It was all perfect — the sun, sand, sea, and sky. They were all so breathtaking.

I liked to close my eyes and feel the sun’s warmth radiate on my face and the breeze gently nudge me toward the sea as if inviting me in. The breeze cooled me and neutralized the day’s heat, though I still relished the warmth of the sun caressing my skin. I felt like I was opening like a flower.

The golden sand beneath me tickled my toes. It was so fine that it would feel like I was walking on cotton clouds.

Opening my eyes, I marveled at the sea glistening in the sunlight, as if barrels of marine-blue glitter had been poured over its surface. I watched waves play lazily on the shore, drenching the sand and retreating as they waves rolled against the sandy shore in a soothing rhythm. The seagulls cried loudly as they floated above me.

Behind me were grand hills covered in lush, green grass that swayed in the wind. The hills separated the bustling city behind them from the spectacular natural scenery before me, allowing those who visited this spot to truly relax as they read the paper, or snacked, or drew in the sand, or, like me, quietly took it all in.

I used to come to the beach by the sea at the end of my workday. Standing in my spot, taking it all in, I would forget about all my problems after a very long, hectic day of work. I would slip between dreaming of the future and decompressing from the common stresses of work at my call-center job (a job that felt like it took all of my energy at the time, but these were minor problems that I wish could come back even for a moment).

This was always the last time of day that I could look, without having to squint, toward the incredible fireball that sustains all life in this world. The sky was a smooth gradient of warm yellows, oranges, and reds, casting intricate shadows on the clouds as the sun set.

When the war beat its drums, all of this was swallowed by darkness: blackness only pierced by the radiating redness of endless explosions. Destruction and blood flowed like a roaring waterfall that never stops.

When I close my eyes now and try to imagine this spot I would relax in, it is different.

In the sun’s place, a colossal, intensely dark cloud covers the entire sky. It shoots bullets of rain, cracks bolts of lightning, and unleashes deafening rumbles of thunder.

The breeze is gone, replaced by a strong fury that tries to push me over, purposefully, with malice. Gone is the playful sea, too. Towering waves as tall as two double-decker buses stacked on top of each other race toward the shore and roar at me before crashing down onto the surface. For a second, it seems like the sea reaches out to take me.

I run back home only to discover that I have been followed.

I stumble backwards, trying to escape its clutch, only for my leg to get caught on a jagged rock. Crimson red blood gushes out of my calf, and a sudden pain rushes up my spine, paralyzing me.

My red blood is juxtaposed against the dull, ashy rocks on the ground.

Where had all these rocks come from? Where am I now? What is this place? Where there were grassy hills before, now there are sharp, rocky cliffs with boulders threatening to crush me.

I turn, hoping to see someone who can help.

I see only a figure standing in the violent wind as though they were nothing but a breeze. They are unrecognizable. I can only make out a black cloak flapping in the wind. They seem somehow familiar, but their presence is unsettling, wrong.

I try to back away, but I can’t get up. My injured leg is losing so much blood. My other leg is numb from how hard I had landed on my lower spine. I am rooted to the spot. The figure approaches me steadily.

Ten meters away, now nine meters, eight —

With five or so meters between us, a sleeve becomes visible, and in it is a long, shiny blade that is impossibly sharp.

I have to do something. I have to get up. I have to go. I try calling for help, but no sound escapes my mouth; it is dry. My body is unresponsive.

The figure is indifferent to my struggling and steadily moves to stand above me and raises its blade high into the air.

I whimper: “Please, don’t kill me.”

I had been bombed in my home and was in the rubble for three days.

I am awake now and I dreamed the figure. But I did not dream the war or my time buried alive.

Now, nothing is perfect. The breeze is no longer calm or cool. It hits the face, leaving a scar on the cheek. The sun is no longer warm, but a hell that burns our hearts with heartbreak. The sands of the sea are now dark brown and rough on the feet so that you cannot walk on them. Even the sea’s blue waves have turned to dark grey, since there is no sanitation. They have flooded with wastewater, taking our dirt, bearing our pain and suffering.

The seagulls migrated, the green grass has disappeared, and there is nothing to dance with the air. Gaza has become a barren land, like a desert.

These impressions and imaginations feel real to me. I have more stories, “real” stories, ones that I wish I didn’t have.