1987

The wooden door to our home was wide open, bobbing against the cracked eggshell wall. Nothing unusual. Yet I still held Mama’s hand, burying my head into her fuzzy sweater, as she and Baba led the way in.

I dropped my head down at the floor and noticed beige, floral-imprinted tile coming into view, which meant we were now in the living room. I peeked from behind Mama’s sleeve and noticed Baba eyeing the moved brown sofa. He grabbed one end of and began to drag it back to its rightful place underneath the open French window, its pegs scraping against the tile.

“Hold on Waleed, let me help you or else you’ll bust something again.” My mother smirked.

“Forget it, Asma. I’ve already got it.”

I glanced at the adjacent window, strangely open as well; The soldiers probably couldn’t tolerate the combined fume cloud of ash and dust that accumulated from the outside world.

Baba looked in my direction. I retreated behind Mother’s petite shoulders, unable to stare at the suppressed pain in his hazel eyes. “Son.” I stayed quiet. “...Adam,” he tried again, stretching his arm out. “Please come here,” his voice went up an octave, faking a smile, but I remained glued behind Mama.

Baba was forced to stand underneath the hot sun for hours with his hands folded behind his head, lined up with the other men on the beach. Mama and I were admittedly forced to do the same, albeit in front of our house, while the soldiers rummaged our home for two hours. But our exhaustion couldn’t compare to Baba’s; we had the mercy of the balcony’s shade above our heads, unlike Baba.

“Adam, habibi,” Mama shimmied out of my grip and bent down. She brought my hands to her pouty lips. “Help me organize the book-shelf?'' She changed the subject. I glanced at the books scattered across the floor, gasped, and nodded. We walked over to the bookcase, hand-in-hand. A variety of my Albert Einstein books, science textbooks, adventure novels, Batman comics, encyclopedias, and retro-film guides Mama and Baba had collected for me were amongst the wreckage: My treasure. Mama was about to bend down to pick up my favorite Einstein biography book by E.J. Ally, but I beat her to it before she hurt her back. “No, let me,” I stuck out my short, thin arms.  

I placed the book onto the shelf and blinked up to find Mama mouthing something to Baba, concern etched in his features, before noticing me and subsequently pretending nothing was wrong. Baba squatted down to my level and grabbed my hand, wrapping his spacious palm around my tiny fingers. “Son, we’re ok,” he insisted, giving me a reassuring smile, like a quartet of pearl pillars propping up a vault ceiling from caving in on us. But even I could see the sand that the pillars were constructed atop of. He patted my hand with his other one. “We still have each other. And they don’t seem to have taken much. We’re blessed, right Asma?” Baba blinked over at Mama.

“Blessed.”

Baba’s eyes widened, realizing the error of his ways, but it was too late. Mama nodded with a weak smile, her chin and rosy lips quivering, struggling to maintain the facade “Yes we are... May God hear our prayers.”

“God.”

My chest filled with uneasiness and dread from hearing that word.

Beads of tears gathered in Mama’s waterlines. She turned away before Baba could say anything. Her shoulders quivered. Everything inside of me slumped to the ground, like layers of thick magma sloshing and dissolving the earth. I stood still, not knowing what to do. I wished I could tear the edges of the scene, crumple it down like a piece of paper, and chuck it into the trash can. I wanted to hug Mama and kiss her cheek, but I didn’t want to leave Baba by himself. Baba looked at me, at Mama, and then back at me. “One second,” Baba brought his finger to his lips. I nodded. He gave me a peck on the cheek and then went after Mama, having read my mind. I trailed a few steps after them but stopped at the corridor and shyly leaned out from behind. Baba comforted Mama with a tight hug, (as I anticipated), reassuring her that as long as God kept us together, we were ok. Mama attempted to apologize for losing control, but Baba shushed her. It reminded me of when I’d break down crying out for no reason and Baba would carry me in his arms until I was ok, whispering that he, Mama, and God were there for me.

“God.”

A comforting yet unsettling word.

I brushed all thought of him aside.

