They slide and sink into her skin like always. And it’s as if, in that moment, the magic has been unlocked.

The room starts to fade. I can no longer feel the hard chair I’m sitting on, or the hospital floor beneath my feet. I can no longer hear the ventilator, or the nurses chatting in the corridor. For a moment it’s as if I don’t exist. And then all at once I’m back there, in the house.

An enormous rug stretches across the living room, embroidered in blues and greens, but it’s worn, half the thread spilling out of it, resembling an tumultuous ocean. A diamond chandelier hangs over the rug, cracked, its ends jagged, like stars twinkling in the sky.

This is the room where I first met Aminah. I think back to her argument with Zaina and Mama, and then I think about how much their lives have changed, how much my life has changed.

The room is the size of my entire house put together. The furniture is covered in all sorts of patterns, and there are antique cabinets with items made of gold that glisten. But a layer of dust has settled over everything like it’s been empty for years, waiting to be found. Waiting to be searched.

I cross the rug and look up at the chandelier. One of the cracked diamonds winks at me, like it’s asking me to choose it. I drag an ornate chair across the room, though its arm is now hanging off, broken, and place it just beneath the diamond. I climb the chair and prise it off. As soon as my fingers clasp round it, the room erupts into chatter.

Dozens of women wearing colourful Kuwaiti-style dresses – pink, orange and green – stand around the room talking. The men wear traditional clothes too as they huddle together in one corner around a hookah, a cloud of smoke enveloping them. Children rush from one side of the room to the other, chasing one another.

A great big platter of food stands at the centre of the room – it holds melon, tea, dates, and elaborate sugar sweets piled up in a great big tower.

It must be Eid. Mum told me about it once and it sounded exactly like this.

I scan the crowd, trying to spot her. Then I see her dashing down a hallway that leads out from the living room to an exit I haven’t seen before.