Chapter 12. The Path of the Moon
The Path of the Moon
Slowly, the ceiling darkens from white to yellow.
Haifa follows the change silently. She had managed to read her mother’s journal just before her eyes, heavy with jet lag and the weight of tears, finally fell closed.
She slept in gasping, fearful pockets throughout her nap in which all she could see in her dreams was salt.
Salt—icy, white, cold. And there was Haifa, in the afterlife, picking up with her own eyelashes all of the salt grains that her mother spilled.
She sits up on the sofa in Rania’s living room. The sun lowers in the late afternoon and the pages are still strewn about her lap. The last page rests on top, the one entry she kept rereading before finally succumbing to sleep:
Things are only getting worse. Mama says to focus on my homework, and some days I do. I get so consumed that it helps distract me, but then other days all I can think about is everything going on. There’s too much. I just want to fly to a place, or a future, where things are better again.
Tears fill in Haifa’s throat once more as she reads it again.
Throughout the entire journal, she had seen her mother transform from the carefree, lively, playful young girl she once was into the distant mother she knew.
And Nuhad’s trauma hadn’t melted away, no—it had simply cascaded to Haifa.
Nuhad’s fears of instability and war had made their way into ensuring Haifa would be perfect.
That Haifa would be protected in this perfection.
Haifa sets the papers on the coffee table and stands, stretching the kinks out of her back. But at her side gnaw the pages of her mother’s confession. Leaning over the sofa, she pats her backpack, making sure it’s still safely tucked away inside. Neither Marina nor Rania needs to see it.
A thought has been hovering at the edge of her mind all day: Nuhad wanted her to find the confession.
She hid the pages behind a photograph of them together—she knew that Haifa would take the picture once she died, and that eventually Haifa would find the pages.
A guilty woman would have burnt it to ash.
No, Nuhad was proud of her revenge. She wanted Haifa to find it and understand.
Haifa’s eyes search the window. She was lucky, Rania had told her, for she arrived just before the storm. Calm blankets the city for now.
Haifa moves to the bathroom to splash her face with water.
She pulls her curls back, pats them against her head as she clears her face for a moment in the mirror before popping her head into the bedroom where Marina sleeps.
Her breathing is even, and her belly rises gently below the thin blanket.
Haifa’s eyes are dry from the lack of sleep; as she walks out to the balcony, they squint from the yellow of the light outside.
Haifa sits on one of the white deck chairs, the plastic eating through her thin clothes and into her skin.
Haifa breathes deeply. Her brain wants to dull the memory of everything that’s happened in the last day. Here, above the city, things are simple. Rania cares for a small lemon tree in a pot at the edge of the balcony, and the whispers from the leaves calm her despite everything.
Steady breathing from the sea echoes in the distance. There is silence in the rolling waves, even from here. Each cycle sounds like a breath in, a breath out.
Who was her mother? What had she had to endure? And who is Haifa? Did she change because of her mother, or would she always have been this, in every lifetime?
“Mama?” she whispers into the afternoon air. There is a part of her that wants to call Nuhad’s ghost back, bloodied hands and all. She wants to see her mother’s face again. What she really wants is the approval—
But her mother’s approval never did come, and it certainly won’t now. Haifa must give it to herself, an idea that makes her heart pound in fear, for if she accepts herself, her life changes.
A single tear falls from the corner of her eye and traces a path down her cheek. Haifa lets it drip from the bottom of her chin as it falls to the white stone of the balcony.
Perfection became the absolute minimum for Haifa because Nuhad felt as if she had failed her entire life.
In the years after 1948, she felt like she had to atone for Tariq’s death—her own guilt pushing her as far as poisoning a settlement’s water supply.
If Nuhad could go to such lengths, and then emigrate to another country, why shouldn’t Haifa have been expected to be perfect?
Haifa sees herself through her mother’s eyes.
Why not have a daughter and name her for the city and life she’d lost?
Why not place all expectations into a daughter to make up for her own failings?
But Haifa was just a young girl, like Nuhad was when the Haganah came. A hollow ache spreads through her with this realization; it is less of an epiphany and more of an emptiness as answer to a question she’d had her entire life.
Haifa is her own mother now—she is Marina’s mother. A sigh shudders through her lungs. A small part, the one from the hurt child of the past, wishes she never had to experience, or even understand, her mother’s trauma.
