance hijab-less.
I call out loudly, “Layla, I’m home!”
She doesn’t answer. A knot twists in my stomach.
“She might be sleeping?” Kenan suggests, still facing the door.
“Maybe.”
I check the living room where she usually sleeps, but it’s empty and disturbingly cold, no sun rays seeping through the curtains. The rug under the couch is dark, the whorls akin to gray clouds swirling before a storm.
The kitchen overlooking it is also muted, like someone watered down the colors. The uneasiness grows like vines, wrapping around my skeletal system.
“Layla,” I repeat and head down the hallway, my sneakers thudding softly against the carpet.
Shadows envelop my footsteps, and my heart is in my throat, fluttering like a baby bird. Her bedroom door is fastened shut, and I trail my fingers along the surface before deciding to check my room first.
When I creak open my door, all the while begging God for her to please be there, I almost fall to the floor with relief.
Layla is sprawled on my covers, hugging my pillow to her chest. Her eyes are closed, her lips moving in silent prayer.
“Layla!” I cry out, and her eyes burst open, a choked sound escaping her throat.
“Salama!” she gasps. She jumps from the bed.
We collide into each other, my arms shaking as I hold her close, her hair in my mouth. But I don’t care. She’s alive and pregnant. Very much pregnant, her stomach bumping me.
She leans back, grabs my shoulders, and shakes me. “Where were you?” she demands.
“A patient couldn’t be moved from their home, so I had to go there and operate. Then a fight broke out between the FSA and the military, and I couldn’t leave,” I say, breathless.
Her eyes are rimmed red, her cheeks blotchy, but she takes in a deep breath. “Okay.”
“The patient’s brother brought me home. He’s, uh, he’s here,” I say, trying to be casual.
She glances over my shoulder. “Here? As in, in our home?”
I nod.
Realization slowly dawns on her and scandalous shock is in every word.
“Oh my God, Salama. Did you spend the night at a boy’s house?”
I shove her shoulder playfully and she giggles.
“Stop it,” I mutter. “I was nearly sick with worry. Why didn’t you answer when I called?”
She looks at me pointedly. “You know I don’t answer unknown numbers.”
I drag a hand across my face, sighing. “Fine. Fine. Alhamdulillah you’re
okay. That’s all that matters.”
“I am.”
“I have to tell Kenan you’re fine. You can say hello if you want.”
She gives me an exasperated look and points at herself. The flyaway, fiery hair, the watery eyes, and the wrinkled clothes. “Say hello looking like this? No thank you, I’d rather stay here.”
I shake my head, smiling.
Kenan still has his back to me when I walk out. My eyes trail over his broad shoulders and the casual way his hands are in his pockets as he rocks
back and forth on the heels of his boots. I stop and for one minute allow myself to imagine our might life in this dusty hallway. That I’m living my very own Studio Ghibli movie. That in this universe he and I have our own inside jokes, and my ring finger wears the golden band he gave me. Those thoughts make my cheeks burn, but I don’t care. I am owed this. I’m owed at least my imagination.
“Kenan,” I call. “You can turn around. Layla isn’t coming out.”
He does so slowly, his gaze still glued to the carpet.
“Is she okay?” he asks, finally meeting my eyes.
I nod.
His stare darts over the hallway as he takes in the shabbiness. He says nothing, and I detect sadness in his expression.
“Are you sure she’s fine?” he asks again. “I can go get you something.
Like… bread or milk if they have it at the grocery.”
I shake my head. “Thank you. We’re fine. She’s doing good.”
He exhales. “All right. I guess… this is goodbye.”
I chew on my tongue, feeling a bit crestfallen at that word. How I hate it.
Goodbye.
“Right,” I say instead.
He nods at me before opening the door and looks back one more time.
“Thank you, Salama, for everything. You’ve not only saved Lama’s life but
you’ve saved mine and Yusuf’s too.”
He smiles, green eyes bright and warm.
For now, I think.
He slips through the door and the incoherent thought that’s been forming in the back of my mind finally makes its way to my mouth.
“Kenan!” I shout. He stops a few feet away.
“Yes?” he asks, and I swear I can hear hope.
I walk toward him, rubbing my arms. I can save him and his siblings. I know I can.
“Record at the hospital,” I say when I’m close enough that I can see the
two freckles on his neck.
He looks taken aback. “What?”
