Amor Fati
a short story
Before I left for Beled Hawo, I was inundated with requests from cousins and family friends I’d never met, all vying for a piece of America. iPhones. iPads. Cameras. Fancy mascaras. I stuffed two suitcases full of consumer goods, seams bulging and zippers straining to keep them shut. My grandmother, buzzing with excitement, told anyone who’d listen about my voyage. Soon, women at the mosque were pressing close, asking me to haul items to their long-lost relatives. It made me wonder: Was I being sent to Beled Hawo to reconnect with my family, or to act as a duty-free mule?
Beled Hawo was a place I hardly knew or remembered. I had only stories and pixelated images sent over WhatsApp. My sole connection was my parents and siblings, who had settled there after being displaced by years of war. They had built new lives in this dusty border town, perched on the edge of Somalia and bordering both Kenya and Ethiopia. Now I was going to join them—albeit briefly. My grandparents had scrounged together enough money to send me there as a high school graduation gift. I feigned enthusiasm, but secretly I was terrified. Spending an entire summer with my estranged family tested the limits of my imagination.
At the airport terminal, waiting for my flight, I played out scenarios in my head. My father and my brother, Hassan, were meant to meet me in Nairobi. Hassan was closest in age to me. I’d been told countless stories about how protective he’d been—how inseparable we were as small children. As a toddler, he would often drape a blanket over my infant face to shield me from strangers’ gazes. But that closeness had frayed with time and distance.
My grandparents tried their best. Every Sunday, they arranged a call. My grandmother would warm up the conversation before passing the phone to me. Mostly, I listened. Our lives had grown so foreign to each other that I never knew what to say. Sometimes I felt ashamed by how little I wanted to speak to them, how those Sunday calls felt more like a chore than a chance to reconnect.
When I arrived in Nairobi, it was past midnight, and the airport terminal was eerily quiet. It was cleaner and more organized than I’d expected. I got through customs in no time and made my way to the taxi bay, where my father had told me to wait. Cargo in tow, I scanned the sparse crowd for familiar faces. Hassan found me first. He came at a run and lifted me clear off the ground. His excitement instantly disarmed me. Behind him stood my father, taller than I’d imagined. His hug was gentle, warm, with a familiarity I hadn’t expected. I bit my lip hard, trapping the tears at my lash line before they could fall.
Nairobi was just the first stop. After a few days' rest at a hotel, we’d begin the real journey to Beled Hawo. Options were limited—only one flight a week went from Nairobi to the Kenyan border. And just my luck: that flight had left two days earlier. So, we were forced to board a bus and take a grueling 700-mile trek to Mandera, the closest point to Beled Hawo on the Kenyan side. From there, we’d simply walk across the border to meet my three other brothers, Yahya, Abdullah, and Abdirahman, who’d pick us up in a Land Cruiser. No border patrol, no passport stamps. Just a lone tree marked the transition from one country to another.
The bus to Mandera was cramped and packed with bodies. I sat by the window and looked outside at the endless orange-tinted savanna. Through the dust-streaked windows, I spotted giraffes and zebras, animals I’d only ever seen in zoos, now moving freely in their natural habitat. I suppose this was my natural habitat, too, though it didn’t feel that way yet.
The first days in Beled Hawo blurred into one long, sun-drunk haze. Jet lag pinned me to the bed for hours, only to wake into a cycle of stiff-backed visits to relatives’ homes. I’d sit cross-legged on low majlis sofas like a museum object on display while they asked prying questions and pawed through the goods I’d hauled over.
The men always came with the same request: "Find me a wife." A green card marriage—their golden ticket. I’d give a little laugh, only to be met with stone faces. They were dead serious.
Hassan was like my security blanket, always stepping in when things got too nosy or snarky. The bond we’d had as children seemed to flicker back to life. I wondered what my life might've looked like if we’d grown up side by side instead of worlds apart, but I tried not to dwell on it. Some thoughts were too tender to touch.
It took a couple of weeks before I found any kind of rhythm. My sisters, Filsan and Fardowsa, left their husbands behind to camp out with their kids in our parents’ compound. Like most homes in Beled Hawo, ours was a cluster of small buildings arranged around an open courtyard, anchored by a large tree at the center. That tree became the gathering point for meals, prayers, gossip, and lullabies. With the arrival of my sisters’ kids, the place was soon buzzing with life.
