Chapter 4. The Shatat #7
“Hey,” she whispers now, softly. It’s a framed piece of art that Haifa made as a teenager.
The frame is black plastic from the Dollar Tree.
Inside bloom three watercolor flowers, each a different shade of rose.
Haifa had been experimenting with watercolors and followed a book tutorial for these.
The green water lilies surround them and serve as a carpet for their survival.
She’d given it to Nuhad for Mother’s Day, she remembers.
Haifa had been so proud that her watercolor trial had turned out so beautifully.
Nuhad must have placed it back into the attic, never hung up or shared.
Haifa’s fingers tremble against a taped piece of paper in the back, and she already knows what it is.
Dear Mama,
Happy Mother’s Day!!! To the best mom ever XOXO
Love, Haifa
Haifa stares at the paper for a moment before tearing it off, crushing it beneath her fist, and throwing it into an unseen corner of the attic. A loud rushing roars in her ears.
“Serves me right for trying, I guess,” she mumbles, and turns to leave. Her toe stubs against a heavy box. “Fuck!”
Haifa stumbles toward the light, a heat burning inside. She clambers down the ladder, anger and frustration granting her speed, and rushes into the house. Trying to find old photos was a fruitless mission anyway. Her eyes blink back the flood of light.
The picture of Nuhad on the mantel smiles serenely at her. Haifa stares back.
“Of course,” she mutters. Nuhad reserved her sentimentality for other people, other homes, other cities—she never cared about the little things from Haifa.
Whether she begged for love or some form, any form of connection, Nuhad brushed her aside.
She only cared for Haifa’s material successes.
Watercolor paintings or teaching music at the elementary school nearby didn’t count—not even after Haifa had to dust herself off, medical degree abandoned, and scrounge for a job after her divorce.
Her tenacity was worthless if it wasn’t accompanied by a title or salary that Nuhad could revel in.
Haifa goes to sit on the carpeted living room floor and opens one of Nuhad’s boxes from the hospice.
Grainy, spotted black-and-white photos from Nuhad’s childhood mix with old, blurry pictures of Marina and Haifa.
A photo falls out of the side and Haifa catches it.
It’s of Nuhad and her older sister, and in her sister’s arms is a baby dressed in a baptism robe.
A couple of folded school assignments from Marina reveal exceptionally good grades, and a few art pieces leave coarse glitter at the bottom of the box.
“Hmm.” At the bottom is a painting that Nuhad kept over her bed no matter where she slept. It shows a woman’s bare back as she looks out to sea, her golden curls fluttering with the air. The ocean glitters in the distance.
Atop the painting is a photo of Haifa on her wedding day. Nuhad’s mouth had turned down at the edges when Haifa declared her intention to divorce shortly after Marina’s birth. In the photo, Haifa’s hair is piled on top of her head and her smile is soft as she looks up at her ex-husband.
Haifa slumps back against the edge of the couch, the photo in hand.
The television is muted, but its pictures slide by on her face in reflections of reds and blues and yellows.
Haifa feels nothing for her ex-husband anymore; it was a whirlwind romance, and they divorced as quickly as they’d fallen in love.
But there’s Nuhad, off to the side, a controlled yet joyful smile on her face.
The familiar fragrance of bleach and vinegar follows Rania as she walks through the streets of Haifa.
The sights and scents of Wadi Nisnas—spice shops with towers of za’atar, street cats sleeping on the sidewalks, voices laughing and chatting from behind walled gardens—welcome Rania to her neighborhood.
Wadi Nisnas is where most of the remaining Palestinians after 1948 were sequestered to.
It’s their own personal ghetto. Walking through it, Rania finally feels relief—like she can breathe again.
It’s crowded and worn-down, but it reminds her of the neighborhood she grew up in.
Her childhood home is at the other end of the port; it’s part of an Israeli neighborhood now.
A smattering of clouds blocks the sun in dull grayish yellow as a reminder of the storm to come next week. She shields her eyes and looks up toward the obscured light. It is blue everywhere else.
The FOR SALE sign is still emblazoned in her mind as if it were written in blood rather than big red letters as she reaches home. Her own stone domicile sits above a dukkan selling fresh fruits and vegetables, and Abu Marwan waves at her on her way inside.
