Neve Emek: Room 102 - Part 4 of ?

4

My fingers were sticky with sweat as I dragged the suitcase from the carousel.

The doll was no longer with me. I didn’t leave it behind on purpose, though. No, nothing like that. But things… just got out of control. The last thing I wanted was to leave a kid with that… doll. You know? Why would I? Something about it put me on high alert, and although it was impossible for it to—I don’t even know what I’m talking about anymore. But something told me not to leave that thing with the kid. In the end, I ended up doing just that.

I was reaching for my backpack in the overhead compartment when I noticed belatedly that the woman and the kid who had sat beside me were gone. The seats were empty. Clean. Like they were never really there. Naturally, I searched for them as I walked down the aisle and between travellers, catching glimpses of countless hurried faces. Still, I couldn’t find them. I scanned the departing passengers several times in the terminal, too. But my desperate search yielded nothing. They were nowhere in sight. Just gone.

And so I gave up and directed my focus on a much more pressing matter.

I’d never set foot in Tel Aviv before. The signage was unfamiliar, and the announcements were in a language I did not speak or understand. I must’ve gone in circles for several minutes trying to figure out where I was supposed to go, when I finally stumbled upon an information desk. Behind it, a woman sat hunched forwards. Her eyes were fixed on a computer screen, but she glanced up briefly as I crept closer. I must’ve looked quite out of place and awkward by the way a flicker of irritation passed through her wide-set eyes behind the thick, granny glasses.

“Excuse me,” I said. “Do you think you can help me? There’s this place I need to get to. It’s called, uh, Neve Emek.”

The clerk lifted again. “Neve… Emek?”

“Yes,” I said. “How do I—”

She cut me off. “You have family there?”

I hesitated. The tone of her voice told me I couldn’t tell the truth, not the whole truth, that is. So I lied. I had an American passport, and there was no way this woman could discern me from an Israeli. “Yes,” I said finally, hoping the explanation sounded plausible enough. “Got some… uh… inheritance issues I need to take care of so… yeah.”

Her eyes narrowed, just a fraction, as if she was gauging whether I was telling the truth or lying. Why was she even asking me these questions? Was it routine here to do so?

“Well, there’s no train going there,” she said. “But you can take a train to Haifa, then a bus or taxi once there. Terminal 3. Next train leaves in twenty minutes. Better hurry.”

“Right, uh, thanks.”

Even as I followed the signs to the underground train station and took the escalators down, I couldn’t shake the feeling that the questions the clerk asked me were not routine. The mention of Neve Emek had changed something in the way that woman looked and talked to me. I was certain. But there was no time to dwell on these things. I had to catch up to the train.

I never felt as out of place as I did standing on the steps and slowly descending to the platform below. It was like entering a time capsule, of which I felt like an impostor among a sea of uncanny faces that seemed to distort under the lights, especially this deep below the ground with nothing but artificial lights to guide me.

Trains arrived and departed in a fast sequence as I stepped onto the platform and lowered my suitcase to the ground, feeling the wheels settle heavily. I shifted my weight from foot to foot as I waited, listening to the clatter of arrivals and the din of passengers moving through the station. I hardly waited five or so minutes before my train arrived, the doors sliding open with a hiss, and I stepped inside.

The carriage was nearly full; I moved along the carriage, searching for an empty seat, but found none. Settling instead somewhere near the exit doors, I placed my suitcase at my feet and pressed my palms against its cool surface, letting the rhythmic sway of the train breathe with me. Outside, the platform and city lights blurred into streaks, buildings and streets sliding past like a scene from a fast-moving film, carrying me further from the airport and deeper into the unfamiliar night. The carriage itself was quiet, with the occasional clack of wheels against track the only thing that pierced through the prevailing silence.

And yet, I felt it again, that subtle uneasiness that had gripped me at the terminal. Like I was being watched, though no one looked at me. I shook my head, trying to shake off these harrowing thoughts that led nowhere. I was tired. Drained. I told myself I had to be. But it was easier said than done. So, I steered my thoughts in another direction.

The only way for me to reach Neve Emek was either by taking the bus or a taxi in Haifa. But even though I looked the place up on the map on my phone, I couldn’t find the village. I even tried its old name, hoping for some trace, but that too returned nothing. It occurred to me then that the village must be one of those old Palestinian settlements sieged by illegal settlers, rumoured to have been set on fire, and the few that survived were forcefully displaced.

I recalled a news segment about it happening far more often than what was shown in the news, but was later ‘debunked’ as being propaganda with no truth to it. And for whatever reason, all records of those villages got removed from every archive in existence all over the world. I guess the government at the time wanted to cover up for what the extremists were doing as part of their plan for a ‘greater Israel’ – and, perhaps, to a certain extent, even protect those whom they supported in secret. Therefore, my only means to find the village, I realised now, depended entirely on the Israelis' knowledge of its existence.

The train slowed, pulling me out of my mind. Overhead signs flickered in Hebrew and English. Haifa, next stop. I gathered my suitcase and moved closer to the doors. As I was doing that, however, I saw that kid again. The one who sat beside me on the aeroplane. Beaming wide.

I froze.

The doors opened. Hissing.

Someone pushed me out of the way and out onto the platform. Even then, I could not move of my own accord, like I had lost all control over my extremities. Only when the doors closed could I move, like the weight over me had lifted the moment every chance of me stepping back into the train was out of the way.

My legs almost gave way under me as I tried to wrap my head around what had just happened. But it made no sense. No sense whatsoever! Was I really seeing things? What was wrong with me? Trying to dispel the disorientation, I shook my head repeatedly, but the questions clung and disturbed me, nonetheless. Something was wrong – very, very wrong. But what? Just… what? Things like this never happened to me. Ever.