I remembered how my grandmother used to quiz me on the names of my nieces and nephews, like it was a game show. Now I could finally match names to faces. The kids gave me something to hold onto, something to fill the long, shapeless days that might otherwise have stretched into oblivion.
During the day, I chased goats and chickens around the courtyard with them. Keeping myself busy was the easiest way to dodge thorny conversations with the adults. Even after weeks, I still had no idea what to say, especially to my mother. It felt like she was always studying me, always seeing something I couldn’t. There was a pain behind her eyes that made it unbearable to sit with her for too long.
At dusk, the courtyard filled with cots and mats, mosquito nets strung up like translucent tents. During the summer months, sleeping outside was typical business. I was the outlier. I preferred the safety of walls, a ceiling, and a door—a clear boundary between me and the outside world.
Not that I hadn't made an attempt. That first week, I would lie rigid on my mat, staring into the infinite, indifferent sky, breathing in the open air which cooled to a pleasant temperature each night. Cicadas provided an uninterrupted chorus, underscoring my insomnia. Each night as I lay there, dread rose from my ribcage and lodged itself in my throat. My thoughts raced, and I saw my whole life extended out before me like the star-strewn sky.
I thought about the unfairness of not truly knowing my parents or siblings. The schoolyard shame when teachers asked about them. How natural yet unnatural being among them felt.
I thought about Yahya's crushed hopes when our aunt's promised bride never materialized. Years of waiting had dulled him into someone silent, unreadable.
At least, Abdullah and Abdirahman didn't bother hiding their resentment. They mocked my American accent, my slouching walk, the pristine Nikes I wore to the border. "You want to get kidnapped?" Abdullah sneered. To them, I was painfully American, painfully naive.
They did nothing to ease the guilt I carried, but I couldn’t really blame them. I felt resentful, too. They seemed so whole, so steady, like whatever our parents had given them was enough. I couldn’t help but wonder what I might have had if I’d stayed.
Some nights, I’d stare at the sky until the stars blurred and tears pricked the corners of my eyes.
After that week, I gave up. When dusk settled in, I slipped back inside the main house and folded myself onto a narrow mattress. I’d curl into a ball and pull a thin blanket over my head until only my breath filled the small space.
It must have been around four in the morning when my brothers woke me. A shock of ice water hit my face. For a split second, I thought I was drowning. The cool water flooded my nostrils, filled my ears, and slid down the back of my neck like a slow blade. My eyes flew open as I coughed, flailing. Looming over me were my four brothers, their faces bleeding into one shadow in the dark.
I kicked at them in protest, but it didn’t matter—their hands quickly clamped my wrists and ankles. Before I could blink the water from my eyes, I was weightless, then airborne.
Outside, the crisp pre-dawn air nipped at my ears. Above me, the stars lingered, and the moonlight cut through the vast, empty dark.
I imagine my refusal to be one with nature had something to do with why my brothers were carrying me outside before the cock’s crow. They had taken to calling me “city girl” with a playful sneer, the kind that betrayed just a trace of contempt.
By the time they set me on my feet, I realized what was happening. Under the moonlight, I could see my father sitting with his back against the compound wall, a goat in his lap, a machete in his hand.
Yahya ran over to pin the goat’s legs. I tried to cover my eyes.
Abdullah and Abdirahman grabbed my hands and held them down.
Hassan laughed along, but leaned in with a bit of reassurance.
“Don’t worry, it will be over quickly.”
I’d never seen an animal slaughtered before, and even with the knowledge that animals were butchered every day for our nourishment, I still couldn’t conceptualize the act. I guess this was meant to be a seminal moment, a moment for me to understand the sacrifice, look directly into its eyes. That didn’t stop me from turning green at the gills.
It’s not like I hadn’t wrestled with this before. In middle school, I even attempted to go vegan. After watching a documentary about the environmental impact of meat consumption, I became thoroughly convinced. My grandmother, however, found it almost sacrilegious; she was sure veganism was its own religion, one where adherents worshipped animals and therefore refused to eat them. She didn’t have to worry too much, though, because I only lasted a few months before caving.
