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.

I knew my mother-in-law only through the telephone, and would meet her for the first time now as I came seeking a divorce. She was nearly blind and possessed the limitless generosity and kindness that often accompanies sightlessness, as if one’s love for the world increases as the ability to see it diminishes. I recalled the immediate affinity I had felt when we spoke years ago, and now I wished I had come to visit her sooner.

She wore a black embroidered thobe and black hijab in permanent mourning for her husband and, some would say, her eldest son, Mhammad, although he was still living. She had prepared msakhan for my arrival. I didn’t know if she knew or if it was a coincidence that she had made my favorite dish. I could smell it when Bilal and I walked into their home, a modest stone structure nestled on the side of a hill in the unplanned, organic style of Palestinian villages, its floors tiled in beautiful granite from nearby quarries in el-Khalil. Their home was accessed only by a narrow, winding footpath, over which Bilal had carried my large bag, and I had struggled to walk in my heels.