He notes the change in my expression and snorts. “Did you think getting to Europe would be cheap? Did you think it would be easy? We’re talking about smuggling two entire people to a different continent. Not to mention bribing all the soldiers on our way there.”
I’ve lost feeling in my legs. “You… you don’t understand. The other person, she’s my sister-in-law. She’s seven months pregnant. If she gives… The money will be needed for her to survive. I don’t have enough.Please.”
He considers me for a minute. “Four thousand dollars and I’ll let you jump the waiting line. That’s as far as my courtesy will extend. Don’t take too long to think about it. The boat doesn’t wait for anyone.”
And with that, he walks away, leaving me rooted to the ground while Khawf stares after him with narrowed eyes. I wonder what my brain will do with this obstacle.
WHENDRZIAD FINDS ME, I’M ON THE FLOOR INthe corner of one of the recovery rooms, clutching my knees as I rock back and forth, shaking and crying, trying to soothe myself. Two little girls lay motionless before me, bullet holes ripped through their throats. Military snipers take to the roofs at the borders between the military’s posts and the Free Syrian Army’s protected zones. The girls look about seven, clothes torn, knees scraped.
The snipers’ victims are always the innocents who can’t fight back. Children, the elderly, pregnant women. The Free Syrian Army informed Dr. Ziad that, early on, the military would target them for sport. Even Layla had a very near miss in October; now she’s not allowed to leave the house. Ever. Not without me.
Dr. Ziad crouches beside me, his kind face weathered with pain.
“Salama,” he says gently. “Look at me.”
I tear my eyes away from the small faces with purple, bruised lips to meet his eyes. I press my hands to my own lips, begging them to stop trembling.
“Salama, we talked about this. You can’t work yourself to this point. You have to take care ofyou. If you’re drained and in pain, you won’t be able to help anyone. No one should have to handle this horror. Especially someone as young as you are.” His glance softens. “You’ve lost more than anyone ever should. Don’t confine yourself to the hospital. Go home.”
My hands fall to my lap as I process what he’s saying. Over these past seven months, he’s become a father figure to me. I know one of his daughters is my age and that he sees her in me. I also know he’d never ask of her what he expects of me every day. To drench my hands in the blood of innocents and push it back into their bodies. Witness the horror and still come back the next day. And a small part of me, a very small one, begrudges him for it. Though he tries his best to take care of my health, not letting me exceed my limits.
I clear my throat. “There are still more patients—”
“Your life is just as important as theirs,” he interrupts, his voice leaving no room for negotiation. “Your. Life. Is.Just. As. Important.”
I close my eyes, trying to hold on to his words, trying to believe them; but each time I try to catch the letters, they vanish from my grasp.
Nevertheless, I stand on unsteady legs as Dr. Ziad throws a white sheet over the bodies.
Layla doesn’t say anything for a long time after I slump down on the couch.
With my eyes closed, I relay my conversation with Am, my voice cracking when I tell her the price. I hate him. Innocent lives don’t matter when he can fill his pockets from our suffering. No one wants to escape more than people who have been broken down to the core. They’re looking for a lifeline, no matter how brittle it may be.
“Say something,” I beg, and open my eyes when she stays quiet. She stares at the coffee table in front of her. She’s thinking of a plan. And then she grimaces.
“I have nothing to say.” Her brows are furrowed. “Unless…”
“Unless?”
“We could sell our gold?” She twirls a strand of hair around her finger. The late-afternoon sun filtering through the stained windows pools in the middle of the living room, turning the Arabian rug under us into something ethereal. I watch the way the light dances around my shadow between the forest-green plants sewn into the material. If I focus on it, I can pretend whatever exists outside the yellow halo is all right—is safe.
Sell our gold.
Gold is passed on through our families. Deep beneath its glittering surface, it holds our history and stories in its thick braided strands.
When I went back to my demolished building after the bombing, I wasn’t able to find anything that belonged to me. The granite ensured it. My gold is still under there, buried, but Layla’s is here. Gold that Hamza gave her as part of her dowry.
“Who would buy it?” I ask.
Layla shrugs. “Maybe Am would accept it instead of money.”
I’ve never heard of anyone buying their way with gold, and we’re surely not the first ones to think of it. And anyway, I’m not willing to part with Layla’s—my family’s—gold like that. Not to someone as crooked as Am.
“He didn’t say moneyorgold.” I pick at the threads spilling out of the couch. “If he wanted gold, he’d say it.”
Layla watches me while I continue to poke at the strands.
“So you don’t want to try and ask him?” she finally says.
