Lost And Found - By Maryam Hamza

Written By: Maryam Hamza

Category: Short Story

Competition: Global Poetry and Creative Writing Competition 2026

In the realm of creative storytelling, Maryam Hamza emerges with her evocative short story, "Lost And Found," submitted to the Global Poetry and Creative Writing Competition 2026. This narrative intricately weaves themes of love, loss, and the profound journey of self-discovery, offering readers a poignant exploration of the human experience. Maryam's entry in the Short Story category reflects her ability to capture deep emotional currents, inviting readers to embark on a reflective journey through her compelling narrative.

About the Work

"Lost And Found" delves into the intricacies of grief and healing, set against a backdrop rich with cultural and emotional imagery. Maryam Hamza's narrative style is both vivid and introspective, painting a tapestry of moments that resonate with authenticity. Through her characters' experiences and interactions, she explores the themes of love, memory, and the struggle to find peace amidst turmoil. The story's mood oscillates between somber reflection and hopeful emergence, offering a meditation on the enduring human spirit.

Lost And Found

Original Submission by Maryam Hamza

Lost And Found

The last stars glared down at me superstitiously.

You shouldn’t be out – not at this hour. Remember what happened the last time you were?

The voice in my head sounded like my grandmother. Musical with an Irish lilt. Jarring when juxtaposed against the tropical humidity that plastered my hair against my temples a few minutes into my solitary walk.

I don’t know why she nagged. Hadn’t she met my handsome Sri Lankan grandfather at a starlit bonfire where she’d reeled him in with Celtic legends and witty limericks?

I shivered despite the heat.

It had been cold that night, but Lars had wasted no time in throwing his jacket around my shoulders.

I had been working late at the diner. The varsity sports team had won the home game, and the victory party had lasted till three in the morning.

Lars had been surrounded by his ecstatic teammates and beautiful girls who couldn’t take their eyes off him.

Yet, the set of his broad shoulders only softened during the brief moments our eyes met. His smile always started slow, spreading like the sunrise into something almost too glorious to behold.

As I had snuggled into the jacket, something hard and flat slapped against my thigh. A book, of course. Would it be The Odyssey or Little Women?

I had caught him reading both in the past week.

I hadn’t been looking to date anyone. Especially not a college rugby star who shifted the very air of a room when he walked in.

It was my co-worker at the diner, Indira, who had brought the sparks rising between us to my attention.

“He isn’t here for the muck we call coffee, nor the greasy carbs, Kellia. He sits there with a herbal tea, for crying out loud, and devours you like a novel he can’t put down.”

I was majoring in English and Journalism, but the Biotech student had to read between the lines for me.

“A forgotten fairytale”, Lars had amended when I told him this some weeks later. “Kellia. Your name means bright-headed warrior. Is that not the stuff of myths and magic?”

“My hair is as dark as a crow's wing,” I had pointed out, breath catching as he ran his fingers through it.

“But your brilliant mind is a world I never tire of discovering.”

It was the gentle curiosity in his deep, sure voice that undid my firm resolve. He treated me like an unmapped land that he wanted to explore without exploiting it or changing its nature.

Kellia, stop this. Go back inside.

I dug my nails into the inside of my wrist as the first wave of pain started, rocking me on my heels.

I was standing under a street light, images I didn’t want, flickering through my mind.

Lars was pulling me close, then away, twirling me under the stars, so beautiful that my laughter died in my throat as I gazed up at him.

I heard the roar of an invisible monster.

The road was icy, and the lights were erratic beams that froze me in place. Something slammed into me, and my face smashed against the asphalt.

I gripped the pole until my knuckles felt fused with the cold metal. When I blinked, I saw dark splotches of blood on the road—his blood.

Lars. Struck down by the monster.

When it should have been me.

I dragged myself back to the beautiful bungalow that my grandmother had lived and died in, desperately missing home.

It always smelled of lavender, earth, and mothballs.

I headed straight to her courtyard studio, breath short, sharp, and ragged.

Sinking onto the dew-soaked grass, I faced the relics of my grandmother’s struggle.