Sure, I had not been sober for ages, and the possibility of me seeing things that weren’t there was more than just a possibility, but… I don’t even know what to say, how to explain all of this madness. It was like a curse had fallen over me, wrapping around me like a thick fog I could not see or shake off. Perhaps it was this very moment, as I not only noticed but felt something wasn’t as it was supposed to, that I should’ve returned and not look back – even if the curiosity would’ve eaten my heart out for the remainder of my life.

But I didn’t. I chose to ignore it and move on.

Not a single vehicle waited as I approached the taxi stand, which made the entire place seem almost unreal under the harsh glare of the lampposts, painting long and sharp shadows across the cracked pavement. The air was too still, the usual sound of idling engines and conversation absent, leaving a silence so deep it gave me the heebie-jeebies, though I was a grown-ass man. Every time I looked over my shoulder, however, the distant terminal and the darkened streets beyond it felt intensified in this desolate place devoid of souls.

I paused and forced my shoulders to relax. My hand drifted towards the letter, my eyes tracing the name ‘Neve Emek’ over and over again as if repeating it aloud would give an answer, some hint of direction. But that didn’t happen.

Then, finally, a taxi rolled slowly into view, headlights cutting through the pooling shadows. A man stepped out, clad in a worn leather jacket. He leaned against the car, bringing a cigarette to his lips. The faint glow flickered, casting sharp angles across his face as he inhaled, and the thin trail of smoke curled into the night. Even from a distance, I could see that heavy, acrid scent clinging to him.

When he noticed me, the chauffeur exhaled a long plume of smoke, and his hooded eyes met mine for a second as he took another draw from the cigarette. It wasn’t hostility I saw there, but caution, as if he were assessing the purpose for me being here at this very hour, at this very place. I guess he could tell I wasn’t a local by the way I was acting like a fish out of water and was thus on high alert.

“What do you want?”

“I, uh…” I cleared my throat. “I need to get to Neve Emek. You know the place?”

He squinted at me through the smoke. “That’s far. You got money?”

“Yeah. Money’s not a problem,” I said, trying to sound confident.

For a long moment, he didn’t say anything, the faint orange glow of the cigarette tip trembling between his fingers. Then, with a sharp flick of his wrist, the cigarette clattered to the asphalt and he ground it under his heel, muttering something in Hebrew I couldn’t catch, before adding:

“Get in.”

The taxi scraped along the uneven asphalt as we pulled away from the train station, the streetlights flickering past in a blur of motion. The landscape itself opened into acres of olive groves and low hills stretching towards the horizon as the day drew to a close and night settled, albeit too slowly. I frowned as the unfamiliar world passed me by in a haze and the city gradually disappeared, replaced by narrow roads winding through scrub and dust.

We’d been driving ten minutes without a word when he finally spoke.

“Neve Emek,” he said. “Not many people go there. Especially at night.”

“I guess I like quiet places,” I said, watching the fields slip past the window, unbothered and not as vigilant as I should be in the backseat of a stranger’s vehicle in the middle of the bloody night.

He made a sound, something between a laugh and a snort. “Quiet, yeah. Too quiet, maybe.” He tapped the steering wheel with his fingers. “You got family there or something?”

This was what the clerk also asked. Family… I mean, it wasn’t entirely a lie. I did once have a family in that village, only now they were either displaced or buried in that burial ground I was supposed to inherit.

“Something like that.”

He looked at me in the mirror again, his eyes lingering a little longer this time. “You don’t sound local.”

“I’m not.”

“American?”

The words slipped me before I could hinder them. “No.”

“Sounds American to me. Where you from?”

I hesitated, well aware that I just fucked up pretty badly. Why did I even say that? I wasn’t supposed to let anybody, especially a local, aware of my real identity. But there was no way I could tell the man my real roots. That’d be too risky in this situation, if not foolish.

“My family used to live near Neve Emek. A long time ago.”

The driver didn’t respond right away. He just stared at the road. His expression was unreadable; I couldn’t tell whether he believed my lie or was simply occupied with another thought. That is, up until he suddenly locked eyes with me through the rear-view mirror and said something so chilling that my heart skipped several beats.

“Ah. You mean before ’48. ”I couldn’t even get a word in before he quietly added, not taking his eyes off me for even a second. “You’re one of those families, then.”

I said nothing. Couldn’t. The words got stuck in my throat.

 “You know, they rebuilt that place from nothing,” he said. “Ashes and stones. Took years.”

“I heard,” I said. “My grandfather used to talk about it. Said he could still smell the olive trees burning, even from the hills.”

The driver’s hands tightened on the wheel. “Olive trees,” he repeated. “Funny thing to remember.”

“They… were his,” I said.

The road narrowed in the windshield, and the fields gave way to clusters of dilapidated huts marked by fire and soot, before the taxi once again pulled up at the edge of a rough, uneven dirt track. It was at this moment that I shifted my gaze away from the windshield, just in time to see the driver’s eyes flicking away from mine in the rear-view mirror. My eyes narrowed, but not for long. Instead, I lurched forwards abruptly, and the vehicle came to a stop.

“What’s going on?” I said, looking out into the empty landscape cloaked in darkness, trying to make sense of what was happening and calming myself down.

“Neve Emek,” the chauffeur said. “Get out.”

“Neve—what?” I repeated, confusion mounting, as I took a gander at the window, where some distant lights did indeed reveal to me that there was a village up ahead. But the distance was too great. I’d have to walk on foot for at least half an hour. So, naturally, I opened my mouth to protest, to insist he drive me closer to the village, but something in the way he rested his hand on the wheel stopped me. What the fuck was this guy’s deal, even?

As soon as I stepped out, the taxi swung back onto the empty road behind me and disappeared out of sight. Great. Now what? To think I’d have to walk to the village in this suffocating darkness did little to soothe me. On the contrary. I didn’t know this place, didn’t know the people, or what awaited me once I set foot there. Not to mention it was bitterly cold – so darn cold!

