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Zahra

The Formidable Escape

By JKPublished 3 years ago 9 min read
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« Zahra means rose» she replied, as Elay scribbled away in his little black notebook. She was amazed by how quickly that reporter could write while staring at her in awe, without flinching. Frail with divine innocence, golden-eyed beauty Zahra - the disobedient one - had just turned sixteen. She was the eldest of four girls. Her mother would only think « good riddance » on her wedding day.

She was promised in marriage to Kamil, the camp's butcher. He inherited his trade from his father who died of Covid last winter. Both of their families fled from war-torn Aleppo to the Bekaa refugee camp a little less than a decade ago. Her family was working-class and owned a prosperous farm: seventeen cows, twenty-five pigs, and more than fifty chickens. Her father was killed during the ISIS raid on the village «execution-style» along with her three uncles. She would sneak out at night sometimes, to hear the men's stories near the fire pit: "they stripped them naked, turned their heads towards the wall and opened fire with machine guns on all of them. Cowards.»

Elay had to leave before Zaza could give him the grand tour of her sector. He received an unexpected call and had to drive to a nearby town to cover a story about the death of one of the wealthiest people in Zahle, an old well-renowned couturier who wanted to die at home amongst his loved ones - not on a hospital bed. « I will come back in a few hours, probably spend the night here too, you know to get fully immersed in your world» he asserted as he rushed out.

« There is really not much to show,» she murmured.

Living in a twenty-foot rudimentary shipping container with her mother, stepfather, and siblings, Zaza had seen better days. Here, basic human necessities are considered luxuries and are often never met; the running water is brown and the food is scarcely rationed. Zaza would reminisce about the life she once had and smirk. It was such a long time ago, and she was so young. Maybe her memory was deceiving her, and this only existed in her mind... Yet, when the sun starts to set on those hot summer afternoons, with peachy cotton candy nuances in the horizon, she would close her eyes and almost smell the scent of the night-blooming jasmine. She could almost feel the moisture of the handpicked strawberries she'd forgotten in her pockets. She'd find herself wandering in thoughts of her father watering the garden; especially her gardenia tree; it would only blossom once a year during her birthday month, in May. Blurry visions... the big powdered milk tin cans that were repurposed to plant basil and green thyme. Her aunt would use them to collect snails after a rainy day. Agreeingly, it is a disgusting thing to do, but somehow, she found peace in those souvenirs. The sound of the trickling water from the fountain, the hookah and Turkish coffee rituals came to life every day after nap time, the Virgin Mary statue and all the saints, incense and charcoal lite first thing in the morning, the Fairuz prayer coming from her aunt's battery-operated radio that would only tune to the AM channel, her grandmother knitting crochet tablecloth on her rocking chair… The basement was her favorite part of the house, it was always the coldest room on hot summer days. Zaza was born there during the war and didn't see the daylight until she was two. Maybe that's why she liked it so much down there.

The last time she looked back at her village was from the back of a pickup truck while holding her newborn sister tightly in her arms, as they were driven away. It was Christmas time, and she couldn't understand why they were escaping, why the women’s faces sitting across from her had turned ghost-white. Peeking out through the plastic curtain, she could steal a glance of their five-hundred-year-old Jerusalem pine tree in the main square. The yellow lamps were turned on and little boys, lifeless little bodies approximately her size, were dangled down on ropes from the branches. All around, the village was on fire.

« Reporters like him have been interviewing us since the first winter we arrived here; all they ever do is bring mom to tears. Nothing good ever comes from them. This one is particularly foolish, forgetting his notes here… what an airhead! » she snickered as she snatched the notebook from the plastic table and rushed off to the toilet. She wanted to ensure some privacy as she riffled through it. A certain sense of forbiddenness took over her as she locked herself in the bathroom stall, a guilty pleasure as she invaded his privacy. In her defense, she was only reciprocating - reporters were always intrusive.

It was one of those fancy black leather books for grown-ups, nothing like the low-cost writing pads with gauzy papers they gave them in school. As she delicately pulled off the elastic strap band, it felt as if she was undressing him, little by little unraveling him and reading into his naked soul. The string bookmark led directly to her story: Zahra, dreamer, untamed, and a drawing of a rose. A sudden rush of warmth blushed into her pink cheek; it was profoundly satisfying to be acknowledged by an important white man from America. His manuscript was well organized with neatly numbered pages at the bottom; bullet points and sketches of celebrities, political personalities, and famous drug lords, with their addresses and phone numbers. An old-school Rolodex meets the messy handwriting of a chaotic good person. Maybe he's smart this one, she thought; he's carrying the perfect backup tool for hard terrain travel, anticipating the downfall of technology which would undoubtedly fail him in this part of the world: Access to electricity and internet is almost non-existent, electronic devices here can get useless. Inside the foldable pocket, an old polaroid picture of him kissing a model, who had become FLOTUS in recent years. On the first page were his name and credentials, the title « Off the record » and the phrase « One thousand dollars reward if you find me,» which seemed a little meek little reward: « This is worth much more,» she connivingly murmured, shoving the notebook swiftly into her donated Frozen backpack as she ran off to the dump.