Nana had been a ceramicist and had even incorporated Lankan motifs into her exquisite pieces, alongside Celtic knotwork, whimsical folk art, and intricate floral embossing.

She had bravely fought her homesickness and depression; a phoenix rising out of the ashes again and again. I was not her.

Lars was my home.

His presence in my memory was like a lit match in a dark abyss. I was melting into the darkness; it was consuming me even as I strained to see the pinprick of light.

My mother, in some inexplicable, convoluted way, blamed herself.

She was a well-known fashion designer in Sri Lanka, specialising in edgy, limited-edition wardrobe staples infused with traditional elements like Beralu lace, handloom textiles, and bold batik art.

In return for managing her fashion blog and modelling some of her creations, I got to keep free samples or gift them to my friends.

It was the batik silk dress with lace-edged sleeves and an agate waist chain I wore to a college céilí that Lars claimed stole his heart, body, and soul.

I knew you were a warrior queen even before I first heard your name.

But it wasn’t until he had fitted his six-foot-two frame between an elderly lady and a pert eight-year-old during the block print workshop I was hosting at a culture fair that he really caught my attention.

I started to notice who Lars was outside the celestial orbit of his stardom.

By the end of it, the old lady was glowing with pride after recounting the exploits of her seven grandchildren to a patient listener, and the kid had to be dragged away from her new partner in crime by her mum.

His tote was surprisingly well done, if comically tiny when he’d tried it on. It featured solid geometric patterns arranged into a neat pyramid in the centre with leaves and vines curling at its base.

“A little small to fit your sports gear,” I’d quipped as he’d shown it to me with that single dimple weaving in and out of his cheek. “But A-plus for creativity.”

“Your eyes inspired the whole thing.” He was about to trace a finger over the blue-green leaves on the bag when I grabbed his hand.

“It’s still wet!”

That first, inadvertent touch fanned the spark between us into something warm, bright, and irresistible.

My mother, who lived for her art, had the habit of aggrandising its effects.

And so, she insisted that I come back and live in the family bungalow as long as I wanted, while I tried to figure out how to reassemble my broken shards.

Part of it had been modernized and converted into an Airbnb. I was promised that the current tenants would not bother me. My grandmother’s old rooms at the back of the house, facing the courtyard, provided all the space and solitude I needed.

My mom and her partner lived in the city centre, and I never went there unless I could help it. I shivered as the dew seeped through my cotton pyjama bottoms. The faintest golden thread materialised in the phantom grey sky.

“Missie?”

Saroja’s voice was like her peaked eyebrows. Always ending on a question. Her long, silky black hair, not yet wound into its customary plait, brushed my bare shoulder as she bent over me.

“Here – tea.”

The mug was one Nana had made especially for me. It was the blue-green of our eyes, and featured undulating sea serpents and pirouetting peacocks.

I smiled at her weakly, letting the delicious warmth tingle through my hands before taking a sip.

The sharp bite of ginger and the melting sweetness of jaggery. Just the way I liked it.

I first met Saroja when I was ten, and she was thirteen, sent by her father to work as a maid in the city. In those days, this was a common practice for estate workers with too many mouths to feed.

Though I never would have admitted it then, I had been jealous of how much my grandmother had loved her. They had been kindred spirits – the little village girl and the silver-haired Irish artisan.

Saroja was now married with a dimpled baby boy who made my chest clench with a strange longing. Despite having a family of her own, she had come. For my grandmother’s sake at first, perhaps.

The first week I was here, staring blankly at whatever happened to be in my line of sight, she had tried to breathe life into me with my favourite dishes and delicacies — fish ambul thiyal, brinjal moju, spicy jackfruit curry, and thick wood apple juice laced with jaggery.

I ate dutifully, mechanically. Then she brought me pieces of my childhood to hold on to: creaky old albums, my grandfather’s tobacco-stained pipe, my grandmother’s beautiful gramophone that I had always loved. I looked, touched, listened, and felt nothing.

Finally, desperately, she put her own child into my arms. He held my gaze with his soft brown eyes for what felt like an eternity. I don’t remember which of us started bawling first.