I focused back on Mama burying herself into Baba’s neck, waiting with anxious anticipation for the moment where Mama would nod at Baba’s words–because if an adult believed that the end of the war was near, that meant that it was true. Baba then murmured one last thing into something into her ear, causing them to glance at me. I whipped my head back behind the wall in embarrassment and slid down against the cream floral wallpaper. They weren’t stupid to think that I was oblivious towards Mama’s crumbling every now and then. But I still felt ashamed by injecting myself into a private moment between two adults, even if those two adults were my parents.

I fixated on the dirt between the tiles. Everything was quiet until approaching shoe soles then clacked. I ignored it, tracing a curling trail of dust with my finger and reminiscing of the jasmine vines that once decorated the outside of our apartment before the war charred it to a crisp.

A pair of faded-black dress shoes and pastel flats entered the corner of my eye, pointing towards me. I kept my head down.

“Adam?” Mama’s silk voice spoke up. I granted the floor a bashful smile, hoping to humor Mama without having to meet her eyes. Fabric rustled, and then two warm, veined hands wrapped themselves around my own. Mama tilted her cerulean eyes pleading to meet mine. She pecked me on the forehead. I blinked up as a reflex to the feeling of her lips blessing my skin. Palpable sadness traced Mama’s forehead and her swollen eyes, betraying my mother’s front of unwavering strength. She buried her nose in my curly hair and embraced me once more. Baba did the same. “Light of my heart,” Mama purred. She rose and walked to her bedroom at the end of the corridor, like a clay jar of golden honey pouring through a hole at the bottom.

Baba stayed beside me. “Adam, look what I’ve got.” He reached out towards me, his hands clasped over each other, concealing something. Last Tuesday, it was The Best of David Bowie cassette tape that we listened and sang-along to after being forced onto the beach. And the time before that, it was a laser-pen kit that he and I spent the afternoon putting together. I was excited as to what this surprise would be, but also hated putting him through so much trouble for me. We barely got by, as it was, yet he always made me a priority.

“You ready?” he asked with a grin. I nodded. “Look what I got you, Kiddo.” Baba unclasped his hands to reveal a radiant special-edition Whistling Piper lollipop in its golden and red-polka dotted Einstein wrapper glory. My jaw dropped at such a jewel, my mouth watered upon imagining the savoring cherry tangs zapping my tongue, and I gasped in excitement of blowing the end of that whistle. I know, I was overreacting to a lollipop. But I was a kid of war, give me a break! I hadn’t seen anything remotely tasty-looking like that for four months, courtesy of soldiers placing strict and erratic curfews on the district, causing a deficit on the merchants as well. We were stuck with only stale bread and Picon cheese for so long. Curfews were unpredictable. Sometimes Baba was allowed to get us food and supplies every four days. Other times, a week or even more. And there was no way to bend your way out of those curfews. Sneaking out wasn’t an option. Rather, it was an invitation to getting shot at by soldiers or robbed, kidnapped, shanked, raped, or killed by thugs lurking in the streets.

Baba noticed the distant look in my eyes. He nudged me and smiled at the gift. I leapt into my Baba’s chest, struggling to wrap my short arms around his long neck. Baba read my mind, picked me up, and placed me onto his lap. “Thank you, thank you, thank you, Baba!”

Baba stayed quiet, smiled, and wrapped his arms tighter around me: His way of saying ‘Don’t mention it.’ “Go on then,” he spoke up, “Give it a good blow!” I blinked at him, trying to think of something to say to buy time. “This lollipop’s different from other lollipops,” he said, understanding the context of the situation.

“Nuh-uh.” I shook my head.

           “Yes it is.”

“How?”

“This lollipop here is number 500,50540046, born to 500,50540030 and 500,50540015. When it was made, its parents specifically told it that its pop purpose was to find you and make you smile,” he grinned. I laughed. “Overwrite the old memory with the new one to make it worth it.”

I nodded. “Watch me!” I grinned like a troll, seized the P-51 jet attachment off the stick and stuck its tip into my mouth. I took a deep breath, puffed out my chest, and blew on the whistle. The whistle screeched like an eagle thundering through the apartment–flying, free, and powerful. I squealed, clapped my hands, and rocked back and forth like an infant amused by a game of peek-a-boo. Baba roared with laughter back, happy that I was happy. He held me tighter, pressing his cheek against mine. Before I knew it, Mama’s arms then joined and wrapped themselves around us in an embrace. My mother and father made me feel like the most cherished kid in the world.

