Sketch: One Year Ago

"When the fighting started, we ran to hide.  I took my children to the safest place I could think of.  We were under the concrete steps.  The chickens lived there.  We chased the chickens out and hid under the stairs."

Two days ago this woman contacted her with an incredible story.

"The fighters began running past us.  The mujahideen had been in our house.  I learned later they had killed a soldier inside and were trying to escape through the back yard.  They were running, turning to shoot, and running away again."

One year ago today, this woman, a stranger, had watched Michelle's husband gasp out his last breaths.

"The soldiers came through, chasing them.

"They are terrible.  Incredible.  So fast and sure.  I have never seen anyone fight like your soldiers.  I thought surely nothing can touch them, nothing can harm these warriors.  They are like lions!"

Michelle dreads what is coming.  She aches against it.  But she needs to know.

"There was so much shooting.  My children were so frightened!  They cried, and one of the soldiers turned to look at us.  Your husband."  She nods.  Her fine, delicate hands twist together in her lap. restless with emotion.

"I thought he would shoot us.  The look on his face.  He was so fierce and intent.  But he realized that we were no threat.  He turned forward again, he was going to pass us by.  I was relieved, I thought, if he doesn't draw attention to us, no one will know we are here.  We'll be safe."

Michelle closes her eyes.

"That's when he was shot," the stranger continues, her voice sinking to a whisper.  And she stops again.

Michelle shivers.  She doesn't want to know!  But she needs to know.  "Muna, tell me.  Please.  Tell me everyhing."  She takes the other's slim hand in hers.

"I saw it happen.  I saw the blood burst from his body.  And he fell.

"He was as close to me as you are.  I could touch him, we were so close.  He stared at me.  He couldn't speak, but his eyes – his eyes were begging me."  Her eyes are filled with tears now.

"I couldn't help him!  Please understand.  I don't know any medicine.  I dragged him into shelter with us.  I don't know how I did it, he was so heavy.  There was not enough room under the stairs to get him out of the open.  I held his head in my lap.

"I didn't know what to do.  He looked at me with such pain.  I told him to lie quietly, and to look at my face.  He couldn't breathe, and there was blood in his mouth.  I didn't know what else to do.  I sang to him, a lullaby.

"I held him and sang to him, and wiped the tears from his face while they were fighting all around us.

"He died there.  It did not take very long.  He died before I finished the song."

Silence reigns in the living room for a few moments, the two women lost in thoughts.

"When the other soldiers came to get him, they were suspicious of me at first.  They were afraid I had hurt him, that I had killed him!

"But I made them understand.  I didn't want to leave him.  I couldn't let him die alone."

"Muna."  Michelle smiles sadly at the other woman, this Islamic stranger.  "Thank you."

They embrace, and let the tears flow free now.  "Thank you for telling me.  Thank you for being with him.  If you could ease his passing in any way, I'm glad you were there."