The narrow, single-lane road was darker than I’d wanted, twisting between low hills and uprooted olive groves that were no more; even the shadows were deep enough to swallow a person whole. But these things were hardly what set a shiver down my spine. From here, this distance, I could feel the silence, the way the world held its breath in eerie anticipation as the wind bit at my face repeatedly. Relentlessly.

And I was alone.

All alone in this forsaken place with nowhere else to go but forwards.

Neve Emek: Room 102 - Part 3 of ?

3

I wheeled the suitcase across the linoleum floor, which drowned beneath the constant buzz of announcements reverberating from the ceiling. None of it mattered, though. Not to me, at least. They were simply noise in the background, the din of a world in constant transit.

At the check-in counter, the line pressed forwards, albeit unevenly, each traveller inching closer to the desk. By the time it was my turn, however, I had already gone through each motion several times in my head out of habit. Used to have severe anxiety as a youth, so thinking about what to do, what to say, and how to do all this put my mind at ease. And that was exactly what I did even now, with the passport in my hand and the things I was to say fully memorised. Even so, the clerk barely looked at me. Not even as I placed the suitcase onto the belt and the weight caused blinking on the digital screen. What happened instead was that the clerk, a young woman in formal attire, said something under her breath. It happened so quickly that I barely registered that she was saying something.

What was taking so long, anyway?

I let my gaze wander at that point. Not sure why. Maybe it was the feeling of something watching me or the constant background noise of announcements, but… I don’t know how to explain all this. Maybe it was my unsound mind playing tricks or just intuition, if you will. All I knew was that I felt something that shouldn’t be there. Not really. But as I looked across the terminal, people of all walks of life came into my line of sight. Some sat in rows of benches, chatting with fellow travellers, while others stood with cups of coffee in their hands, relaxing, or entire families walking briskly to catch their plane. I scanned the place without thinking much. Why would I? That is, until I turned my head in the opposite direction.

They were staring at me. All of them.

Dozens of eyes turned towards me without warning, blank and empty like a shell without soul, like a room full of mannequins. Motionless. As if the entire airport had stopped breathing… to watch me. But not just watch me, to keep an eye on me. I think. Even now, in the comfort of my own skin, I’m not sure how to describe this feeling that rose in my gut. Only, I… feared. There was nothing but darkness in those eyes that fixed on me, no reflection, no blinking, no recognition. Only. Vast. Darkness. Like they were all dead inside or pretty darn good actors trying to mess with my senses. Maybe it was both.  

When I blinked unwittingly, the world resumed. Those hollow eyes that followed me were no more. Like it was all in my head. It had to be. So, why did I doubt myself? I could swear those people looked at me, that they followed me with hostile eyes. Yet… it all happened so abruptly, so fast, that I couldn’t wrap my head around what was happening until the moment passed and—

“Here,” the clerk said, sliding the boarding pass across the counter.

Right. I almost forgot.

I murmured a brief thank you, albeit still shaken, took the ticket and got out of the line.

The terminal spanned ahead in a blur, with people passing by with hurried steps on either side, signs pointing in every direction. I drifted towards the escalators, which was the only way I could describe it without sounding completely mad. Like a ghost or something, not quite myself. Not yet. Each step was weighed down by a heavy burden, harrowing thoughts that got nowhere the more I thought things over. Was I slowly losing my sanity?

On the second floor, the overhead lights washed everything in a pale glow. One even flickered for a few seconds as I passed by, then stopped completely. Not that I put too much thought into these strange occurrences. I had no reason to at the time. Had I known half of what I knew as I was putting all these thoughts into paper, I might have figured out something wasn’t as it seemed. But I didn’t know.

The air here seemed thinner, clearer. Even the chatter of the numerous travellers trying to check in dimmed, replaced by the low rhythm of conveyor belts and the sound of trays being stacked in the distance. But as I started for the security checkpoint up ahead, I understood the reason behind this arcane stillness that did not last as long as I wished it would. In jagged lines stood several stanchions, guiding travellers like they were all cattle.

I joined the queue and watched as the people ahead slipped off their shoes, belts, and electronics, piling them into grey plastic bins. When my turn finally came, I did the same without thinking, shedding little pieces of myself. The detector did not find anything unusual, but that detail did not stop the security from thoroughly searching me, like I were posing a security threat by my mere existence. What I didn’t know was that things were about to get worse. At the police control, that is.

The officer turned the pages slowly as I slid over my passport, far too slowly in my humble opinion, the way someone leafed through a diary instead of a document. His eyes traced every line, every crease, every ink mark as though it might tell him something that would allow him to deny my entrance. Then, finally, he looked up. But the way he looked at me, judging, told me he didn’t like what he was seeing.  

“Where are you travelling?”

“Israel, sir.”

He raised his brow. “And what is the purpose of your visit?”

“A legal matter,” I said. “Is… there a problem?”

The officer looked dead in my eyes as I asked this, as if he weighed the options in his head before choosing to remain silent and extending his hand to return the passport. I barely nudged the passport when he shot out his hand and wrapped it around my arm, pulling me close so that no one else could hear him. No one but me. I’d never felt this scared in my adult life. Never heard words of warning of this scale before. Like I was doing something I wasn’t supposed to.

“Be careful or you’ll face the same fate…”

Then he let go as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened.

I was so out of it, honestly, that it didn’t even occur to me to ask what this was about or why he was telling me this. Or what he meant by ‘you’ll face the same fate’. The same fate as who, exactly? I wished I could go back in time and ask him how he knew… Then again, things had started spiralling out of control the day I received that letter from the solicitor. Even if I did ask him back then, I might not have understood it. Not really. Not all of it.

Instead, I snatched the passport and slipped through the police control without a word. Moving blindly at first, unable to think straight still, my feet carried me faster than my thoughts, weaving through the maze of corridors and signs, past travellers in haste and the constant hum of wheels on the floors.