We went on like that for ten minutes straight, until I had to use the bathroom from laughing so hard. “I’ll be back. Two minutes.” I entered the off-white bathroom, unzipped my pants, and did my business. After finishing up, I turned two steps around me and washed my hands with the levantine soap. “Scrub, scrub, scrub,” I entertained myself in a low, goblin-like voice, pleased with the foaming bubbles in the faucet. I reached forward to place the soap bar back on the countertop when a high-pitched masculine scream rocked the building.

I froze, paralyzed with fear.

It sounded like someone was on fire–no–an explosion–no–a warplane.

I continued to hold still, hoping to hear whatever else it was. But everything was quiet again with only the water running down the drain echoing in the bathroom. “...No, but it wasn't a warplane. Where’s the whirring–the shaking–missiles–the apartments crumbling–kids screaming.”

A commotion then sounded. I leapt over to the edge of the bathtub and slammed open the window’s blurred panel. I leaned out to see what was going on and found a yelping crowd forming ten feet away from the roadblock.

 A malnourished thirty-something-year-old man was on the ground, disoriented eyes locked towards the scorching sky. Not a limb or nerve twitched. Blood spread out from underneath his rib toward the trembling crowd.A soldier stood in front of the injured man, his hands still propped on his FN FAL assault rifle.

“Adam!” A distant pounding catapulted the door behind me.

None of it was real.

The blood was fake.

The guns, the debris, the roadblock, the crowd, the soldier. It was all fake.

 “Adam! Adam, open up! Open the goddamn door, son!”

Familiar, drained-out voices.

It was all just a film set.

“You son-of-a-bitch!” A muscular man emerged from the crowd, taking two steps towards the soldier. “Have you no shame? No honor?”

“Gibran, don’t!” a lady in a beige dress stretched out. He swatted away her arm and proceeded towards the soldier. More screaming commenced from the crowd.

“The soldier brandished his gun towards Gibran. “Move,” he spat in heavy Arabic.

 “To loot our homes? To kick us out, arms folded as if we’ve done shit to you? —”

“Stop.”

“—To kill our loved ones in cold blood and tell us it’s for our protection? To destroy our country? To take away all we value? Our dignity, our respect—” Gibran pointed to the man laying on the floor.

He blinked. “Enough or shoot.”

“Please, Gibran!” his wife begged him.

Gibran twitched, halting in his steps, “...Look at him. He needs help, goddammit! Have you no mercy? Help! Help! Help! Doesn’t your bastard brain understand what the hell you’ve done?” Gibran was only a crouch away from the injured man. “H-E-L-P!” he kicked at the crunching gravel.

“Beg,” the soldier kept a firm voice along with the javelin it impaled.

“What?” Gibran was caught off guard.

“Beg” he sneered.

“In your fucking dreams, scum.”

“Then watch. Shoot another filthy one.”

Gibran snapped back towards the crowd in disbelief. “You’re bluffing.”

“Don’t try.”

“Gibran!” the woman called again. “Shut your mouth. Stop talking back or else he’ll really do it.” She clasped her hands together in a pleading gesticulation. Gibran continued to stare the soldier dead in the face.

The soldier clicked his gun.

Gibran gulped. “Please,” he muttered through gritted teeth.

“Not begging. Down. Ground,” the soldier demanded.

Gibran glared into the soldier’s eyes with a hateful vengeance as he sank to the floor. His forehead veins throbbed, ready to pop out through his temples. Puss dripped from the crevices of his callused, crumpled hands. 

“Pray to God so he helps you.”

My heart skipped a beat.

Gibran’s stare dripped of death.

“Well?” the soldier asked.

“…May God curse you and your house. May you taste the fires of hell as raw as you deserve them—"

The soldier smirked.

Something exploded behind me and sent wood chips clattering into my hair and onto the floor. Arms wrapped themselves around me, picked me up, and took me away from the bathroom as I began to process what was happening.

“No, put me down!” I shouted.

“Are you ok? Are you hurt? Your back’s soaking with sweat!” my mother sobbed.

“Mama, please! –”

A gunshot clacked outside and echoed into the sky between the apartments.

“No! No!”