I WAS TOLD to expect difficulties from Israeli border authorities when crossing the Jordan River into Palestine, but it wasn’t as bad as I anticipated. I was interrogated. Searched. Searched again. They would not accept the Palestinian ID that Jehad had worked hard to reinstate because it did not appear in their system. They said this was not uncommon because it takes time for new hawiyyas since the Oslo Accords to update in their system. Hours later, they stamped my Jordanian travel document with a three-month tourist visa. One of my interrogators, whose sense of power had been irrepressible and somewhat exhibitionist in the way she ordered me around, pointed to my plump belly and asked, “You have baby?”

Bitch.

In all, I was made to wait six hours. Maybe it was finally getting through, or some spiritual call from my ancestors, but I was overcome with relief—and something akin to belonging—when I emerged on the other side of the crossing terminal. The landscape, topography, weather, and smells were no different from the east side of the Jordan River, but Palestine was nothing like Jordan. There was an immense silence just beyond the bustle of people milling about, waiting among parked cars, taxis, soldiers, handcarts. I gazed toward the unfolding land, where rolling hills met the sky. Images began to converge in my chest, deepening my breathing. Memories of two trips we’d taken as children with Baba; Sitti Wasfiyeh’s tales about Ein el-Sultan; stories from Mama, Baba, neighbors, and friends about Haifa. The ones I thought I’d discarded, tuned out, dismissed. They were all there to greet me, enfolding me in the embrace of our collective dislocation from this place where all our stories go and return. Here is where we began. Where our songs were born, our ancestors buried. The adan sounded from unseen minarets. It floated through me, raised the hair on my arms, made me close my eyes and inhale the call to prayer.

A man stood before me. “Salaam, Yaqoot.”

I knew who he was, of course. He had told me on the phone he’d be waiting. His brown face was creased, much older and wearier than the youthful photos I had seen years ago. I suppose he recognized me from my photos too, and maybe thought the same of me. We stood that way, in an uncomfortable pause, acknowledging something shared.

“Hello, Bilal,” I said. “You can call me Nahr.”

“Alhamdulillah assalameh, Nahr.” He smiled, taking my bag with a dark, hairy arm that emerged from the rolled-up sleeve of a white linen shirt. He looked like Mhammad, with a defined jaw and strong, dark features, but he was thinner and taller. “Our mother is anxious to see you and insists that you stay with us, of course,” he said.