And then, one rainy day, she pulled me into Nana’s studio and slapped a lump of clay onto the pottery wheel in front of me. She guided my hands with her own, even more patient and gentle than my grandmother, who had taught her everything she knew.

“Women hold things differently,” she’d said simply, sweetly.

By the time I could work on my own, pounding, pulling, and pinching the clay, I had begun to feel something. Anger. Guilt. Pain that ran bone-deep. My creations were misshapen, hideous, eyesores. But they were solid, real. They were my grief incarnate.

I still roused myself every night, before the break of dawn. I would walk in the familiar darkness, imagining he was with me. His breath stirring the hair at the top of my head, his special brand of warmth anchoring me before his arms did.

Maybe if I relived that night enough, I could change how it ended. It would be my blood on the asphalt and his broken screams cursing the stars.

Sleeping pills awaited my return.

Saroja laid a light hand on my head, reading my thoughts. “Not today, Missie. You need to get ready for Hana baba’s party.”

*

The day I first saw her, I had woken from a dream that felt like a Leviathan pulling me into a dark, choppy ocean.

I had staggered to my window, grappling with the old-fashioned sash as I struggled to breathe. My grandmother’s back garden was a curious blend of tropical jungle and quaint, orderly flower beds.

The strangest sight had greeted me: a girl with wild curls held a watering can to the fountain in a small clearing. When she had filled it and balanced its weight on her hip, she disappeared around the side of the house.

Losing sight of her felt like being submerged in sinister darkness once again. I pushed away from the window and made my way to the back door, past Saroja humming in the pantry.

She was tipping the last of the water into an old stone birdbath when I got there. A good amount had sloshed onto her pyjamas from the watering can, and she was shivering.

“Hello.” My voice sounded rusty.

She didn’t turn.

She was gazing up at the trees.

My chest caved in at the rejection, and I spun around, wanting nothing more than to disappear.

A small gasp arrested me.

I turned slowly, arranging my face into a soft, if worn, smile.

She stared back with wide, dark, liquid eyes. She couldn’t be more than nine or ten. Her face tapered to an elfin point, and her deep brown skin was almost translucently clear.

Slowly, she raised her hands, palms facing out. I got the sense that she didn’t want to frighten me – as if I were a wild critter, shy of humans.

The thought made my forced smile tilt impishly. Her own smile flickered to life.

Then she began to sign.

“Hello. I tried to be very quiet and not disturb you. Sorry if I did.”

I shook my head. A spark of gratitude that I had learned sign language during a high school community service project flickered in the cavern of my chest.

“You didn’t disturb me at all. I happened to be looking out my window and saw you. Your hair is beautiful.”

She smiled again, wider this time.

“Your eyes are beautiful. My Mama paints in that colour sometimes. Like the sea.”

Terribly, my eyes started prickling. I was not going to break down before this fawn-like child.

“Is your mother a painter?”

She nodded. “She’s an artist, and she also does art therapy. She’s having a workshop tomorrow. Will you come?”

Her gaze made me feel strangely witnessed. Like she didn’t measure me by earthly parameters, didn’t expect me to fit any box constructed by superficial standards.

This girl wasn’t trying to fix me; she was inviting me into a world she loved.

Suddenly, she laughed. A musical sound that sent shoots of pain and wonder up my torso. We would have shared a laugh if things were different, one of unfettered joy.

“I didn’t introduce myself; how silly! I’m Hana.”

“Kellia,” I signed, taking a deep breath. “I’ll see you at the workshop.”

I did not take my sleeping pills the next day.

Instead, I took a long bath infused with one of Saroja’s magical Ayurveda potions that made the water silky and sweet-smelling, like the folds of my grandmother’s wedding saree.

Then I went to find Saroja with the enormous pair of kitchen scissors.

“Please,” I said, as her eyes widened.

As the dark locks fell on the velvety red sandstone, I felt a floating lightness that made me dizzy. When Saroja guided me gently by the shoulders to the mirror in her room, I saw why.