It wasn’t until I spotted the gates on the overhead screens that I slowed and drew a shaky, deep breath. What had just happened to me? And why had the other passengers not said anything? The guy was literally—a breath. On my neck. So fleeting. Gasping, I turned around. My chest rose and fell in an uneven rhythm, the frantic beat like a drum in my ears. What was that? I knew I… heard something. Like a whisper. Or maybe just… breathing.

Fuck! What was the matter with me? It was nothing. There was nothing behind me. Nothing at all. Nothing could explain what just happened.

The departure lounge opened up before me as I finally gathered enough courage to keep advancing. Windows showed the runways outside and made the entire place much brighter at once. Even the aeroplanes, with their wide wings, seemed like birds ready to release into the air from where I stood.

The whole lounge was riddled with benches along the walls, occupied by people slouched under the harsh light, the majority staring at their phones. Overhead, monitors showed several flight numbers and destinations, some delayed and blinking red. I sat down on one of the vacant benches and pulled out a battered paperback from my backpack, and tried to read despite the noises around me since the boarding was not due for another ninety minutes. But the words blurred together, turning into nonsense no matter how many times I tried to focus. With all those people around me and the constant bellow of children running amok like they owned the place, it would be a miracle to understand even a single sentence of what I was reading. Trying to read, that is.

Things didn’t get any better by the fact that time dragged more slowly here. At least that was how it felt. For a while. I could swear an hour had passed already, maybe more. But the clock above the gate disagreed with me, it seemed. But that was hardly the strangest part of all of this. The world outside had shifted, and the sky dimmed. I wasn’t an astrologist or a scientist, but I knew that the sun wasn’t supposed to give way to night until an hour later in this part of the world. So, what exactly was this ominous feeling swelling in my gut and taking over every inch of my being?

Restless, I put the book away and approached the airport staff in a neon vest to ask whether I had found the wrong gate, or whether my plane had been delayed. But before I could reach him, something tapped against my feet in the milling crowd, and I lost sight of the man.

A porcelain doll.

Its face was unnaturally pale, lips painted dark like crimson. With its glossy, black eyes, it stared up at me—no, it looked through me. Like it had a soul equal to mine. Its neatly arranged hair draped down its shoulders, tied sleekly with a white ribbon. The design was unmistakably vintage, one of those Japanese dolls that had once been all the rage in the 90s.

Turning it in my hands, the porcelain was cold and heavier than it looked. I checked the crevices for a tag, a name – anything that might help me find its owner, thinking maybe someone had lost it and tucked a number inside. That was when a curl of hair brushed against my arm, warm to the touch. It wasn’t made of plastic or whatever it was supposed to be made of. Was it real or—I frowned, almost losing my grip of it. For the briefest of seconds, its lips moved. A tiny shift, almost invisible. As though it had read my mind and mocked me with a crooked grin. Like it were a person, not an inanimate thing.

“Final call for boarding, Gate 14. Final call.”

The announcement pulled me back into reality. Hard. It was my gate.

I shoved the doll into my backpack and started jogging, then broke into a full sprint as I saw the gate attendants glance at their watches. Fumbling in my pocket for a short while, catching my breath, I handed over the passport for inspection, and then tried to calm my racing heart before a final nod from the lead attendant signalled I could proceed.

I lunged through the sliding doors and onto the jet bridge, which was unusually narrow for some reason and vacant now that every other passenger beside me had already passed through. I wasn’t claustrophobic by any means, never had been, but something about the feeling of being trapped got hold of me and disturbed my senses. It felt like the bloody walls were closing in, suffocating me. Thankfully, it didn’t last for too long.

At the cabin door, the stewards greeted me with wide smiles as they welcomed me aboard.

“Sorry,” I said, feeling apologetic for causing the delay, even though I had technically not been late. Only, time seemed to have… shifted. Somehow. Unnaturally. How? I don’t know. I just knew.

 As I was walking down the aisle, head dropped low, still trying to wrap my head around this whole thing, it hit me that the shadows moved erratically, pivoting in my direction as I passed by. Like the passengers were all turning their heads towards me. Not in the casual, fleeting way strangers glance at someone passing, but with some kind of intensity, as though I had entered a place uninvited. When I looked up, however, the shadows returned to normal. No one was looking at me. No one…

I hurried to my seat near the emergency exit, beside the wings. The woman already seated there pulled her daughter close as she noticed me, probably out of habit. Apologetically, I took off my jacket and was about to place my backpack on the overhead compartment, when I noticed the girl staring at something with curious eyes. The doll. It poked out of the backpack I had failed to zip in my haste to reach the plane.

She shifted her gaze to mine as she saw me hesitate, so I pulled it free. I mean, the doll wasn’t even mine to begin with. Neither did I have any use for it. Better it stay with someone who wants it, right?

“Ma’am? Uhm, do you mind if I… gave this to your daughter?” I said, probing carefully not to sound like a darn predator. “I found it at the airport and I thought… that maybe…”

The child’s mother, who had been occupied with her phone at the time, now flickered between me and the doll, as if she wasn’t quite sure what to tell me, before giving the ‘go ahead’ sign.

The girl’s face lit up as I handed it over. “Here, take it.”

Believe me when I say the kid didn’t once let go of the doll, not even once. She kept playing with it, turning to show me now and then that she had a blast and was grateful. It reminded me of my daughter and our bond, of all the memories we shared back when life wasn’t this cruel and miserable. Then I caught myself smiling subtly. But not for too long. It moved. Or rather, its head tilted. The doll’s head. Looking at me, trying to. Seeing that, my smile faded, and something twisted in my gut. Feeling unsettled, I was about to ask the girl to give the doll back when the intercom buzzed without warning.

“Cabin crew, prepare for take-off.”

The stewards started moving down the aisle, reminding passengers to stay seated and fasten their seatbelts. A few passengers were still standing, adjusting carry-ons or stretching their legs before the final roll. The stewards guided them gently back to their seats, as professionally as they were trained to.

