For the past ten months, Zain had felt as though his heart and soul were still in the north, even though he had been displaced to the south with his family. His fiancée and beloved, Sama, remained in the north, and that weighed heavily on him. Like many others, Zain was forced to flee when the bombardment of his residential block began. He was fortunate enough to notice the panic outside the window as people fled in terror, allowing him and his family to escape. Had he hesitated, they would now be skeletal remains buried under the rubble.
The journey south, on foot, was hellish. After many grueling days, Zain found himself in the streets of the south without food, shelter, or even drinking water. Everyone was simply trying to survive and reach the south, but once there, the mind began to process the harsh reality: they were now in a new catastrophe.
Zain thought it wouldn’t take long before he could return to Sama, marry her, and fulfill their dreams. But time had passed, and those dreams were shattered. Gaza had become rubble, and the nightmare had turned into a grim reality. Days, weeks, and months went by, and the war only grew fiercer. It was as if all the powers of the world were trying to crush this small strip of land with every ounce of strength they had, without mercy, and yet to no avail.
It was then that Zain began to have terrifying thoughts: What if my dream of returning to the north is like my grandmother’s dream of returning to Ashkelon until the day they buried her? It was a haunting thought that turned his world upside down, leaving him feeling as though his heart was broken and bleeding. He sensed that Sama was beginning to accept the reality, as though they were two people in separate countries divided by oceans, even though only a few kilometers separated them—kilometers blocked by the Netzarim axis. Zain, on the other hand, didn’t have time for love in the south. His life had become a relentless routine of searching for water and food for his family.
The question that never left Zain’s mind was: How long would he continue waiting while his and Sama’s lives slipped away with no hope for the war to end? What should he do? Should he keep waiting, or surrender to the reality? Most likely, he would choose to wait.