I was a child again.

Little curls framed my face, sweeping across my forehead, tickling my ears.

My face was still colourless, yet open somehow, like an unwritten page. While my eyes stared dully in their sunken grooves, their colour had lightened, giving the illusion of glimmers rising from unknown depths.

I had put on a pair of my grandmother’s corduroy overalls, striped in green and orange, over a white T-shirt that I suspect my grandpa had used as an undershirt. I was now fully immersed in a past that was safe and painless, and that came with an intoxicating sense of freedom.

Saroja shook her head at me, a half-smile on her face, and I tried not to see the foreboding behind it. Perhaps she feared this was my irretrievable descent into madness. If it was, I welcomed it.

With a few more hours left for the workshop, I steeled myself and opened my laptop. Chewing at my lower lip, I logged on to my student portal and checked my grade and professor’s comments on my last assignment.

Professor Ludwig might have looked and acted like a Dickensian character, but his pages-long diatribes on our essays were worth their weight in gold. I stared at the screen, eyes popping wide. Impossible.

There was no way I would have gotten full marks on the paper I barely scraped together in the throes of grief so I could escape what had become hell on earth to me. I scrolled down to the comments section.

Dear Miss Cabraal,

On the suggestion of one of your colleagues, I have taken the liberty of eschewing consideration of the paper you submitted and embracing another informal publication that is a rather brilliant example of journalism at its finest —a work of relentless investigation, powerful narrative, and immense societal impact.

I look forward to discussing it with you at tedious length.

Best Regards,

Prof. Ludwig

With trembling fingers, I clicked the link he had attached below, which whisked me to a newspaper article. It was titled “The Silencing of Journalists in Palestine and Beyond: When the “Press” Vest Becomes a Moving Target.”

The article detailed how the hellish Occupation was responsible for two-thirds of all global journalistic deaths in recent tallies, contrasting glaring frontline realities with the chilling effect of censorship and systematic suppression to sanitise atrocities in Western newsrooms.

I had interviewed campus media professors, student editors, news agents, and local press freedom advocates to expose journalistic malpractices and highlight the courageous media workers who confronted editorial bias despite escalating harassment.

The article was born of a different spectrum of anger, grief, and helplessness. My words were the only weapon at my disposal against the injustices that I witnessed through impersonal screens, burning into my retinas when I closed my eyes.

It was different from any other article I had written.

While Lars had often played with the whimsy of my name, my journalist classmates were often alarmed by my warrior-like tendencies during investigations. I did not tolerate narratives that weren’t grounded in data.

My reports were usually a violent rip of the band-aid, leaving a wound that still pulsed for a salve. Something more.

My first real argument with Lars had been over whether or not Jane Eyre qualified as an unreliable narrator.

A ribbon of heat unfurled in my stomach as I recalled his flushed cheeks and glittering eyes, the way his breath hitched as he held himself back from interrupting me.

Even as I ranted on about Jane’s unwitting subjectivity, selective omission, and the dehumanisation of a certain character, I felt my pulse quicken at the fierceness of his beauty.

“Kellia, she was young, impressionable, and clearly depressed. How could we expect her to zoom out and assess her situation from a logical lens?”

“If I could just sit her down for a rousing interview and make her see how toxic—”

Lars had grabbed my shoulders, shaking me gently. “Is that it? Don’t journalists have to report the truth of what people experience instead of making them see things their way?”

“She is brainwashed and biased. I’m the one who has the privilege of objectivity here.”

“Honesty is more important than objectivity. The truth is self-evident. Your job, as I understand it, is to amplify suppressed voices and cover the lived experiences of real people. Especially when we are all inherently subjective, my love.”

There it was, the truth laid bare: I had a phobia of unreliable narrators.

That’s why I rarely included anecdotes in my reports and barely scratched the surface of the spectrum of perspectives out there.

And wasn’t this a bias in and of itself?

But Lars’ passionate words had made me realise that people deserved more than being relegated to facts and figures. They deserved a voice, especially when they were most vulnerable.

