Chapter Six: The Wound That Spoke
246 Words
It started with dreams.
Not for the father alone—
but for the villagers.
They all saw her.
Not bloody.
Not broken.
Just standing… silent… with her hands outstretched.
Some dreamed of her walking through fire, untouched.
Others saw her standing in the mosque,
Staring at them,
Not with hate…
But with a silence so loud,
It cracked something inside.
The baker’s wife stopped kneading dough.
She said her fingers ached with guilt.
The schoolteacher, who once crossed the street to avoid Huda,
Wrote her name a hundred times on the chalkboard before collapsing in tears.
And the father?
He no longer slept indoors.
He built a small tent near her grave.
Refused to return home.
He spoke to the soil.
Read verses aloud at sunset.
Asked questions only the dead could answer.
“Would it have mattered… if I had believed you?”
“Did you hate me in your last breath?”
No answer ever came.
But the wind changed.
And the village—once proud, once judgmental—
Began to change too.
A plaque was placed by the olive tree.
Not by order.
But by shame.
It read:
“Here lies a girl whom truth came too late to save.”
And for the first time,
The village felt small.
Human.
And deeply, deeply wounded.
Because now they all carried her wound.
And no one—not even God-fearing men or pious women—
Could find the right prayer…
To stop the bleeding.
- Writer
