A photograph of Nima's parents together in their homeland introduces Nima's longing for the father she never knew.

Nima and her mother are turned away from the airport check-in counter by Islamophobic employees.

Mama Fatheya warns Nima and Haitham that singing old songs could summon jinn from the spirit world.

Nima argues with Haitham about jinn and says mean things, causing the two friends to stop speaking.

A group of classmates attacks Nima at school and calls her a terrorist.

Nima is suspended from school despite being the victim of the attack.

Nima learns that Haitham has been beaten and hospitalized in a hate crime targeting him for being Muslim.

Aisha tells Nima that her father was shot by officers when he tried to drive her to safety in Sudan.

An airport elevator opens not to a floor but to the party scene from Nima's parents' photograph.

Nima overhears her father Ahmed tell a friend that he plans to abandon Aisha and refuse fatherhood.

On the rooftop of an abandoned building, Yasmeen pushes Nima off the edge into the river below.

Nima dives underwater to free Yasmeen's trapped foot and saves the spirit girl from drowning.

Nima hurls rocks at the officers surrounding her parents' car, allowing them to escape unharmed.

A portal deposits Nima back into her overflowing bathtub in the present, surrounded by new family photographs.

Aisha gifts Nima her yellow dress, and Nima twirls in it feeling warmth and belonging.

Nima grows up in the United States as the daughter of a Muslim immigrant, longing for the father she never knew and struggling to belong anywhere. Islamophobia shapes her world early — her mother is turned away at the airport, and Nima herself is attacked at school and called a terrorist before being suspended despite being the victim. When her best friend Haitham is hospitalized in a hate crime, Nima learns the truth about her father's death and eventually steps through a magical elevator into her parents' past in Sudan. There she discovers that her father planned to abandon her mother and that the homeland she idolized is far from perfect, while also confronting the spirit Yasmeen's attempt to drown her and usurp her life. She tries to alter history by saving her parents from the officers who shot her father, but cannot stop him from leaving on his own. Returning through the portal, Nima finally understands that home is not a country but the love she shares with her mother, a truth sealed when Aisha gifts her the yellow dress.

Nima's journey from isolation and hate crime to self-acceptance and belonging.

Haitham teases Nima about her love of old photographs, music, and film, dubbing her the Nostalgia Monster.

Nima feels like an outsider in Arabic class, dismissed as too traditional by her Americanized peers.

Nima learns that Khaltu Hala's hair was shorn by officers in Sudan and that she bears scars on her back.

Nima imagines all the glamorous careers her father might have had, always picturing him as a devoted dad.

Mama Fatheya shares rumors that Nima was a twin whose sister did not survive in the womb.

Nima visits Haitham in the hospital and finds him unconscious and kept alive by machines.

Nima trespasses into a stranger's backyard and swims in the pool, finding calm in the underwater silence.

Yasmeen leads Nima away from the dangerous hotel stranger and onto an airport shuttle to safety.

Nima overhears in the past that both Hala and Aisha are pregnant at the same time.

Nima and Yasmeen discover that Hala has been arrested for adultery, her hair shaved and her face bruised.

Nima's friends play a name game in which each round won for Yasmeen causes Nima to lose part of her body.

Yasmeen's body flails violently at the party until Mama Fatheya drives the spirit away with incense and prayer.

Ahmed chooses to leave Aisha even after Nima has altered the confrontation with the officers.

Nima and her mother embrace soaking wet in the bathroom, flooding their reunion with love and gratitude.

A new classmate introduces herself as Jazz in Arabic class and seems strangely familiar to Nima.

This pool traces the quieter but essential events that give Nima's story its full texture. From Haitham's playful nickname and Nima's feeling of exclusion in Arabic class to the painful truths about Khaltu Hala's trauma and the rumors of a twin who never survived, these moments reveal the depth of the wounds carried by Nima's diaspora community. Once inside Sudan's past, Nima discovers Hala's arrest, learns that both women are pregnant at the same time, and witnesses the joyful party papering over so much hidden suffering. Yasmeen's violent unraveling at the party and Nima's role in steering the spirit girl toward a new life mark pivotal turns in the supernatural thread of the story. Returning to the present, Nima finds a softer reunion with her mother and eventually spots Jazz, the new classmate who seems to carry Yasmeen's spirit, completing the circle of the girls' shared journey.

The supporting moments that built Nima's world and carried her through Sudan's past.

Nima longs to have been named Yasmeen, imagining a more beautiful and beloved version of herself.

Nima learns her mother once dreamed of becoming a dancer and that Nima was nearly named Yasmeen.

Alone in the apartment, Nima sees a shimmering ghost girl who looks just like her.

Without explanation, Nima's mother stops wearing her headscarf.

After her suspension, Nima lashes out at her mother, saying she might as well have two dead parents.

Convinced her mother deserves a better daughter, Nima calls out to Yasmeen to come and take her place.

A stranger who paid for Nima's meal at the diner drives her to a hotel instead of taking her home.

At the airport, Nima asks to go home and realizes she has been saying 'homeland' instead of 'home.'

A dance instructor tells Aisha she should be named Nima for her grace, inspiring Aisha to name her daughter Nima.

Nima wanders her grandmother's house in Sudan, gazing at family photographs and feeling she truly belongs.

Yasmeen confesses there is no parallel universe and that only one of them can truly exist.

Nima steers Yasmeen toward Ahmed's friend who longs for a child, helping the spirit find a life to inhabit.

Nima whispers to her unborn self that she needs her mother, and Aisha names the baby her saving grace.

Haitham wakes in the hospital and asks Nima for space; the two laugh and reconcile their friendship.

Nima takes her mother's traditional food to school and feels the dread she always carried finally dissolve.

This pool captures the moments where Nima's inner world shifts most dramatically, beginning with her earliest longing to be Yasmeen and her first sighting of the spirit girl shimmering in their apartment. Her mother silently removing her headscarf and Nima's explosive lash-out after her suspension map a girl at her lowest point, convinced her mother deserves a better daughter entirely. In the past, Nima learns that the very name she was given was born from a moment of grace, and gazing at her family's photographs she feels genuine belonging for the first time in her life. Yasmeen's confession that only one of them can truly exist forces Nima to confront the real cost of her longing for another life, while helping the spirit find a new body marks Nima's decisive choice of her own. The pool closes with two quiet but profound victories — Haitham waking and asking for space, and Nima eating her mother's food at school with relief rather than shame.

The discoveries and emotional shifts that transformed Nima's understanding of herself and home.

Safia Elhillo

Novel/Book in Verse

Fiction

Guide