And so, for this article, I had included human stories that breathed life into the statistics and inspired meaningful action against systemic violence and institutional deception.

Lars had been the first to read it.

“This needs to go in The Tableau.”

I shook my head bitterly. “Not their cup of tea, apparently.”

The college newspaper was notorious for its elitist publications. They didn’t want to rock the boat.

Lars had frowned lightly, absently running his thumb over the back of my hand, then his forehead smoothed.

“Jedi!” He grinned. “Have you heard of Maqthub?”

I narrowed my eyes at him, trying to ignore the way his touch sent tingles up and down my body like melting snowflakes. “Is this some obscure facet of Star Wars lore?”

He laughed, gently butting his forehead against mine.

“Come on.” He pulled me up from the grassy knoll, deftly folding our picnic blanket after scattering crumbs for the ducks.

Lars knew the college library like the back of his hand, so I shouldn’t have been surprised when he led me through a secret passage between two floor-to-ceiling shelves, down a rather musty staircase, and into a cavernous room.

The room had a single, long table, hosting a motley crew of students, hard at work amid towering books, scattered papers, and laptops.

A boy wearing a team jersey nearly identical to Lars’ looked up from his laptop, brushing a few strands of dark, unruly curls from his eyes. He had smooth, caramel brown skin and wore a sweetly serious expression.

Lars never broke his confident stride, going up right to him and clapping him on the back.

“I’ve brought you a recruit. She already has a report ready for submission.”

A girl with an auburn pixie cut and electric blue glasses got to her feet and extended her hand with a friendly smile. “Hey. I’m Myr, editor.”

I returned her warm squeeze. “Haven’t I seen you…”

“Playing Gwendolen Fairfax? Yes, that was me.”

“I laughed until my sides ached. You’re a force to be reckoned with on stage.”

She grinned, a glimmer of her character peeking through.

“That’s her personality in general,” said a boy with pierced eyebrows. “Myr and I are the masterminds behind Maqtub’s short stories. We enjoy poking fun at the absurdities of life.”

A girl with satiny cocoa skin and a vibrant turban sighed, though her teeth flashed in my direction. “And I try to temper these two tragi-comedians with practical survival tips for campus life and only the spiciest surrounding news.”

A boy with slanted amber eyes and blue-black hair leaned back in his chair as he surveyed me. “I’m Tristan, a psychology major. I amplify student voices and occasionally play Agony Aunt.”

I smiled and nodded shyly at all of them. Jedi, it seemed, was their centre of gravity. All eyes in the room drifted towards him.

“I’m Majed,” he said, giving me a quizzical look. “And you favour covering national sociopolitical issues that have an inevitable parallel with our local campus community. Grounded, relatable, and research-backed.”

I gaped at him, barely registering Lars’ delighted laugh. “How did you…?”

“Ludwig’s class. He has pointed out the merits of your work on several occasions.”

I felt myself flush. The lecture hall was massive and packed, but I still felt bad for not noticing him.

Jedi stood as Lars returned to my side, fairly quivering with excitement.

He swept us both with an unexpectedly charismatic grin. “Cabraal, this collaboration has been a long time coming.”

*

I had missed the workshop.

Yet, standing outside the front door holding the multi-tiered warmer Saroja had thrust into my hands, I felt less anxious than I had in a long time.

Hana would understand. I knew this like I knew that Nana would have nodded approvingly at my clay-splattered overalls and Seeya would have been able to guess what delicacies Saroja had packed with a single deep sniff.

A rather alarming shape materialised behind the frosted glass of the front door, and I stepped back just as it opened. The woman had Hana’s wildly curly mane, over which she wore a massive helmet with a generous visor and an attached LED light.

“Hello.” Her face under the helmet was softly appealing. “You’re just in time for a night ride.”

That was how I found myself laughing for the first time in many moons.

It was an unexpected foray, wobbling on “Maamu”’s giant bicycle and trying to catch up with a ten-year-old who nimbly wove through patches of moonlight and tree shadows, showing off just a little.

We returned, flushed and windswept, to a picnic on the veranda comprising Saroja’s coconut shrimp broth and ghee-infused garlic bread.