“Come to the hospital and record the injured. You say you want to help, right? Show the world what’s happening? Well, nothing screams injustice more than that. The protests are usually at night. And because it’s dark, the
visibility isn’t that good. But at the hospital, you’d… It’ll be more impactful.” My voice trails off into a quiet whisper.
His eyes soften at my words and he stares at me for a long minute before
saying, “Why?”
“Why?” I echo.
“You’ve made it clear you think what I’m doing is dangerous. Why do you want me doing more of that, closer to you?”
I crack my knuckles, looking for a way to drain the anxiety building in my blood.
Because when you see the people who are dying. When you see the mutilated children and you hear them crying with fear and pain. Maybe then you’ll know how lucky you are that you are okay. That you can leave.
Instead, I fix him with a cool stare. “My thinking it’s dangerous has nothing to do with the fact that I love my country and I don’t want to see more people murdered.”
His ears turn red and he covers his face with one hand. “I—I’m sorry. I didn’t—”
I shake my head. “It’s fine. I know you didn’t mean it like that. Look, I’m not forcing you. Do you want to do this?”
His arm falls, and I’m met once again with his brilliant green eyes.
“Yes,” he says. I feel a shiver run up and down my back. “Yes, I want to.”
I let out a relieved breath. “Good. We have to ask Dr. Ziad’s permission, but I doubt he’ll mind. He’s all for this war.”
“Revolution, Salama,” Kenan says. His smile is sad. “It’s a revolution.”
I purse my lips. “Be at the hospital tomorrow at nine.”
As I walk back inside, I see Layla standing right in front of the door with the biggest grin I’ve ever seen on her.
“Kenan, huh?” She wiggles her eyebrows and I groan. “You sounded awfully cozy there. I was this close to opening the door and marching over there myself to see what was happening.”
I push past her, heat claiming my cheeks, but she’s fast, grabbing my
arm and turning me around.
“Why are you blushing?” she asks.
“I’m not,” I stutter.
She narrows her eyes. “Do you know him?”
“Yes?”
“Oh my God, if you’re going to drag out your answers, I will hit you on your head,” she says with a fierce look.
“Fine! I—we—he was the one who was supposed to come with his mother last year for the marriage talk thing.” I say it in a rush like I’m
tearing off a Band-Aid.
Silence. Then… “Ohmygosh!”
There’s no way to get a sentence in when Layla starts gushing.
Everything I thought she would say and everything I didn’t yet think of bursts right out. Kenan and I are meant to be. This is fate. This is true love.
I’m going to be happy. I will get married. We will be a power couple. She’ll be the lovable aunt our children will adore. This is great. Our children will grow up together. We will survive. Her chatter follows me from the kitchen to my room where I change into a fresh sweater and back into my lab coat —because I’m already late for my hospital shift—and I head to the front door again.
“Layla, that sounds nice and everything,” I finally say when she stops to breathe. “But we have bigger things to worry about.”
I take a deep breath, steeling myself for the words that will be my undoing. “I’ve decided we’re going to leave. I’m going to talk to Am and I’m going to find a way to pay for that boat.”
Layla stops short, her mouth dropping open. “What—what changed your mind?” she whispers.
I scratch at a stain on my sleeve. “Reality set in.”
Layla reaches out, grabs me by the shoulders, and hugs me tightly. “I know how hard this decision is for you. But you’re not doing anything wrong, okay?”
I say nothing, just breathing in her daisy scent.
“Say it,” she says fiercely. “Say you’re not doing anything wrong by leaving.”
I let out a choked laugh. “I’m… not doing anything wrong by leaving.”
She pulls away and brushes my cheeks. “Good.”
Before I walk out, she grabs my hand and I look at her.
“Salama,” she says, smiling. And with the sunlight pouring from the cracked door caressing her face, she looks like she did in the old days. Rosy cheeks and ocean-blue eyes sparkling with life. “It doesn’t hurt for you to think about your future. We don’t have to stop living because we might die.
Anyone might die at any given moment, anywhere in the world. We’re not an exception. We just see death more regularly than they do.”
I think about Kenan and that might life. Saturday nights marathoning Ghibli movies. Collecting potted plants and flowers so our apartment is always filled with life. Having Layla and Baby Salama over for dinner and doting on my niece. Hamza and Kenan bonding over something like soccer or video games.
I clear my throat rather loudly. “Yeah, I’ll see you tonight, Layla.”
The smile she gives me mirrors Kenan’s in its melancholy.
