I woke up to the piercing sound of gunshots ringing through the village of Madaya. The sun was hours from rising, but flashes of gunfire illuminated the pitch-black streets. I could hear cries of panic shouted from below my bedroom window. They were close.

We had all been waiting for this day; the day that ISIS attacked. Now that it had finally come, I did not know what to do. I felt my mother’s soft hands grip my wrists and pull me out of bed. “They’re coming for the bakery,” she whispered. “Nour, you must hide.” 

“But what about you and Baba?” I asked, suddenly stricken with fear. “And Fatima?”

“Your safety is more important than ours,” Mama replied. “Daesh does unspeakable things to young girls, and I would die before I let that happen to you.”

“I love you, Mama,” I said, pulling her into a hug.

“I love you too,” she replied. “Now go! Your sister is already in the grain store room.”

I hurried into the small closet where we kept the flour that my father religiously made into pita. Every morning, our neighbors would frequent the bakery to buy bread, pastries, and baklava. My family had lived in Madaya for centuries, and we passed the tradition of baking down through the generations. Now, one night could wipe out all those years of history.

My younger sister Fatima was huddled in the corner of the closet. I took her hand in mine, and I could feel her entire body shake. She was only twelve, and the animalistic sounds of warfare frightened her even more than they did me.

“Just stay silent,” I reassured her. “Everything will be over soon.”  

Suddenly, the entrance to the family bakery was thrust open. Through the slats of the wooden door, we could see menacing militants rush up the stairs into our cramped apartment, surrounding my mother and father. Their leader, a towering man dressed in all black, lifted his machine gun and pointed it at my father’s head.

“We claim this bakery in the name of the Islamic State,” he stated. “Surrender the keys or die in the name of Allah.”

Always defiant, my father refused to back down. He stared straight into the leader’s empty eyes and wouldn’t break his gaze.

“This violence is not in the name of Allah; it is in the name of the Devil,” Baba proclaimed. “I was born in this house, and I will die in this house.”

Unable to silence the fear growing inside my chest, I screamed, “Baba, no!”

It was too late. In an instant, the leader of the militants fired his machine gun straight through my loving father’s forehead. He crumpled to the floor in a pile of blood.

The pack of militants turned towards the closet where Fatima and I were hiding. My heart almost leapt out of my chest, and I began to recite sacred prayers as I waited for death. A shorter soldier wearing a green bandana loaded his pistol and stepped towards the door.

“Habibti, run!” Mama shouted, as she threw herself in front of the soldier. A bullet exploded through her skull. Her blood staining the walls, the carpet, and my soul, scarlet red.

Before I could process what had just happened, I grabbed my sister and sprinted out the back door. Gunfire followed us as we weaved through the narrow streets of Madaya. By the grace of God, we were not hit, and continued to run farther into the outskirts of town.

We did not stop until we reached the foothills of the mountains. Our legs ached from running for our lives, and we collapsed in a heap onto the gritty sand. I held Fatima tight as our chests heaved with sobs. In one night, we had lost our parents, our home, and life as we knew it.

We had gone from Nour and Fatima, the baker’s daughters, to Nour and Fatima, the displaced orphans. Our lives would never be the same.