Halima disappeared into the kitchen with the enticing promise of peach iced tea, leaving Hana and me to roam the garden, nursing our full bellies.

The sparkle in Hana’s eyes had dimmed, and as she walked silently beside me, her head began to droop.

“Are you tired?” I asked after stroking her hair to get her attention.

She shook her head. “No. I’m sad.”

The simplicity of her admission staggered me. I squared my shoulders.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“I dropped Mama’s phone today. There’s a huge crack in it.”

I felt a guilty stab of relief. “I drop my phone all the time, Hana. Accidents happen.”

“It wasn’t an accident.” She turned away from me, hands moving fast. “I saw a video of children lying on a hospital floor, covered in blood. They were screaming…”

I gathered her to me, burying her face against my shoulder as she cried. After she had quieted down, I gave her Nana’s soft cotton hanky to blow her nose.

“My Maamu says all feelings are a blessing from Allah. Even the hard ones. Because they remind us we’re human and help us have em—em—"

“Empathy,” I finished numbly.

“Yes. People who can’t feel properly don’t do anything to help others. They only care about themselves.”

That night, I was too exhausted to walk. I lay in bed, listening to the crickets and thinking about Hana. What she had seen. The words said to her by someone I had never met.

How long had it been since I cared about anything?

Since I researched, wrote, or advocated something that would spark a change, however small?

I knew my grief wasn’t selfish. But how could I make it mean something?

I fell into a fever dream where the wheels of a bicycle spun fast through pools of moonlight and puddles of blood.

*

Hana’s tenth birthday was Pottery Barn themed.

The décor and outdoor table settings were rustic, hand-crafted pieces that Haleema, Saroja, and I had spent many happy hours working on.

Quirky ceramic vases spilled fresh flowers onto wooden barn tables flanked by long benches. Two massive tables groaned with cute platters and tiered stands laden with party food. Cushions, paper lanterns, and bunting relieved the lush, slightly wild greenery of the garden, the grass scattered with woven mats and baskets of gifts for the games.

Hana was wearing overalls; her wild curls had been tamed into braids. She eyed the gift in my hand with glee. I shook my head with a grin when she reached for it.

“This goes on the gift table I’m guarding with my life.”

We had decided that my role would be to help out behind the scenes. Haleema had asked me to sneak in a very special guest through the back door.

I knew Hana wanted me to celebrate outside with them, but she gave me a brilliant smile and a hug before skipping off to welcome the first guests.

Fighting a wave of emotion, I slipped in through the streamers curtaining the front door and stationed myself in the cosy kitchen.

I almost didn’t hear the knock with my head in the freezer, checking on the mango, pineapple, and chilli popsicles. I wiped my hands on my gypsy skirt before rushing to the back door; hopefully the surprise guest would politely overlook my dishevelled state.

I opened it, forcing a smile.

The young man looked up quickly from his phone, a friendly smile already creasing his eyes.

Then he reeled back, dropping his bag.

On the threshold stood Jedi.

*

I remembered the scent of warm spices and sharp citrus.

It had wrapped around me the night I was slumped over Lar’s body, tugging me away, gently, even as I’d kicked and clawed.

Jedi’s luminous eyes had filled, but I shook my head before he could speak, brushing past him.

I had holed myself up for three days before Saroja came to me with a message from Halima.

Majed has gone out for the day. Hana would really like to thank you in person for her “Miss Rachel” dress.

It took me several hours to reply.

Meet me on the roof.

My grandfather’s telescope was a veteran of time, but we could still see enough magic through the dust-clouded lens.

“I thought I saw a girl dancing among the stars,” I said softly.

Hana’s laugh sounded older than her ten years. “I wish we could see them. The beautiful souls of the children of Gaza, lifted through the skies by Angels.”

I held out my hands to her. The wind ruffled her curly hair and the dainty folds of her white dress, sewn with miniature drawings — vivid dreams spun by children in an open-air slaughterhouse.

“Why don’t you like Maamu?” she asked, after slipping her hands from mine.