She wipes her face before standing to turn back inside in search of Rania. She will go to Nazareth tonight. Philippe—her oldest cousin—knows that she’s coming.
“Rania?” she whispers into each of the rooms, but there is no response. She turns to the kitchen to find a notepad, where she hastily writes:
Going to Nazareth today. Call if you need anything.—Haifa
As she turns to stick it on the fridge, she nearly bumps into Rania.
“My god, you scared me,” she says, her breath crashing out of her throat. Adrenaline courses through her veins and her heart beats heavily for a few moments before calming.
“What do you have there?” Rania gently takes the note from Haifa’s hand and reads it. Her hair is pulled into a low bun, with loose flyaway hairs blurring the image. Her housedress is long, reaching her ankles. “You’re going to Nazareth today?”
Haifa nods. “I’ll take the bus. It’s not far.”
“You’re not taking Marina?”
“I will, I promise. But first—” Haifa looks down at her fingers, spreads them out against the background of the white tile floor.
“I have to talk to my cousin alone. It’s too much for Marina—she needs rest first. She’s already gone through so much since coming here.
I’ll take her when she’s feeling better. ”
“Well, you’re not going alone. Take my car. We’ll go together.” Rania turns to face her squarely, her jaw set with determination.
“No, auntie, I can’t—”
“Take me with you.”
“What about Marina?”
“I’ll call Khaled. He can take care of her for the evening.”
“Okay.” Haifa nods. She cannot turn Rania down. “Let’s go.”
Groggy and with the taste of sleep in her mouth, Marina wakes. She doesn’t need to check the clock to feel the warmth of the sun cascading rays through the window.
Stretching for a moment, she pauses, soaking in the stillness, then sits up. There are no rocks in her lungs—not yet. Breath flows normally in and out.
“Mama?” She opens the door and peeks through to the living room. It’s empty, save for Khaled, who sits at the table with a notebook and pen.
“Hey. Sabah il-kheir,” Khaled jokes. “Your mom and my grandma went to Nazareth. They’ll be back tonight.”
“She went without me?” Marina stands in the middle of the hallway.
Khaled shrugs, an apologetic look on his face. “I don’t really know what her plan was. Maybe because you’ve been in the hospital.”
“Oh.” Marina sits on the couch. She is sad for a reason she can’t even articulate; she didn’t even really want to go to Nazareth in the first place.
But now—despite the haunting—she feels her grandmother in Haifa.
She wants to feel her in Nazareth, too. Marina clears her throat. “What are you writing?”
“I’m figuring out my schedule for next semester. I’m cramming to finish my master’s, and it’s going to be busy.” He flips the pen in his hands.
“A master’s in what?”
“Electrical engineering.”
Marina nods. “Nice.” In the silence, Marina realizes that Khaled is here to look after her. “So you’re my babysitter for the day?”
Khaled laughs, and the joy reaches the wrinkles of his eyes. “I guess so.”
“I’m already feeling better,” she says, and as she speaks, she realizes it’s true. In the safety and calm of Rania’s home, she breathes easily.
“Well, if you’re feeling better, I have an idea.” Khaled leans back in his chair. “I have a great spot I can take you to. If you’re feeling up for it.”
“Where?”
“Just trust me.” Khaled grins. “And if your mom and my grandma get to go on a field trip, why can’t we? You’ve barely even seen Haifa yet, right?”
Marina’s lips twist into a barely suppressed smile. She nods.
“Okay. Let’s go on a field trip.”
People and buildings and trees pass by the window in a blur of color. Haifa fiddles with the air-conditioning; the car is old, and as the clouds gather outside, the heat is heavy and wet.
“Mirtaha?” Haifa asks, her eyes flicking to Rania for only a moment before turning back to the road—she is hunched over the wheel with hands tightly grasping the leather. Haifa has never driven outside of the United States before.
“Yes, I’m fine.” Rania shifts in her seat. “Ya’ani, this is from years of cleaning. Day after day. There’s nothing this old car or any other kind of seat could do to fix it.”
Haifa doesn’t respond. She finally turns onto the highway and Rania’s car heaves back and forth, back and forth as the engine exerts itself to accelerate. It shakes for a moment and settles into gear. Haifa’s shoulders finally drop a bit.
“Thank you for letting me drive your car,” she finally says. Haifa can sense Rania’s gaze on her.
“Thank you for driving me,” Rania responds. “I haven’t had a reason to go to Nazareth for a long—” She sighs. “—long time.”