Marwa went to a department store one evening with Sahar. She jumped on the back of a shopping cart and pushed off, racing down the aisles. Sahar chased her. "Don't do that! Marwa, please."
"But Auntie," Marwa shouted. "Here I am free! Free, Auntie, free!"
Finally, the day came.
Marwa's nose was healing. It looked much like a normal nose, slightly upturned and gracefully proportioned. It had a small lump at the bridge, and its skin was a touch darker than her cheeks. A thin scar traced a straight line from between her eyebrows up to her scalp.
She had spent the night at the Karams' in Palos Verdes Estates so she could be nearer LAX. Now it was morning, and she was watching a video of Cinderella, who was defying all expectations and transforming into a princess.
"Time is up, Cinderella," Lily Karam said. "We are going to miss the plane if you keep watching."
Marwa wouldn't budge. "No, no, I don't want to go. I'll go tomorrow, OK?"
I had planned to fly with her as far as Amman, Jordan, where her father was to pick her up and take her home. But now I could not go. My father's heart had grown weaker, and he had died just days before.
In Lily's car, rushing to make up time, I told Marwa how her courage with far greater hardships had helped me while I sat at my father's side.
On several occasions before, she had let me know exactly how tired she had grown of my notebook and questions. But now she paused.
"Thank you, Kurt," she said in English as she sat in a car that drove through thick traffic on Pacific Coast Highway. "This nice. Thank you."
She grew quiet. She rolled down the window and stared out. Her lips quivered. She turned to Lily and said that she knew she had to go home but that she wasn't sure if going home would be good for her.
It helped that at LAX she was surrounded by many of the people who had helped her. Saad was there, along with officials from the relief fund that had paid for her trip. One of them wondered aloud: "How does a 12-year-old girl injured in the war adapt to a foreign country like this one -- and then go back to war?"
Marwa stood tall. She wore a chiffon top, high-heeled shoes and wraparound sunglasses. She carried a fancy handbag. Covering her hair was a new, cream-colored \o7hijab\f7, embroidered with tiny sparkles.
Her luggage was filled with new clothes, stuffed animals, jewelry, wristwatches, purses, a SpongeBob, Play-Doh, journals, a picture frame trimmed in pink fuzz -- and photos of Saad, Miller, Theresa.