A few minutes later, seatbelts clicked shut across the cabin, and the plane took off. Lights out. No other sound present but that of the engines spurting to life and picking up. Faster. The world slipping away, becoming nothing but a speck in the sky…

My eyes drifted to the doll unbeknownst to myself, like in a trace or a bad dream of which there was no escape. My eyes narrowed as I took in the sight before me, trying to make sense of it. Huh? Its mouth. It was wider now, like it was smiling. Grinning? Or perhaps… laughing?

Then it faded.

The smile.

When I took my eyes off it, the girl was staring at me. Inside her sockets were no eyes, only empty holes overflowed with crimson blood. I flinched, tried to stand up, but the seatbelt tethered me back in place.

A hand fell on my shoulder.

I flinched.

“Sir, please remain seated.”

I blinked, wheezing. My eyes settled on the girl again, but she wasn’t looking at me anymore. Just playing with that… thing.

“Sir? Is everything okay?”

The child and her mother now turned to face me, like they were expecting a reply too. Or perhaps gauging my response, assessing how far gone I was, what kind of answer I would give.

“…Yeah. I’m… I’m fine, thank you. I just—” I wetted my lips, feeling my throat become dry. “—something to drink.” I faced the stewardess now, white as a sheet, completely out of it. “Please.”

Neve Emek: Room 102 - Part 2 of ?

 2

The pitter-patter of rain obscured the view through the windshield, distorting and blurring the lines of reality. I didn’t focus on the downpour or the way the wind swept through the serene neighbourhood I couldn’t even afford if I worked a lifetime. It wasn’t like I didn’t try my best to provide for my ex-wife and daughter – I was simply not enough. I guess she wanted to live another life, one where she never had to worry about finances. Even so, I knew that the guy she lived with was not whom she truly loved.

Alena and I met by chance. She was an exchange student on a visit to her friend, with whom I happened to be on good terms since we lived in the same student apartment. One night, that mutual friend called me over after getting a scare with a stalker who had followed the two of them at the bar they went to. I caught the guy as he was trying to break in and made sure he did not return. It was only when this friend invited me over for a cup of coffee as a thank you that Alena and I first met and, eventually, fell in love.

I had seen my fair share of beautiful women by then. But she wasn’t human; she was another species. Or at least, that’s what I thought. Maybe it was the fact that she was a metalhead that made me think she was. I don’t know. All I knew was that she too felt the same way.

When she finished her course and had to leave, I confessed, and we kept a long-distance relationship for a few years. I proposed to her when she came over at our fourth anniversary and spent the night imagining what our wedding would be like, what our kids would look like, and what kind of beautiful life we would have as a family.

Perhaps it was those memories we shared that ensured me that one day she would return to me. I know, wishful thinking on my part. But what was the alternative? That I lose all hope and just… fade away? Once I secured the ownership of the property, I would be able to sell it and use the money to get my life back. I couldn’t stop thinking this whole inheritance thing was sent from Allah as a way to help me get back on track. Maybe I was just getting ahead of myself, who knows, but I couldn’t help but feel this way.

When the door swung open, Alena stepped out into the light spilling from the porch. Her arms were folded over her chest. She didn’t walk, she marched towards the car. For a moment, I thought she’d be over the moon to see me, tell me she missed me. Instead, she wanted me gone. Not just from her house but from her life entirely. Imagine that.

I had never seen her like this before, so cold and indifferent. It was as if the woman I had loved, the woman I once believed I knew better than anyone, had been stripped away and replaced by a stranger. How could someone change so much? Was this hardness always there, buried somewhere beneath the surface, and had I been too blind to notice her true colours? The thought unsettled me more than her stern expression – more than I wanted to admit.

I thumbed the switch and lowered the window, hoping to explain why I had come. But she didn’t give me the chance. Her words cut through the silence before I could even open my mouth. She hated me. Why? We had been in love once, so how come all there was left between us was this profound hatred instead? I guess the saying about the line between love and hatred being thin was true after all. Only, why had I failed to see this until now?

“What are you doing here? Go.”

“Just listen—”

“No. My husband will be back any second! Leave.”

“Your husband… right. I know. I just need to say one thing.”

“We don’t have anything left to say. It’s over! I’ve moved on. I’m happy here, Sami. Why do you keep turning up? Don’t I deserve peace? Doesn’t our daughter?”

“You think I didn’t try?” The words felt bitter. I felt bitter. How could she accuse me of not providing for her, of not making her happy? “I bent over backwards, gave everything I had to you – to our daughter! I loved you, Alena! I still do. Can you say the same about him? Does he even love you? Do you love him?”

“This isn’t about love, and you know that.”

“No. It’s about money, isn’t it? Always hungry for more. Like—”

She snapped. “Don’t you dare.”

“—a fucking whore!”

“Get out of here! Don’t ever come back!” she shouted. “Do you hear me?”

But I didn’t leave. Neither did I respond to her pleas. I just stared blankly at her, trying to find the right words to say sorry. I didn’t mean to say those things to her. I loved her. So, why did I say those horrible things to her? I just—

At the end of the driveway, twin beams of light pierced through the dark, growing larger as a car rolled to a stop. The engine stopped, and out stepped the man she’d chosen over me. He wore a tailored suit that looked more at home in a glass tower than here. This was the first time I had ever seen him in person. I already knew enough about him, though. He was a director of operations at some corporation, born with money, living with arrogance. People said he had a taste for other women, too, and a mouth that dripped with contempt whenever he spoke about them like the crude bastard he was.

Alena rushed to meet him, clutching his arm as if to ground herself. At first, I thought she was pulling him back from me, shielding me from his glare. Then I saw the bruises beneath her sleeve, those dark smudges on her pale skin, and realised she wasn’t protecting me. Not at all. She was trying to keep him from lashing out at her. The sight hollowed me out and stirred something inside me that I knew not I had in me. Contempt. Disgust. Awe, even.

