Finding Muna: A Palestinian Novel

Chapter Twenty Six

Muna sat in her spot, almost completely frozen from the extreme cold, she was careful not to make any sounds, she did not even dare to turn tilt her head to catch a glimpse of what was happening. Even turning her phone to check how many hours had passed seemed like a very risky thing to do.

They just kept shooting and screaming at the top of their lungs.

They were taking people, firing missiles at them and the injured ones? They crushed them with their fire fighting tanks.

Muna knew everywhere would have gotten destroyed merely by their presence, the attack felt like it had been ongoing for days, and at this point she was considering staying in her spot until they either leave or find her and do whatever they would do with her or she going to them by herself to get herself killed.

She was already fed up.

Hiding, running to places, deprived of basic necessities, all for what? To eventually get killed, why not end it all now?

But her heart would hammer against her chest whenever she heard them nearby, speaking an almost foreign language to each other as they would fire aimlessly at the building she and others sought refuge in.

Luckily, no one in her building died, and whenever the bullets would touch them, they would only whimper as silently as they can. Because they all knew that if they made sounds, they wouldn't only put themselves in trouble, but their neighbours.

Muna was worried about her friends; she had never been apart from them for more than thirty minutes ever since they got to Gaza Strip almost two months ago. Being so far from them yet so close was giving her anxiety.

She had a feeling that April might have the urge to jump at the soldiers like her own self, and she feared Lamees wouldn't have gotten a good hiding spot because she would be worried about her friends. And what Muna feared more than ever is surviving the attack only to see that her friends didn't make it. She had already lost two people, losing additional two people wasn't something she was quite ready for.

And as a matter of fact, Muna was positive she would not make it past a week if either of her friends were to die.

She tiredly rubbed her eyes and pursed her lips as she sat glued in her spot, waiting for death to come to her or for the soldiers to leave so she would face what would be her new reality.

She covered her face with her hands as quietly as she can, breathing hot air into her palms to prevent them from freezing. She shut her eyes tightly for as long as she could and after what seemed like an eternity, she noticed people were leaving their hiding spots one after the other.

"Qad thahabu?" she found herself asking in surprise, she looked amused as she stood from her spot since no one replied to her question and then she carefully left the toppled house.
(They have left?)

Muna's breath hitched as she took in the sight before her, she her widened as she looked around and got more scared. Their little base and street was bloodied, she saw pools of blood everywhere with different part of the limbs of different people on the ground, crushed people probably from the impact of the firing tanks. Everywhere looked so strange, almost like she'd stepped into another world.

The buildings which were already destroyed looked worse as it was stained with dripping blood and relentless smokes from the grenades thrown into the buildings, the buildings that were previously standing were now levelled to the ground, Muna could hear some screams under the rubble and that only frightened her the more. The school where Mr. Ahmad and some other guys used to pray in was long gone; their refugee camp was almost fully destroyed.

Muna felt her legs tremble in fear.

She could feel her heart in her throat as she wondered where she would begin to search for her friends.