TABLE OF CONTENTS It was dark. The clock next to the bed cast an eerie glow across her face as she looked at the time. It was 1:56 a.m. Looking across the small room, she noticed that the small television was still on. She had apparently fallen asleep watching CNN. She was lying awkwardly across the small bed, her clothes still on. The fog in her head was clearing now and she remembered: There had been an attack in the Middle East.
The news was on nearly all the television and cable networks; they all gratuitously showed blood in the broadcasts, splattered across the broken concrete, bricks, and splintered wood laying in haphazard piles. The bombing had occurred earlier that day in the Iraqi town of Najaf. The world press had jumped on the story hoping to play on the tragedy, recognizing the audience loved death and destruction, as long as it was far from home.
The inadvertent victims of the attack this time were children; their small, innocent bodies lying in the road, covered with blankets as their mothers and fathers sobbed as they kneeled beside them. CNN was rattling off useless statistics about body counts and the number of injured while live pictures of the fatal incident flicked across the screen in an endless stream. The scene made Layla cry. Although she tried to be strong and make her heart cold inside, there was a hurt inside of her; memories of her past tormented her. She could...