“I’ve always liked him,” I replied truthfully. “He just reminds me of things that I can’t bear to think about.”

She looked down, lovingly tracing the little tapestry of impossible hope she wore.

“I’m glad. He’s leaving soon, you know.”

“Is he?”

My hands shook.

“Yes. He’s going to Gaza.”

*

I stopped just when the call to prayer unfurled in the darkness, my knees weakening.

The mosque at the end of the road was white, pearlescent in the leafy shadows from the park across the street.

I made my unsteady way to a bench, shivering. The beautiful, piercing voice always made me stop short, just before I reached the main road.

I don’t know whether it's strengthened or sapped me, but I found myself sitting still and staring into the darkness before dawn, eyes streaming.

The adhaan temporarily tuned out the siren call. The dark, irresistible invitation to give in to my fatigue, lie down on the dark asphalt of the main road.

I battled it every night.

I sat very still, wrapped in Nana’s rose silk dressing gown, long after the echoes faded away.

I could hear voices, make out shapes through the trees as the worshippers headed back home.

It was the fear of being found by one of them, broken body splayed on the road, that helped me turn away.

Yet the temptation burned in my throat like a terrible thirst. It warred with the liquid warmth that had pooled in my bones when the sacred words had spilled across the horizon, calling me to something I dared not contemplate.

I met him by the garden gate, and he took a gentle step back, letting me pass.

I could see him only in outline – tall, slightly stooped, thick curls straying in the wind.

Suddenly, I wanted to throw my arms around him, sob into his chest until I had choked out all the Lars-shaped shards inside me.

But I paused, remembering.

Majed had never been like the other players. Even Lars had been amused at the pains he took to avoid the lavish attentions of the most stunning girls on and off campus.

“Lad’s saving himself for The One. Not even a peck on the cheek. Blushes like a cailin when he’s caught off guard.”

Not trusting myself to speak, I raised my hands.

You…are going …to Gaza?”

“Yes.” His large, long-fingered hands traced the single, shattering word with impossible grace. “You know why.”

It was as if he was playing some unseen instrument and something deep in my soul thrummed in response.

He did not treat me like a wounded wild animal; he spoke to me as an equal despite, perhaps because of, my broken pieces.

“It was you.”

The presence I was blinded to all this time.

Lars had often looked at him admiringly.

“Rugby is just a side quest for Jedi. Reporting, amplifying buried voices, that’s his priority. He considers it a Divine duty to pursue the truth.”

But that wasn’t all.

He was there for people.

I remember the blood on his jacket from my hands. His voice had been ragged as he tried to coax the paramedics into letting us ride with Lars. His strong arms had broken my fall into blissful oblivion.

They told me that I had been hospitalised for a week. Indira’s face, and then my mom’s, penetrated the fog in my brain from that time. I remembered closing my eyes tight, praying for unconsciousness.

Yet, I knew Jedi hadn’t left.

Just as I knew that the shuddering in his chest as he had pulled me away from the man I loved had been sobs.

He had looked at Lars for a long moment after hauling him to the pavement, closing his eyes with a tenderness that had made me double over.

Now, standing before him as the night began to fade, I watched him shake his head.

“Ludwig was looking for every excuse to pass you.”

So that had been him too.

He doesn’t know I remember all he did that night, I realised. And all those days after. He was the one working diligently behind the scenes to smooth my way, to let me escape the carnage.

“Why?”

He dipped his head

“Because he realised the world would be a darker place without your voice, Kellia.”

My resolve broke then, and I reached out to him.

But he had twisted slightly, fishing inside the pocket of his messenger bag.

I folded my arms into myself, trembling even before I looked at what he held out to me.

“His journal.” Majed took a step forward, his shadow mingling with mine, offering comfort without touch. “It’s yours for whenever you’re ready.”

He laid it on the gatepost, giving me one of his heartbreaking smiles.

Then he did me the kindness of walking away.

*

The tiny apple-cheeked girl looked up at the camera with wide, melting brown eyes.

I was already choking on tears before hearing his voice, calming and sure, speaking fluent Arabic.