“Ya hala, Im Omar,” he greets her.
She nods back, smiling, but the red letters flash in her mind over his face. Over the store. Over her home. The stones flash with the crimson, and it is as if they speak to her directly:
Us, next?
The rumble of worry spreads to her chest and she pauses to catch her breath before climbing upstairs.
Rania has lived in her home for seven years.
What promises can be made to a Palestinian in Palestine when the only guarantee is that home is a concept in name only?
What promises can be made that she will die here?
What promises can be made that she herself can return to her own childhood home?
There are none.
The sound of her footsteps echoes in the narrow stairwell. Her breath is cut short, and she stands again at the top, panting, before she turns to open her door.
Loud voices rumble and thump, laugh and tease, from behind the door.
As she unlocks it, she is greeted by the aroma of maqlubeh and the sounds of her children and grandchildren.
Her youngest grandson is most often the one to come visit, but it’s common that everyone gathers for large meals.
Rania’s home is usually filled with the family that lives only a block or two away.
“Ahlan wa sahlan,” her youngest grandson jokes, as everyone has been waiting for the owner of the apartment to arrive.
“Ahlan feek.” Rania winks at him and he giggles. She plants a kiss on top of his head, then turns to her daughter. “What did you do? You made maqlubeh?”
“Don’t even start with me, Mama,” she chides. “Yes, we made it without you. No, you can’t help. Yes, you can sit down and wait to be served.” Her daughter waves a wooden spoon at her and winks from behind the kitchen counter, biting her lip in jest. Rania turns away from her—
Nuhad is there.
Rania’s face breaks into a cheek-splitting grin—one that shows all of her teeth and crinkles her eyes—as she rushes toward the young girl with a speed and excitement she has not known for many years. Nuhad stands.
“Miss Rania? Eh—Im Omar?”
Rania blinks, and her smile falters a bit. It’s not Nuhad, but—
“Are you Nuhad’s daughter?”
The girl’s eyes light up and she takes a step forward. “I’m her granddaughter.”
Of course. Of course, Nuhad would have been too old for a daughter this young. Rania looks to the kitchen, where her own grandson Khaled is walking toward them.
“Sit, Teta.” Khaled takes her by the elbow and guides her to the sofa. He nods toward the girl. “She’s from dar Sayadi. I remember you talking a lot about your friend from there.” He kisses her on the cheek in greeting. “How was work?”
Rania tears her eyes away from the girl and stares at Khaled. She sinks into the couch as his words register. “The same as always. When will work ever be noteworthy enough for a conversation?” She reaches for the bottle of moisturizer on the side table.
“What, the children didn’t take their horseback riding lessons today?” Khaled pinches his nose and his voice turns nasally. Rania laughs as she rubs the cream into her bleached hands.
“No, sire, they only played the harp today.” Rania raises her eyebrows and fluffs her hair with each hand. Khaled chuckles and returns to the kitchen to help his mother.
In the echoes of their laughter, the girl looks between them, her eyes bereft of understanding. She looks lost; in this emptiness there is something reminiscent of Nuhad. Nuhad after 1948.
Fear has not cut her edges, though—her face is still soft and innocent. Black hair, a shade lighter than Nuhad’s was, is tucked behind her ears, but in her face—it is like Nuhad is here. Here—again.
Rania realizes she’s staring and instead turns her attention to the moisturizer, which she squeezes into her palms. She massages the worn calluses of her hands. “What’s your name, ya binti?”
“Marina.” Nuhad’s eyes stare back.
The girl doesn’t understand Arabic very well, Rania realizes, so she switches to English. “Where is your grandmother?”
Marina’s gaze falls to the floor. Red rushes up to her cheeks. “She … passed away. A few months ago.”
“Allah yirhamha.” Rania speaks the words automatically, but the reality hits like a strike to her heart. How can Nuhad be dead when she yet sits in front of her like this? “What happened?”
Marina plays with her hair at the ends, and it is so achingly reminiscent of Nuhad that Rania has to look away.
“She had cancer.”