This story is based upon true events from the author’s life. Tamar first meets Tariq when they are small children. The friendship endures and strengthens through the years, and becomes an intense love. At the same time, Tamar develops a complex and confused attachment to Muhammad, Tariq’s older brother, whose love for her and jealousy over her relationship with Tariq are never stated and express themselves in anger and vindictiveness.

Tamar carries Tariq’s child, but on the day of the baby’s birth Tariq is killed in a bus bombing. Only nineteen years old at the time, Tamar must work through the emotional devastation. To meet the demands of Israeli society she enters the army service that is expected of all young Israeli men and women, but which would be denied to her if it were known that she had a child. She leaves the baby to the care of an aunt and visits on weekends.

Her army commander, Boaz, who loves her and who is deeply affected by her tragic personal story, wants to marry her; but her attachment to the memory of Tariq is powerful, and she resists his approaches. Eventually she agrees, and after her service is completed, they marry. The marriage is a good one and Tamar’s second child is born. But Tamar’s attachment to Tariq never leaves her, and at the same time her thoughts turn frequently to Muhammad, who has escaped the emotional confines that Israel imposes on its Arab citizens, and has settled in America. After several years Boaz dies of a stroke.

Tamar has become reconciled with Tariq’s parents, and they are very supportive of her. Tariq’s mother knows that her son Muhammad still loves Tamar, but when she indirectly broaches the subject, Tamar rejects it as ridiculous. More years pass before she will eventually unite with Muhammad. Israel has always been her home and is all she has ever known, but the memories and emotional conflicts associated with it are too much for her to continue to endure. She leaves her homeland to live with Muhammad in America.