As Long as the Lemon Trees Grow (20)

Dusk has turned the sky into a deep pink flecked across the blue. After we finish our food, he calls his brother and we pray together. Kenan begins reciting verses from the Quran in a beautiful melodic tone. I feel hypnotized by each word, drinking in their meaning, feeling them bring peace and serenity to every cell in my body, washing away the sorrows. I can’t remember the last time I was so at peace, nearly empty of worry.

After prayer, I check on Lama. No change.

Kenan brings out a few candles, lights them up, and thanks to the blanket covering the hole in the wall, they don’t go out. I excuse myself to go to the washroom to freshen up and try to call Layla again, with no success.

She’s fine, I repeat to myself as I massage my scalp and splash water on my face to calm down.

When I go back into the living room, Kenan is beside his sister, and I take the opposite side of the mattress. A laptop is on the ground near him with the screen turned off.

“When will we know if she’ll be totally okay?” he asks, dabbing her forehead with a cloth.

“Cephalexin takes about ten to twenty-four hours to reach a steady concentration in the blood. Tomorrow, insh’Allah, she’ll be all right.”

He looks at me. “You sure do know a lot about medications.”

I shrug. “It’s my job.”

“Yeah, but you know the timings and stuff by heart without hesitation. That’s got to be an advanced level.”

“It is.” I feel myself coloring up and avert my eyes to the window beside us, focusing on the blue morphing to black. It finally dawns on me that I’m spending the night at a boy’s house. Under extraordinary circumstances, yes, but it’s still happening. My hands become clammy, and I try not to imagine Layla’s eyes widening at this juicy piece of information. The most scandalous thing anyone I know has done was when Hamza kissed Layla’s hand after their Al-Fatiha. And they weren’t even formally engaged. It was a pre-engagement party. I teased Hamza about it endlessly until he flicked my nose, red in the face.

And now here I am, sitting on the living room floor with a boy mere feet away from me.

“You still remember all this information even after graduating?” Kenan asks suddenly, and I glance up, registering the tone he’s using. He’s trying to distract himself and, in turn, me, from the awkwardness of this situation.

I clear my throat, and the voices go quiet in my mind.

“I didn’t graduate. I had just begun my second year when—you know.” I don’t tell him I stopped going when protests broke out at our university and the military arrested dozens of my classmates. I don’t know him well enough.

“I finished my second year last year. Bachelor’s in computer science. I had dreams of becoming an animator. Everything was going perfectly,” he muses, nodding his chin toward the laptop. “Ironically, with all that’s happened, I have so many stories to tell. To be animated into movies.”

“You mean like the Hayao Miyazaki ones?”

“Exactly like that,” he says, stunned. “You know him?”

“I’m obsessed with his movies.”

He straightens up, eyes shining with excitement. “Me too! Studio Ghibli is my goal. That place is where ideas and imaginations run wild. They weave stories like magic there.”

His enthusiasm stirs something in my heart. “That sounds beautiful,” I murmur.

He closes his eyes, smiling. “A silver lining.”

There’s an honest joy in his voice, but for the first time tonight, I can see his real face behind the fragments he’s had to glue back together over and over again. He looks broken, and my heart hurts for him. But he also feels so familiar.

I shake my head and ask him bluntly, “Have we ever met?”

His eyes snap open, surprised.

“How do you mean?” he replies slowly.

“It may be nothing.” I play with the hem of my sweater. “But I think I’ve seen you before. Not around the hospital but… somewhere else.”

My voice trails the last words like a question. He bites his lip, and I can’t read the look on his face. The eagerness has dissolved into something else. Confusion? Incredulity? Pity? I don’t know.

Suddenly Khawf appears by the front door and slowly glides closer. Sweat breaks out at the back of my neck.

“I… um…” Kenan clears his throat, scratching the floor with his hand. “We’ve never met.”

Huh.

“Must be in my head, I guess,” I say, playing it off as a common mistake and trying not to let Khawf’s presence unnerve me. “You must look like someone I know or treated.”

He nods, but it’s plain as day: There’s something more going on.

“What’s your last name?” I ask loudly, and he jumps from his spot. In a way, everyone knows everyone in Homs by their family names. My grandmother could recite a person’s entire family history if they told her their last name. She’d know who their grandfather was, what their aunt studied at university, which other families they were related to. She’d name it all, dissecting the line like a scientist analyzing a cell under a microscope.

This is a specialty shared by all Syrians.

He smiles. “Aljendi.”

That’s a well-known family name that many share. I rack my brain, trying to remember if Mama ever mentioned an Aljendi, and come up blank.