The Alena I remembered was fierce and stubborn, a woman who spoke at protests and wouldn’t let a single injustice slip past her without calling it what it was. Now she clung to this piece of shit like a fragile shadow about to break, shrinking without even trying to put up a fight. Not once in all our years together had I ever shouted at her, not once had I laid a hand on her, even in our worst arguments. And here she was, clinging to a man who did both. What a bloody irony this whole thing was…

She pleaded with me to leave with those pretty eyes, to not do something stupid and just leave. How could I, though, after seeing those bruises on her arms? At the same time, I knew that she would only be beaten should I try to confront the guy about it. In the end, she left me no choice. Though it was hard to turn a blind eye, I could do nothing but accept that this was the kind of life she had chosen for herself. But my daughter didn’t, and as soon as I claimed the inheritance, I would make sure she stayed with me. I guess this was why that letter arrived right when I was about to end things. Had I left this world too soon, what would’ve become of my daughter?

When I hit the road, I thought of calling the police for the briefest of seconds. But what was I going to say? Alena would never testify against that guy, and I didn’t know if he beat my daughter. All I knew was that those bruises meant nothing as long as Alena did not claim otherwise. Only I wished she’d ask for help, say she made a mistake and wanted me back in her life. But she didn’t. She’d rather be beaten up by a brute than get back together with me.

A smirk tugged at my lips as this thought crossed my mind. Fucking hell.

The road narrowed as did my thoughts in the gloom.

I did not consider myself a good person, but that did not mean I was a bad person, did it? Like all humans, I too had both good and bad days. Coming here, telling her I was to leave for Israel, was the last thread of hope I held onto. Why did I even assume she’d somehow listen and tell me not to go? I didn’t want to go. Not really. But if leaving everything behind and starting anew somewhere no one could find me, perhaps Israel would be the perfect place? But what would happen there, I had no way of knowing beforehand. All I could think of was the agony of losing both my wife and daughter, the feeling of not being wanted, the emptiness of being lost in this vast, bloody world.

Back in the apartment, the walls closed in around me like a crushing weight and suffocated me. The bills were piling, rent was overdue, and the landlord threatened to cut the electricity.

Hunched over the kitchen table, my daughter’s drawings pinned on the refrigerator arrested me. A family of three. Supposed to be happy. She drew it when she was three. Alena wanted to get rid of it, but I convinced her not to. Since when had this happy family of three fallen apart? The day I got injured at work and had to stay at home for three months? Or had it cracked years before, and the incident only acted as a catalyst? It was one of those things I wanted to ask Alena, but I never managed to. Couldn’t. I guess I feared what she would say.

Beyond the open balcony door, rain fell against the railings and chilled the inside. Drawn by the cool air, I crossed the room and leaned out into the wet night. The soft patter reminded me of something from the past, one I could not recall, especially this moment where the moon had yet to rise fully and twilight gave way to complete darkness. Like a lullaby, the steady murmur comforted my broken heart and soothed my soul – or whatever remained of it.

I patted my pocket for a cigarette, already imagining the first draw. Instead, my fingers caught the edge of the letter, which was still folded and worn. For a moment, I just stood still and did not move. My thoughts were all over the place, and the longer I thought things over, the more convinced I became.

The inheritance wasn’t just a curiosity now; it was survival, a chance to reclaim something – anything – before it was gone. Maybe it was a mistake. Maybe I wasn’t thinking straight. But here, in the rain’s cold embrace, it was the only chance I had. At least, that was what I thought. Believed.

Besides, what was the worst that could happen? The atrocities against my people had ended a long time ago, and the homeland of my ancestors had been stolen. What beef would there be between me and the current population, who were not part of the illegal siege and the consequent displacement of the Palestinians that happened years before they were even born? None of us chose our parents or the country we ended up being part of, and so I had no right to condemn an entire population that neither took part nor supported the humiliation and murder of my people.

Still…

It all seemed too good to be true. I wished the solicitor would tell me more about how the property ended up as being my sole right to claim, especially since it felt like she lied or did not tell the whole truth during our brief phone call. You see, I looked up the bill she said was about to be passed in the Israeli parliament, but from what I could gather from the few English articles I found on the internet, the bill had been in circulation for over a decade. Something else had prompted the solicitor to find me. But what kept her from telling me? Moreover, where was my missing aunt, who was first in line to inherit the property?

These were only the tip of the questions that I told myself I had to ask the solicitor once I arrived in Israel. As someone with a good head on his shoulders once said, when something’s too good to be true, then it probably is. Something was off. I couldn’t put my finger on what it was or could be, only the pit of my stomach twisted, and my instinct screamed at me to be on high alert. And so I did.

By the time the sun rose, the decision was no longer a question. The ticket was booked, my passport lay ready on the counter, and the date of departure loomed closer with every tick of the clock. More than a journey, it felt like an escape – a chance to abandon everything that clung to me here: the wreckage of my marriage, the loneliness, the hollowness left by choices I couldn’t undo. I told myself I was leaving to start over, to breathe different air, to become a better version of myself – one not constrained by finances.

What I didn’t stop to consider was the other possibility: that I wasn’t running away at all but running headlong into something darker. Inevitable, even. My choices were no more than a performance of free will. Then again, how could I have known? I was just a human, made of skin and bones. Perhaps I should have listened to the alarms ringing inside my skull, the restless warnings that broke into my thoughts whenever I tried to convince myself I was doing the right thing. But I pressed on regardless, not despite those alarms, but, in a way, because of them. Madness, I know. But don’t we all have a loose screw? The alternative was death; no in between. I wanted to live. So, I chose the only option that would keep me alive for as long as possible.

I thought.

Neve Emek: Room 102 - Part 1 of ?

Author's note: This is a finished work-in-progress at 45,000 words. This first chapter has been edited but not the rest of the chapters, so it may take a while for me to upload them. Hopefully, you won't mind!

1

There have been both moments of regret as well as joy in my short adventure on this thing called life, some self-inflicted, others not. But I did not deserve any of these things that happened to me. So, how did things get to this point? I ask that question to myself even now, in this very moment, and I cannot find an answer.

