Shekiba nodded, suddenly feeling her throat tighten. Samina’s voice was gentle, a tone rarely used toward Shekiba. She suddenly felt a gaping hole where her mother should have been.
“Thank you, Khala Samina.”
Samina closed her eyes briefly and nodded her head in acknowledgment before she resumed her work in the kitchen.
Shekiba walked a few more meters to Bobo Shahgul’s room. She could see through the gauzy curtain that her grandmother sat in a chair with her walking stick in her hand. Her bony fingers were wrapped tightly around the stick.
She knows I am here. I have no choice now.
Shekiba pulled the curtain aside and met her grandmother’s icy stare.
“Well, well. Look who has decided to disrupt our peace yet again.”
“Salaam.” Shekiba decided she would take Samina’s advice and try not to antagonize the old woman.
“Salaaaaam,” Bobo Shahgul said mockingly. “You stupid girl. How dare you come here? How dare you step foot in this house?”
Shekiba steeled herself. She had taken worse. All she had to do was resist the temptation to fire back.
You need to get to your house and get the deed. Do not forget why you came here. Do not let the old lady distract you.
“Eid mubarak, Bobo-jan.”
“As if I needed to see that face,” she replied, turning away in repulsion. “There is no Eid for a disrespectful creature like you — you dare to disrespect the grandmother who took you in even after you robbed her of her son.” She rose on her hobbled feet, fueled by rage.
“My father was a wise man who decided for himself.”
Shekiba saw it coming but hardly flinched.
Bobo Shahgul’s walking stick came crashing down on her shoulder.
She is weaker than a few months ago, Shekiba realized.
“Bobo-jan, how is your health? You’re looking a bit frail, God forbid.”
A second blow. She was trying harder.
“You beast! Get out of my house!”
“As you please,” Shekiba said, turned and walked out with her chin held high. She had said nothing. And nothing could have made Bobo Shahgul more irate.
Shekiba stopped by the kitchen. She wondered if Khala Samina had heard the conversation.
“Dear girl, there is something about you that makes that old lady crazy.”
She had heard.
“Khala Samina, I want to get a few things from my father’s house. I will not take long.” Shekiba looked in the direction of the living room. She could hear the men laughing.
Samina shook her head. “Do as you must — you are not a child. But understand that there are many people willing to make your life more difficult. It is up to you to find a way to make things easier for yourself.”
Shekiba nodded, wondering which one of them was more naïve.
“I won’t be long,” she said, lowered her burqa and headed out the back door.
She crossed the fields quickly, peering over her shoulder every thirty seconds or so to see if anyone was coming after her. After about twenty meters, she broke into a jog, hoping she didn’t attract attention. Her father’s home looked smaller than she remembered it. She felt her heart quicken as she neared the rusted gate.
For a second, she saw her father standing outside, his face to the sky as he wiped the sweat from his brow with the back of his hand. She heard her mother call out her brothers’ names. She saw Aqela’s songbird face in the front window, watching their father toil in the fields.
There should have been a word for what she felt, the way her stomach jumped with anticipation to be somewhere she missed so much, to be around people who missed her as much as she missed them. It was a feeling that started sweet and finished bitter, when she realized that she stood in the ashes of those perfect times, as short as they’d been.
No one had claimed the home yet but it looked as if someone were trying to fix it up. Cracks in the walls had been filled with clay. The splintered table outside had a new plank nailed to it. Inside, the two solid chairs were gone, as were the few blankets she’d left strewn about to make believe her parents and siblings still slept in the house with her.
Shekiba wondered which vulture had his eyes on the house but pushed the thought aside for now.
She needed to find the Qur’an. Her father’s books had not been touched. They still sat on the crooked shelf above where Padar-jan once slept. She looked out the window, half expecting to hear her uncles’ angry voices.
She blinked back tears and used a step stool to reach the top shelf. Her fingers reached over the ledge and sought blindly.
That’s it.
She pulled at a corner of fabric and the book slid toward her. She grabbed it with both hands and came down from the stool. The Qur’an was wrapped in a thin, emerald-green cloth embroidered with silver thread. This had been her mother’s dismol, or wedding cloth. Shekiba brushed the dust away and kissed the holy book, then touched it to her left and right eyes as her parents had taught her.
Why do we keep the Qur’an all the way up there, Madar-jan? It is so hard to reach it there!
Because nothing is above the Qur’an. This is how we show our respect for the word of Allah.
Shekiba unfolded the cloth and opened the first page.
Tariq. Munis. Shekiba. Aqela.
Beside each name, Padar-jan had penciled in the month and year of their birth.
Shekiba flipped through the pages, the corners frayed. The book opened to the second sura. She recognized the line that her father often quoted. She traced the calligraphy with her finger and heard his voice.
It means that we treasure many things in this world, but there is even more awaiting us in paradise.
The paper fell into her hands. Yellowed parchment with two columns of ornate signatures. She recognized her grandfather’s name. This was the deed!
Shekiba’s senses heightened now that she had what she’d come looking for. She took a quick look around and tucked the deed back into the pages of the Qur’an. It was time to get back to the house before her escapade incited too much anger. She covered the Qur’an again with her mother’s dismol and tucked it irreverently under her shirt.
God, forgive me, she thought.
As she exited her rusted front door, she could see Kaka Sheeragha across the field.
Lazy, she thought, looking at her uncle. The others would have come after me.
Sheeragha met her at the door.
“What were you doing in that house?” he demanded.
“Praying.” Shekiba slipped past him and returned to the living room, hoping Azizullah was ready to leave.
“Where have you been? Bobo Shahgul said she had a pleasant but short visit with you.” Azizullah took one last sip from his teacup. “We should be going. We have taken up enough of your time.”
“Time with you is time well spent,” Zalmai said graciously while he eyed Shekiba with suspicion. Sheeragha nodded in tacit agreement. He was not blessed with the social graces of his brothers.
“You are very kind. Please pass my regards along to the rest of the family. I am sure I will see you in the masjid for Eid prayers next week.”
“Yes, of course you will.”
“Absolutely.”
Shekiba followed Azizullah through the courtyard and into the street. Her uncles watched them leave, mumbling to each other.