The breaking point came when my grandmother made oodkac—a delicacy of beef cubes cooked in ghee until they reached a jerky-like consistency. The process took all day, and the rich, buttery aroma filled the house, overwhelming my senses. That evening, after my grandparents went to bed, I snuck into the kitchen and opened the metal jug holding the oodkac. I plunged a spoon directly into the jug and ate so much that I swore I could feel ghee seeping from my pores. Later, ashamed, I confessed, but my grandmother only reassured me. This was the way of things. Humans were meant to eat meat.
Still, the slaughter itself felt foreign to me. Seeing this beautiful goat cradled in my father’s lap twisted my stomach into a knot.
Shame pooled under my tongue as I heard its wails, the moonlight glinting off its wide, unblinking eyes, rimmed with panic. I thought of how it had kicked up dust in this very courtyard just yesterday, when I chased it with Filsan’s daughter. Did it know what was about to happen? Could it taste the inevitability in the air?
My father placed the machete on the goat’s neck, and the goat jerked.
“Bismillah, Allahu Akbar,” he said before lowering the blade.
At the first sight of blood, something in me snapped. I tore myself free from my brothers’ grasp and bolted inside the house, diving under the covers, shaking, slick with sweat. In the distance, I could hear their thunderous laughter, their voices ringing with amusement at my cowardice.
By noon, Beled Hawo’s sun is blistering, and the courtyard is silent. The pre-dawn humiliation I’d endured recedes to the back of my mind. Stomach grumbling, I trudged to the domed kitchen building—only to be thrust back into reality. There, hanging upside down on a wooden frame, was the morning’s sacrifice: skinned, gutted, unrecognizable.
Then my mother emerged, plate in hand. Liver and onions on a stack of canjeero. I forced a smile, masking my unease, and took the offering. I retreated to the courtyard tree to eat alone. The others had already finished; only the flies lingered.
I studied the plate. Liver had always been my favorite. Back in the States, my grandmother prepared it only on special occasions. She’d soak it in milk, rinse away the metallic tang, then dice the silky flesh into cubes to sizzle with peppers and onions. I’d cradle each bite in torn canjeero, savoring the warm, earthy flavor.
But now, I just stared.
The liver glistened under the sun, rich and dark, the onions caramelized into sweetness. I pressed my fingers into the tender flesh, still pink at its center, feeling the ghost of its pulse between my fingertips. The shrubs the goat had nibbled between stones, the thorny branches it had stripped bare with its blunt teeth, all transformed now into something more sacred than simple nutrition.
Is it so terrible to die this way? At least this death had meaning, had ritual. The machete had been sharp, the hands experienced. My father had said the blessing. Back in the States, animals died screaming in concrete chambers, their fear souring the meat before the bolt gun even fired. This death was dignified, at least.
It is not like my own life is so infinite. I could die in an instant. Sometimes, midstep, I even imagined a meteor shearing through the sky to obliterate me. The odds low, but not zero. Yet I still manage to walk, to breathe in the shadow of this paradox.
I shook off the thoughts and took a bite. The liver was rich, savory, and undeniable. Another bite followed, then another. I ate fast, chewing through the guilt until the plate was clean.
For a moment, the heat, the flies, the weight of it all slipped away. I let myself drift.
In that stillness, something settled inside me. The anxieties I’d carried, about family, about being understood, about whether I belonged here or anywhere, suddenly felt small. Fleeting. Perhaps none of it mattered as much as I’d believed.
Like the goat, I hadn’t chosen this life. I could only live it. Moment by moment. Breath by breath. This fate wasn’t punishment. It just is.
But then, as I began to rest, my stomach roared—a deep, tectonic growl.
My vision blurred. I staggered up, clutching my gut, and lurched toward the back of the main house near the chicken coop.
Then, an eruption.
Projectile. Half-digested canjeero and liver launched from my throat like lava. Stomach acid scorched its way up my esophagus. Strings of spit hung from my lips. I doubled over, gasping, as the sour stench rose around me.
Before I could react, the chickens flocked. Squawking, flapping, pecking at my sandals, they gobbled my puke with grotesque enthusiasm. The wet slap of beaks against barf made my stomach twist again. My throat burned. My ribs ached. My body felt hollowed out, scraped clean.
Then, through the dizzy haze, I looked up and saw my mother. Her face was tight with concern. Without a word, she reached for my hand, pulling me away from the frenzy of feathers. I stumbled into her arms and buried my face into her chest. The tears that had been permanently sequestered on my lower lash broke free.
She held me tightly, anchoring me.