It all started (and ended) with a letter, one I did not see coming – even if I somehow did wish for it. You see, I was a miserable person. My wife of eleven years cheated on me with some rich douchebag, and my daughter took my wife’s side… and then they both left. Just like that. I know how this sounds. I must be such a horrible person for everyone to just leave, right? But that’s not it. There was a time when I, too, was a diligent and hardworking man, slaving through my humble job day in and day out, but once I lost my grandfather, something in me snapped. Alcohol became my only comfort, my only friend.

I grew up in an immigrant household. My grandfather was a refugee from the occupied Palestine, who sought asylum in the UK with my mother, seven-year-old me, and my only surviving aunt and her husband. Mum lost my father, whom she had married only two years before the total siege, to the ‘most moral army in the world.’ He told me when I was of age that my father died trying to protect us, that he had shielded us from the bomb that destroyed an entire building housing several people with nowhere else to run in the open prison.

When the atrocities ended, finally, and millions were displaced from their homes, my grandfather did his best to keep me safe and far away from an environment scarred by carnage. Given these circumstances, he was very strict with me. I was told to pay respect to the people who allowed us refuge in their country, and told me not to act like those who had fled persecution in Europe into another country only to take it for themselves.

I swore to live by those words, and so, I worked harder than anybody else. I didn’t have to, but I did. At the time, it felt like I had to. Proving myself, my worth, became my only purpose in life. But not for my own myself but for those who always brought up issues with immigration and the failure of integration. And yet… the harder I tried, the less worthy, the less human, I felt. Like a machine, an empty shell with no soul of its own, I did nothing but spend every waking hour trying to be the best version of myself to the point of forgetting myself, the culture my grandfather tried hard to preserve despite all odds in a foreign country, and one day, a switch just flipped in my head. I guess my wife’s betrayal was the catalyst, or that one piece of domino, to bring it all falling apart and shatter.

It was the sixth anniversary of my grandfather’s passing and the first I spent by myself, just drinking the night away and looking out the balcony with a half-empty bottle of beer. I wasn’t supposed to drink. I lived my whole life as a teetotaller, as a cultural Muslim who had once learnt the Holy Qur’an by heart at the request of my grandfather, but things were different now. I was different, another person.

Had the night sky always been this clear? I counted the stars and distant planets shining brightly against the backdrop of profound darkness. Mum said grandfather used to count the stars back when we were in occupied Palestine to help me sleep through the constant bombings that had etched such a scar into my soul that I still jolted up by the slightest noise, even though the threat of bombs was long-since gone. Thus, I too began to count the stars whenever I had the chance,  and somehow, doing so always helped me calm down.

I wished upon the stars. I’m not sure why I did that. Never have. But as I finished the bottle and shut my eyes briefly, my unsound mind did its own thing. A miracle… I didn’t even care what kind of miracle it would be, what size or shape, only that it would guide me out of this dark tunnel I was trapped in and help me see the light before darkness swallowed me whole. Because I knew that by the time the sun rose above the horizon, I would bid this world farewell and join my grandfather and father in heaven.

Was I miserable for wanting to die? I did not think so. People often assume those who commit suicide are cowards, that they are too weak, but I disagree. I think those kinds of people are the bravest people to have walked this earth and left on their own terms. Imagine for a second that you have no option but to die: do you have what it takes to commit fully to the thought? The answer is most likely no. Because humans, like other animals, are not wired to die but to survive – even when dying. That’s why people on the verge of death suddenly become better only to die shortly after; it is our brain's last attempt to delay the inevitable.

I should’ve studied medicine. Mum always told me I was too bright for my own good, that I would be of help to people in need if I studied medicine. But what kind of physician would I become, who failed miserably at curing himself from the traumas of his past? No, instead I decided to become a regular blue-collar worker and earn a living the hard way, where my brightness neither stuck out like a sore thumb nor got me in unnecessary trouble. That didn’t mean I spent less time on the sciences, of course. I guess some people are born nerds, and I was one of those guys. I wasn’t sure what intrigued me, honestly. Perhaps the complexity of the human body and the way it was wired to perfection? One head trauma or injury could turn you into a vile serial killer or a genius mathematician – if that’s not some hardcore stuff, I don’t know what else could be. Deathcore?

Okay, hear me out. Everyone knows that intelligent people bang their heads to metal music. Or, maybe that’s not true. Whatever. In my case, however, I liked that sort of music not because I was introduced to it by someone or played the guitar, but because it became my voice and only outlet for letting go of all frustrations and hatred swelling inside me. That’s what happens when you have an IQ of 132 – neither a genius nor an average person. Instead, you become stuck between two sides of the same coin, neither this nor that, just… different.

 Okay, enough rambling. Let’s get back to the story.

It was the morning after; I woke up with a severe hangover, so I brewed myself coffee and toasted some bread. Not that I had any appetite. Funny thing with suicidal people is that they go about their routine chores automatically, going as far as being more cheerful than usual. When you think about it, that is not as weird as it sounds. It is those who smile the brightest who hide the darkest secrets. And when you know that darkness is about to leave forever, that weight on your shoulder lifts and, for as long as it lasts, you leave good memories with those who still care about you, who think you’ve finally found a way to cope and become better. Yet it’s all a façade, a cruel joke, or perhaps one final gesture of kindness. Who knows? Maybe it is none of those things.

12:30 pm. I remember the exact time vividly.

I had just showered and made myself comfortably numb with a sleeping pill when I heard a noise coming from the front door. It wasn’t knocking or anything like that, and I did not expect any visitors either.