Every Tuesday, Zaza had a standing appointment at 3 pm with Joujou and Aisha. She had arrived just in time for the new collection to drop!

Looking at their happy faces, you would think of yourself at a child's birthday party with overly excited kids eager for the Sponge Bob piñata to pop for treats. The scene is slightly different here as a garbage truck unloads tones of rubbish… Imagination can take you anywhere, the possibilities are endless, and those little souls gladly welcomed the weekly additions to their playground. Everything made it here: clothes, furniture, car parts, debris, medical waste, decaying animals, and on some lucky days, just barely expired foods. The content depended greatly on the provenance of the cargo and the weather. Today only a few hints of vomit, mold, and fish. On worst days, it only carried domestic waste; but it wasn’t that repulsive today; even a blood-stained thick mattress made it into the pile. « Someone must have died on this; it's filled with bad spirits,» said Joujou « I don't want anything to do with it.» While everybody else was chanting religious prayers to chase away death demons, Zaza relished the idea of laying on a high-end mattress; not those five-inch foam cushions covered in nylon she had back home. Far from superstitious and with nobody to fight her for it; she dragged that enormous grimy thing for an exhausting half hour before reaching her ramshackle hut.

Upon arrival, she just collapsed on top of it, exhausted from the journey. Yet, it wasn't long until Zaza started experiencing the joys of a trampoline. She loved that delightful weightlessness jumps hindered by vertigo. It was all fun, songs and laughs until she fell through the mattress so hard, she punctured her bare foot with the iron coil springs. She didn't feel any pain initially but started to panic as she tried to retrieve her bloody toes from what seemed to be a chamber, a whole in a trench... Successfully emerging, and recovering her extremity, she discerned a black plastic trash bag sneakily tucked away. Very carefully, she reached for it, grabbed it, tweaked and pulled.

It took her so long to unwrap all those layers of adhesive tape and plastic, but it was worth the effort. Zaza counted twenty thousand dollars in green dollar bills; the sum of a person's lifetime earnings in Syria. «It's a skillful old man's doing» she thought as she stared immobile at the green pile of paper. Her grandfather, a veteran, would tell her war stories about the Ottoman Empire reign; when families would be forcefully dragged out of their homes in the middle of the night while the armed military occupants pillaged their homes and took off with whatever they could carry. Mattresses were the ideal hideaway for small valuable things.

This was far more than she had ever dared to dream. A fortune at her feet. She wasn’t particularly happy, but she was excited and relished the idea of the potential this money could bring. She also knew it could all end in a flash - as it did to many before her. She was conditioned to perceive her life as worthless, aimless for lack of guidance and meaningless for lack of hope. Her death like roadkill, unfortunate collateral damage. This was the only good thing to have ever happened to her. Life as a Muslim woman in an Arab country is always doomed - that is why her own mother hated her even before she was born. She had already lost the fight before arriving at war. But maybe she was destined to more than just suffering. She had no ultimate ambition or grand purpose to follow through; she was never taught to think, to imagine a life beyond the refugee camp. Yet, she was determined to run away, break free. Maybe she could finally find solace. Maybe she could trust the universe.

The day was coming to an end and she had to go back home: Girls can’t stay out after sun down - they said. But the little rebel thing had other plans: "Home is everywhere I am. I need to catch the last bus to Beirut, be as far as I can be from here».

As she packed her life in a backpack, placed the notebook and the money within its lining, she turned off her phone and with it, everything she knew before. Armed with nothing but herself, Zahra walked to the bus stop. Nobody could tell her what to do or who to be anymore. As she hopped onto the back of the full bus, she sat down, placed the backpack safely between her feet and removed her hijab to let her hair down. Sighing, tears would fill her eyes, as she starred into the fields of grapes while reciting a poem: The Will of Life.

إذا الشعب يوما أراد الحياة. فلا بد أن يستجيب القدر

« If the people will to live, providence is destined to favorably respond ».

She knew she would have to sleep on the street that night; so much for that mattress… But she wasn’t scared.

And I like to think that nothing ever really scared her after that day.

Don't you?

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About the Creator

JK

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