“Who was that?” I asked.
“ISI.”
“Seriously?”
“Problem, Kim. Man come up, say ISI, hand me ISI card. He say, ‘Who is boss?’”
“What did you say?”
“You know. I say, ‘I’m a small boy, no read, no understand, I don’t know she. My boss send to Serena to pick she up, I pick up. I don’t know she.’”
“Good work.”
That was always Samad’s act, whenever the ISI asked about me. At least, that’s what Samad said he told the ISI. How could I know for sure? My gut trusted Samad, but I didn’t really understand the ins and outs, all the levels to this Pakistan fun house. Tammy said Samad seemed trustworthy, but given all the double games being played here, given how many times my gut had been wrong, how many times I had been played, how many times other friends had been played, I had no idea if Samad was telling the truth. Part of the reason I had hired Samad in the first place was that he didn’t work at the Serena or the Marriott—both of which were known for hiring staff members who made extra money by informing to the ISI. He also came recommended by a Pakistani journalist friend—but again, some Pakistani journalists played for the ISI team. The ISI was everywhere, in newspapers, TV, shopping malls, hotels, and most definitely lurking inside our cell phones.
A few months earlier I had tried to report on a suicide attack at an ISI office in Rawalpindi. But whenever we tried to talk to anyone, someone else showed up, telling us to leave, shoving us back, refusing to show any identification. The busybodies pulled people away mid-interview and threatened to arrest them—and us. When we left Rawalpindi, a car of spooks tailed us to Islamabad, until we made a few quick turns.
So on this afternoon, I looked at Samad.
“Let’s see if they follow us.”
We pulled out of the parking lot and drove in the direction of my house. A white car followed. Samad turned right. The car followed. Samad turned left. The car followed. These guys were hardly sophisticated. Being followed by the ISI in Pakistan felt like being chased by the Keystone Cops, like the Mad magazine cartoon Spy vs. Spy. I would like to say the song from Mission Impossible played in my head, but it was more like “Mahna Mahna” from The Muppet Show. It certainly didn’t feel serious. After one too many turns, I decided I had enough.
“Pull over,” I told Samad.
We stopped on the side of the road. The white car had no choice but to drive slowly past, the two men inside looking out the window at us. Clever. Samad waited and then dropped me at home.
The next morning he showed up, looking mopey. When I opened the door, he stood in his button-up shirt tucked into his hiked-up jeans, staring at the ground like he wished it would open up and swallow him.
“Problem, Kim.”
“What happened?”
“Last night, the ISI come to my home. Because of car, they know my home. They show up, ask about boss. They say they arrest me if I don’t tell them.”
“So you did, right?”
“So sorry, my sister, I did.”
“It’s OK, it’s fine. Don’t worry about it.”
It’s not like it mattered that much—I wasn’t doing anything wrong. Samad seemed like he felt bad. He seemed like he really considered me his sister. But how could I know for sure? The next Sunday, I needed him to drive me to a meeting. I called, once, twice, three times. But Samad didn’t pick up the phone. I started to panic. Could he have run away with the car, after I loaned him money? Could he betray me? I worried that I was being played. That night, Samad called.
“So sorry, Kim, I go to cousin brother’s home,” he said. “I forget phone.”
I soon flew to Afghanistan for some stories, putting the Pakistan spy intrigue and Samad aside for a while.
But after a few days, another intrigue knocked at the back of my mind. I wondered where Sean was. He was supposed to be back in London by Easter—it was May, long past Easter. I hadn’t heard from Sean in weeks. Farouq hadn’t heard from Sami. And no one had seen Sean since the week after I spoke to him—since he told me about his wacky plan to meet a top insurgent in the tribal areas of Pakistan.
“Oh, you know how Sean is. Disappears for weeks at a time,” a friend said. “Don’t worry.”
“Yeah. I don’t know, I’m worried.”
I called Tom, the British journalist and my former housemate at the Fun House.
“He’s probably fine,” Tom said. “But I haven’t heard from him. He was supposed to check in ten days ago.”
“Ten days ago?”
“I know. I’m going to Jalalabad tomorrow to try to talk to him and track down Sami’s family. I’m also in touch with his driver in Pakistan. But you know how he is, Kim. He’s probably fine.”
We hung up. The next night, I had a nightmare that Sean was kidnapped. I woke up convinced that he would be killed. I called Tom.
“It doesn’t look good,” said Tom, who had driven to the eastern city of Jalalabad near the Pakistan border with his fixer, Tahir, who besides Sami was the only Afghan fixer we knew with serious Taliban contacts. “The driver said he’d meet us. But then he turned off his old phone numbers. Tahir had to make a lot of phone calls but finally got a new number for the driver. He said he’d come up to Jalalabad from Peshawar to meet us. But then he switched off his phone.”
“That doesn’t sound good,” I said.
“No. Tahir is still trying. I’ll let you know.”
Days passed. I worked on a story about pornography and soap operas invading Kabul—something easy and light that I could focus on, although Farouq and I shared the uncomfortable task of looking at various DVDs we had bought, making sure they were porn and trying to see if Afghans were involved. Still, almost seven years since this notion of democracy was thrust into Afghanistan, many Afghans, especially the young ones, saw it as a veneer for “anything goes,” for sex, drugs, and booze, and music about sex, drugs, and booze. Freedom was just another word for losing yourself in excess. I tried to do stories on this culture clash whenever I could, seeing it as a way to write about how Afghans lived, not just how they died.
“This is really, really embarrassing,” Farouq said, popping a porn DVD out of my computer. “People are really sick.”
“I am aware,” I said, popping one that involved a watermelon into my DVD player.
Tom became more and more cryptic. Then, finally, he called.
“I wanted you to hear this from me,” he said. “But Sean has been kidnapped.”
I felt ill. As far as Tom had been able to figure out, Sean and Sami had been taken hostage in late March, immediately after crossing into Pakistan to meet their contact. Brilliant, as Sean would say.
Dave flew to Kabul on his way to another embed with NATO troops. He was unsympathetic to my fears about Sean, blaming him for being an idiot. As usual, Dave and I fought late at night, him yelling at me for some perceived slight. I curled up, facing the wall. He apologized, saying that he was under stress. But I stared at the paint. It was nothing I wanted to deal with at that moment, but I knew I would eventually have to face the truth. This would never be that fairy tale I thought I wanted, the dream of the overseas life, the family, the full-meal deal. I just couldn’t face it now. I didn’t want to be alone in Pakistan. With everything happening, I didn’t want to be alone at all.