There was an envelope in front of the door. It hadn’t been there when I ran the bath. The content of it was just as bizarre as its arrival, sent by someone who signed off the letter with their title and what I assumed was a last name: Solicitor Harris. Allegedly, I had inherited a property from a distant relative I had no recollection of. My grandfather never spoke about the family he left behind or those who had resisted the siege till their last breaths. But I wasn’t the direct heir to the property; Amal Khalil was. We shared the same surname, but I didn’t know anybody by that name, not until a memory I had suppressed resurfaced.

I was about six or seven, maybe older, maybe younger. Bombs had been raining down on us for several years by then. But I was a child, and as everyone knows, all children ever want is to play and have fun. So, I snuck out. I don’t really have a ‘sequence’ of memories, but more like frozen pictures in my mind left from that time. In one of those images, I keep seeing a face, a woman with green eyes smiling,  then, suddenly, children running and people collapsing from what I can only guess is gunshots, and then I see a barrel pointed at me and a man in uniform laughing and saying something in a language I don’t speak or understand. The image is then replaced with another. I see the young woman again, seizing me and running. I don’t really recall her name, but she stayed with us for a few days before she disappeared. I once asked my Mum, years after we fled, who she was, but she refused to answer. But something in her eyes told me she knew who the woman was and that she was part of the past that we all tried hard to forget and leave behind us. But what if she were Amal? The date written on the letter of her birthday did align with the age of the woman I saw in those fragments. Who could she be, and why had she disappeared and never returned – even when the occupiers took over the land completely and Palestine was wiped off the map completely?

There was a picture attached of the property, too. A grainy, black-and-white photo. A graveyard? Something about the place sent chills down my spine, so I turned the letter over and re-read it to make sure I wasn’t missing things. But here’s what it read, roughly: I was told to return to Israel as soon as possible and bring with me everything that could help identify me for the transfer of ownership, under one condition. What condition? I must’ve read the letter several times before I finally gave up trying to decipher what this condition was or could be.

There was an address in the letter, but I had only an old passport as a token of my time in occupied Palestine to remind me of the pain inflicted on my people, and no reason to pay a visit to an undemocratic country that had yet to be punished for its war crimes. What was I going to say at the airport? That I am a Palestinian trying to get ownership of an inherited property in Israel? Well, wouldn’t that be stolen from me the moment I say the word? Besides, I didn’t speak a word of Hebrew and speaking Arabic had been forbidden, even English in some rural parts.

But the real question was: what if it was all a prank? The letter came out of nowhere. For all I cared, this was nothing but a cruel joke. So I assumed that was the case and resumed my routine, putting on hold killing myself. I’m not sure why I even did that. Maybe I knew another letter would arrive shortly after? Like some kind of instinct or fifth sense, whatever you pick. The second letter too was written in the same manner and, again, signed off by Solicitor Harris. But in addition to the former letter, there was also a phone number I could call attached.

It came one fine day in October. I woke up to a rattle of some sort and started for the hallway. And there it was. I knew who had sent it before I even opened the envelope. Still, it took me a few minutes to hit up the solicitor. Not because I feared it was a prank, but because of how persistent the solicitor was in their endeavour to reach out to me since the last letter had been sent three weeks ago. While I did not know the ethnicity of the solicitor, I knew the population did not like the indigenous people owning land and property they claimed as their own, so what exactly was this person’s deal?

Though I did not expect much when I dialled the number and let the ringing carry on for a while longer than I wanted, I did not expect a woman’s voice on the other end of the line. In my mind, I imagined the solicitor as male and anticipated an authoritative and deep voice, not whatever ‘cheerly’ thing this was. In hindsight, I believe the person I spoke to wasn’t the solicitor, but her assistant I would later encounter at their office. But more on that later.

“Shalom! Good afternoon, Harris & Levinson. Who am I speaking to?”

“Uhm… hello. My name’s Sami Khalil. I received a letter from your office about an inheritance?”

“Yes, of course! May I confirm – are you calling from abroad?”

“From the States, yes.”

“One moment…”

A brief pause passed.

“Yes, I have your file here. You are the niece of Amal Khalil, correct?”

“Ah, yes. She… was my aunt. The letter said I’ve inherited… uh… some property? A graveyard, of all things? But there was… mention of a condition that wasn’t, uh, spelt out.”

“That’s right. The property is a registered family burial ground on the outskirts of Neve Emek, also known as Bayt al-Ruh before it was renamed.”

“Okay.”

“Here’s the thing: under local regulations, it must remain in the stewardship of an heir for a minimum of six consecutive months before any sale or transfer can be lawfully executed.”

“So… what you’re saying, essentially, is that if I don’t live there, I neither keep it nor sell it?”

“Not quite. You can refuse the inheritance, of course. But if you wish to claim it, you are obliged to take up residence on or near the property until the six-month period has run. After that, you are free to sell or otherwise dispose of the land, provided the local council does not object.”

“And why exactly wasn’t this written in the letter?”

“The letter was merely a notice of entitlement. The details of the will, as well as the statutory conditions, must be explained directly to you. That is standard practice here, Mr Khalil. Would you be able to travel to Israel to attend to this? The sooner the better.”

“Why the urgency?” I probed. “It’s been years since my aunt disappeared without a trace. Why now?”

“As we speak, a bill is moving through the Knesset. If passed, it will allow the state to claim property under Palestinian stewardship without trial or appeal. I’m telling you this because, once enacted, it would make your claim nearly impossible. You would do best to establish your rights before that happens.”

“That’s… messed up.”

“I know. Which is why I advise haste, Mr Khalil.”

“And if I don’t come? What then?”

“If you decline or fail to satisfy the residency requirement, the inheritance will pass to the local council. The council would then absorb the land, and your family’s entry on the register would be removed, which would make any future legal claim to the property extremely difficult.”

A prolonged silence prevailed as I tried to process everything. Why did things need to be this complicated?

“All right. I’ll think about it. Thank you for explaining.”

“Of course. Do let us know how you wish to proceed. We can arrange a meeting in person once you are in the country.”

“…Sure. I’ll be in touch.”

Like that, the call clicked off, and I was left alone with all my demons.