Who knows how long I was in that closet? Maybe two hours? And then I heard voices on the speakers—the principal Mr. Green, telling me to come out, wherever I was. That same morning, my first day of school in America, and he said to me, “How are you, young man?” Can you imagine? I guess he didn’t know that Huda was a girl’s name, but I was humiliated. Mama had chopped all our hair when we left the camp to come to America, the way your grandfather used to shear the sheep in Haifa, because we all had hair down to our hips and it was expensive to wash and care for here, and Mama never had time anymore. I remember how we cried, even Mama cried, and Baba threw his hands up in the air, asking, “Are you all Samsons? Lost your strength now? We lost everything, and this is what you cry for?” That first day in school, I was also wearing trouser pants and a long T-shirt that said “Philadelphia Phillies” on the front—donated by a kind neighbor—so maybe I really did look like a boy.

Mr. Emmitt’s voice came on the loudspeaker too, darling Mr. Emmitt, who asked me to please come out and it would be alright. My UNRWA English served me well enough to understand that much, but I would not leave. I remember the stories of soldiers holding a gun to people’s heads and making them speak to get their relatives out of a house. I was not stupid. I snacked on the crackers I found, and they settled my stomach a bit. Much later, I heard another voice—that of my mother—telling me in Arabic, “Habibti, come out. It really is OK.” I trusted only her voice.

And of course, I ran out, kicking the buckets and mops and brooms out of my way, flying down the hallway, when another teacher spotted me—they had all been looking for me—and took me to the big office where my mother was. The first thing I asked was if Ihab, Rana, and Samia were OK, and she said they were fine. Mr. Green and Mr. Emmitt then explained to me what a fire drill was, and I felt miserable. So humiliated.

They let me return home, rather than finish the day. It was better anyway, because everyone in school now knew who I was—the new girl with the short haircut, who was older than everyone else and barely spoke English. The skinny boy who really was a girl. The kid who hid in the janitor’s closet because the fire drill scared her. The girl whose mother had to come to school and talk to her on the speaker in a funny language that sounded like spitting.