“And what do you want to be when you grow up?”

The frame shook just as she opened her mouth, and I could see the fear swallow her words. The hospital lights started flickering.

“Yes, habibti?”

My love.

The girl swallowed, her long lashes wet with tears. “Biddi akoun doktora”

I want to be a doctor.

The frame shook again, plaster raining down. It streaked her small face in fine, grey dust.

I saw his hand then, gently wiping it away. Her eyes were closed tight, and after the initial whimper, she did not cry.

“Why?”

She opened her eyes then, and I saw flecks of brilliant green swimming in the brown irises.

“Because of the bombs. I want to save people.”

Majed’s reply was interrupted by a sound that no child should have cause to know.

The screeching whistle of a missile.

The screen went black.

I cradled Lars’ journal to my body for a long time before opening it.

Hands trembling, I flipped to his last entry.

I don’t know what made me do it.

The deafening roar of the crowd, the flying in my heart – as if it was trying to soar somewhere high, somewhere it had always known.

We had won the game.

But the flash flood of my thoughts held more than the thirst for victory. Questions were tugging against the tides that tried to overwhelm them into submission.

Was this really it?

This transient bubbling and fizzling of hopes, dreams, and joys?

Maybe it was Oran’s giant fist thumping me on my back that brought me to my knees.

And then my forehead was on the ground.

The noise ebbed, a wave receding swiftly, leaving something smooth and unwritten.

I mentally scrawled a huge question mark on the sand.

Scattered words resurfaced like buried pieces of treasure.

Ask, and He will answer.

Walk towards Him, and He will run towards you.

Everything that happens is according to His infinite Wisdom; you only see one pixel, and He sees the whole picture.

Jedi’s words over the course of many games, my unwitting spiritual warrior. What a lad!

And here I was, prostrating as he did in his five daily prayers, and after every victory and defeat.

It is God’s decree.

I got to my feet and saw the most beautiful sight I had ever known. Perhaps will ever know on this Earth.

Kellia, her sweet face glowing like the first light of dawn. A radiance that started from deep within and suffused everything around her in an unbreakable armour of peace and purpose.

Peace.

Purpose.

I guess that’s what I found in that delicious moment of blankness.

An unwritten page, stories beckoning.

Peace because I trusted the author.

And my heart, leading me to higher realms.

I leaned back, cradling his words to my heart. How could it be possible to love someone this much and survive?

My thumb hovered over Majed’s next video, this time at the funeral of a martyred family of six.

I could see him in the blue press vest, looking so like his niece, my best friend. He was no longer stooped; his broad shoulders were thrown back, with new purpose in his dark, piercing gaze.

My armour wasn’t unbreakable, like Lars thought. It shattered over and over again.

But I wasn’t weak because of it; I was human. I wasn’t created to be perfect; I was meant to strive.

As long as I pursued my purpose, however imperfectly, peace would follow.

The people I loved the most, my found family, all had something I desperately wanted.

They were true to themselves and spread love, warmth, and comfort without judgement or discrimination.

I would spend my life learning to hold fragile things like Nana and Saroja.

I would feel deeply for others and channel that empathy into sincere service like Lars, Halima, and Hana.

I would be a Messenger of Truth like Majed.

About the Competition

The Global Poetry and Creative Writing Competition 2026 by Hashtag Kalakar invites participants worldwide to showcase their literary talents. This prestigious event celebrates the power of words and creativity, providing a platform for writers to express their unique voices. The competition encompasses various categories, including poetry, short stories, and essays, fostering a global community of writers.

We extend our heartfelt gratitude to Maryam Hamza for her moving contribution, "Lost And Found," to the Global Poetry and Creative Writing Competition 2026. Her narrative offers a rich exploration of themes that touch the soul and challenge the mind. We look forward to seeing more of Maryam's work and witnessing her continued journey as a storyteller.

About Hashtag Kalakar

Hashtag Kalakar is a creative platform dedicated to providing artists, writers, singers and other creative talents with opportunities to showcase their work and reach wider audiences through competitions, features and creative initiatives.