As Long as the Lemon Trees Grow

by Zoulfa Katouh

For every life I can’t save during my shift, one more drop of blood becomes a part of me. No matter how many times I wash my hands, our martyrs’ blood seeps beneath my skin, into my cells. By now it’s probably encoded in my DNA.

It didn’t matter that I was eighteen years old. It didn’t matter that my medical experience was confined to the words in my textbooks. All of that was remedied as the first body was laid out before me to be stitched up. Death is an excellent teacher.

You know this revolution is about getting our lives back. It’s not about survival. It’s about us fighting. If you can’t fight here, you won’t anywhere else.

This is the land of your father, and his father before him. Your history is embedded in this soil. No country in the world will love you as yours does.

Our spirits are defiant, and our history is glorious. And our martyrs’ souls are formidable guardians.

“Don’t focus on the darkness and sadness,” she says, and I glance up at her. She smiles warmly. “If you do, you won’t see the light even if it’s staring you in the face.”

I focus on the hope rather than counting my losses.

“And don’t forget to pray. Prayers are answered when rain falls,”

“My thinking it’s dangerous has nothing to do with the fact that I love my country and I don’t want to see more people murdered.”

“It doesn’t hurt for you to think about your future. We don’t have to stop living because we might die. Anyone might die at any given moment, anywhere in the world. We’re not an exception. We just see death more regularly than they do.”

“You feel helpless, Salama. But I…” His tone is quiet but livid. “No one deserves this. Here, babies are starving while the world forgets their existence.”

No matter what happens, you remember that this world is more than the agony it contains. We can have happiness, Salama. Maybe it doesn’t come in a cookie-cutter format, but we will take the fragments and we will rebuild it.”

Hope. Finding love and happiness beyond the misery.

“The ‘something good’ doesn’t come for free, Kenan. Now it’s tainted with sadness. There’s no blue here, not one that inspires anyway. Just the one that decays the victims’ skin from frostbite and hypothermia. All the colors are muted and dull and there’s no life in them.”

Time doesn’t forgive our sins, and it doesn’t bring back the dead.

Greed is an illness and it won’t take pity on the weak and desperate.

“Happiness starts here, Salama. In this home. In Old Homs. Remember?”

Syria is just a word to them. But to us, she’s our life. I can’t leave her.

“No. I will always choose Layla. Over anyone.” He smiles, satisfied. “But are you choosing yourself as well?”

Syria was once the center of the world. Inventions and discoveries were made here; they built the world. Our history is in the Al-Zahrawi Palace, in our mosques, in our earth.”

Finding happiness is merely treating the symptoms and not the cause of the disease that grows stronger by the minute.

“There are enough people hurting you,” he whispers. “Don’t be one of them.”

I may be in love with him, but is it real, or just my longing for an escape from this horror? If he were just a boy and I were just a girl, living ordinary lives, and we’d met anywhere else, would we still have fallen for each other?

“Is there anything you need?” You. I need you to leave with me.

Please, God, let him die. Let him find that peace.

😭😭😭

“Your love for Syria will drive you. The guilt is just a side effect.” I smile sadly. “Without that love, your stories would lose their meaning.”

“And we will come back,” I say, my voice wavering. “Insh’Allah, we will come back home. We will plant new lemon trees. We’ll rebuild our cities, and we will be free.”

Life comes back to the world, the leaves rustle. And I’m left yearning for more.

I’m Syrian. This is my land, and just like the lemon trees that have been growing here for centuries, spilled blood won’t stop us. I have my faith in God. He’ll protect me. I’ve been force-fed oppression, but I will no longer swallow its bitter taste. No matter what.”

In the end it doesn’t really matter; there are no innocents in the eyes of the military. They’ll kill us all, protestors or not. To them, the idea of freedom is infectious, and we need to be put down before it spreads.

Time moves differently here. Sorrow does that. Each day is a year, and as each one passes we hope tomorrow will be better.

“Every lemon will bring forth a child and the lemons will never die out.”

pattern the trunks, spiraling around in circles to the top. “There’s life in the smallest, simplest of things. I see why this is happening. Freedom was never an easy price; it’s paid with—” “Blood. More than we ever thought possible,”

If there’s one thing people are scared of, it’s being forgotten. It’s an irrational fear, don’t you think?”

I’m not ashamed of who I am and the struggles I go through. Khawf is an integral part of my life who has shaped so much of who I have become these past months.

“I’m not going anywhere.” He smiles. “You’re my Sheeta.” Joy reclaims my heart and I feel foolish, but I say it anyway: “You’re my Pazu.”

No one knows the future. But I know how I feel. I know how you feel. So let’s find our happiness here in Homs. Let’s get married in our country. Let’s make a home here before we make one somewhere else.”

I stare at the ring and find that I don’t care about whatever uncertainties lie in our future. All I know is that I love him and that even in the darkness surrounding us, he’s been my joy. In the midst of all the death, he made me want to live.

I get married in my lab coat, a sweater three sizes too big, with dust on my hijab and dirt marks on my jeans. We don’t have cake, a proper wedding dress, or even clean clothes. But it doesn’t matter. It feels like the whole thing happens in snapshots.

Nothing will ruin this moment for me. It’s mine to enjoy, to love, to be happy in.

“I want a marriage. Not a wedding.” I smile. “Besides, this is way more romantic.” “Really?” he asks uncertainly. “Oh definitely! A wedding amid a revolution. Isn’t this a good premise for a story?”

In the quiet space between us, he sees me. Not as the girl with nerves of steel who saved his sister. Or the girl who fell for his brother and took him away. He sees himself in me as I saw myself in him.

“You being here is enough.” I smile. “I promise. You ground me.”

He and I are owed a love story that doesn’t end in tragedy.

Our love story may be unconventional given the circumstances, but why can’t we grab at the small moments of happiness? I want to make a home and find joy in Homs before we leave. My last memories don’t have to be full of anguish and loss.

“I wish you could see yourself the way I see you.”

“We’re human, Salama. Pushed into a corner, we’re forced to make decisions we wouldn’t normally make. You were thinking of Layla when you did that. I’m not saying it was right, but you’ve suffered enough for it. You saved her life and you saved many, many after her.”

“If we die, Salama, at least we die doing the right thing. We die as martyrs.”

“Death doesn’t scare me, Doctor,” I whisper. “It’s being taken alive.”

“Salama, you’ve done everything. The rest is up to God. To fate. If you’re meant to be in Munich, you will be, even if the whole military rips this place apart. And if you’re not, then not even a private plane landing in the middle of Freedom Square to whisk you away will do that.”