Harissa Pilgrimage | حج حاريصا
"She sells candles at the shrine of Our Lady of Lebanon. He's the lapsed Catholic seeking something he can't name. At Harissa's heights, they find faith—in each other. 'Inti mu'jziti' (أنتِ معجزتي)."
Harissa Pilgrimage
حج حاريصا
The Virgin watches over Lebanon.
From Harissa's peak, she sees everything—war, peace, desperation, hope. I've sold candles at her feet for twenty years.
Then he climbs up, looking for something he's lost.
I'm Rita.
Forty-nine, devout, shaped by years of kneeling and comfort eating. My faith is complicated but constant.
Fares Mrad hasn't entered a church in thirty years.
"Sham'a?" I offer a candle.
"I don't believe anymore."
"Tab li shu talit?"
"I don't know." He stares at the statue. "My mother asked me. Before she died."
He's fifty-four.
Lebanese-Canadian, returned for his mother's funeral, stayed because leaving felt wrong. His faith died in a car crash at nineteen—his fiancée with it.
"You blame God."
"I blame everything."
"That's a lot of weight."
He keeps coming.
Not to pray—to sit. Near my candle stall, facing the Mediterranean, wrestling with ghosts I can only imagine.
"Why don't you go back to Montreal?"
"Nothing there anymore."
"W hon?"
"I don't know yet."
Days become weeks.
We talk between pilgrims. He helps me carry boxes. I share my lunch. The Virgin watches, saying nothing.
"Rita—"
"Eih?"
"You believe. Really believe?"
"Some days more than others."
"What about the bad days?"
"I show up anyway. That's all faith is."
Something shifts.
He starts lighting candles. Not praying—just lighting. One for his fiancée. One for his mother. One for something unnamed.
"Who's that for?"
"Someone I might believe in again." He looks at me.
The kiss happens at sunset.
The Mediterranean blazes orange below. The Virgin towers above. His mouth on mine is question and answer.
"Is this wrong?" I whisper. "Here?"
"If love is wrong here, there's no hope anywhere."
We descend together.
To the town below, to my small apartment. He follows like I'm pilgrimage.
"Rita—"
"Don't think. Feel. That's what you came here to learn."
He learns.
His hands on my body, discovering faith in flesh. I'm not what he expected—soft where culture demands hard—but his eyes glow.
"Mashallah." He breathes. "You're—"
"Old. Plain. A candle seller—"
"A miracle." His voice breaks. "Inti mu'jziti."
We make love slowly.
As if sacred space followed us down the mountain. He worships my curves like they're holy.
"I'd forgotten," he murmurs against my breast.
"What?"
"That bodies could be prayer."
His mouth between my thighs.
I gasp, grip the sheets. Thirty years of his faithlessness meets decades of my devotion.
"Ya Allah—"
"See?" He looks up. "You believe."
He enters me gently.
Watching my face, adjusting to my needs. We move together like liturgy.
"Aktar—"
"Aiwa—"
The climax is communion.
We peak together, crying out. Not to God—to each other. Maybe that's close enough.
Afterward, we lie tangled.
"I lit a candle for you today," he admits.
"When?"
"Before I kissed you. Asking for courage."
"Did you get it?"
"I got more than I asked for."
Two years later
Fares still doesn't go to Mass.
But he helps me at the stall, climbs Harissa daily, lights candles for everyone he's loved and lost.
"Do you believe yet?" I ask.
"In something." He pulls me close. "In you. In this."
Alhamdulillah.
For mountains that hold faith.
For candles that light darkness.
For pilgrims who find unexpected answers.
The End.