Raisa wrapped her arms around me. She sobbed, her heavy bosom heaving. I’d known for weeks, but some truths need to be said out loud before they can be believed.
Mahmood would never come back. We’d had our final moment together just a few feet from where I sat. He’d told me everything he needed to in that last moment, his fate written on his face. He had known from the moment the men entered our home.
Saleem slipped back into the living room and walked over to Abdul Rahim who sat with shoulders slumped, his hands folded between his knees.
“Kaka-jan?” he said.
Abdul Rahim met his gaze.
“My father — he is not coming back?”
It was not a boy’s question. It was the question of a young man who needed to know what to expect of tomorrow and what tomorrow would expect of him.
CHAPTER 16. Fereiba
I HAD TO GET MY FAMILY OUT OF KABUL.
With Mahmood gone, there was nothing left for us. We would almost certainly starve once the money ran out. The imminent arrival of our third child complicated matters.
Samira had not spoken since the afternoon of Raisa and Abdul Rahim’s visit. She gave her answers in nods and gestures. I spoke softly with her, trying to coax the words from her lips, but Samira remained silent.
I found Saleem in our bedroom, staring at his father’s belongings. Unaware of my presence, he touched the pants, brought a shirt to his cheek, and laid the pieces out on the floor as if trying to imagine his father in it. He picked up Mahmood’s watch from the nightstand and turned it over in his hand. He slipped it on his wrist and pulled his sleeve over it. It was a private moment between father and son, so I snuck back down the hall before he realized I’d been watching.
My son thought I was too wrapped up in my own grief to know what he suffered, but I observed it all. I saw him kick the tree behind our house until he fell into a tearful heap, his toes so bruised and swollen that he winced with each step for a week. I held him when he allowed me, but if I started to speak, he would slip away. It was too soon.
If I thought of my last exchange with Mahmood, so did Saleem. I could see the remorse on his face as clearly as I felt it in my heart. We would have done things differently, Saleem and I. We would have had much more to say.
From what Abdul Rahim was able to gather, the local Taliban had decided to make an example of Mahmood Waziri. The rest of the family would not be targeted, he believed, but no one could say with any certainty. Even in the light of day, there was little certainty in Kabul. The cloak of night made all things possible.
I couldn’t bear to have my children out of my sight. I sent Saleem on errands to the marketplace only when I was truly desperate. Just one month after the news of Mahmood’s assassination, my belly began to ache. At first, I thought it might be the balmy winter air bringing a cramp, but as I walked from room to room, the familiar pains became clearer.
I paced the room, my lips pursed and my steps slow.
“Nine months, nine days. . nine months, nine days. .” I repeated softly.
Just a few hours later, Raisa coaxed my third child into the world. I named him Aziz.
“Saleem and Samira,” I managed to get out. “Meet your father’s son.”
AZIZ WOULD NEED TO GAIN SOME WEIGHT BEFORE WE COULD venture out of Kabul. As I nursed him, his face started to take on his father’s features: the squint of his eyes, the dip in his chin, the curl of his ears.
Abdul Rahim kept a watchful eye on the widowed Waziri family. He invited Saleem to sit with him when he returned from school. I don’t know what they talked about, but Saleem always came home pensive. I was grateful my son had Abdul Rahim to turn to.
Abdul Rahim and Raisa agreed that it was best for us to leave. We had no family to help us. I feared my son would be swallowed by the Taliban, and as a woman, there was little I could do to help us survive.
“We’re going to leave,” I told my neighbors. “I have no choice but to get my children out of Kabul. Their stomachs are empty, their lips parched. There’s nothing for us here.”
Raisa nodded in agreement.
“There’s no telling if things will get better. They could get worse. As much as I hate to see you go, I can’t bear to watch you stay with things like this. If Mahmood-jan, God give him peace, were with you, it would be different. But like this, Kabul is worse than a prison for you.”
“I’m going to need your help.”
Abdul Rahim had nodded. He’d been anticipating this conversation.
THREE MONTHS AFTER AZIZ WAS BORN, I GATHERED MY CHILDREN and packed two small bags with what I thought we would need most: clothing, a parchment envelope with a dozen family pictures, and whatever food we had left. I’d said nothing to the children until two days before we were to leave. Saleem looked resentful that he’d been kept in the dark. We lived in the same space, with the same dismal thoughts, and yet, for the better part of our days, we were confounded by each other. We were a family beheaded and floundered around as such.
“What if they find out we’re leaving?” Saleem’s voice was quiet with fear.
“They won’t find out,” I promised. I had no other way of answering. His expression flat, Saleem held my gaze for a few seconds too long. He had seen through me.
I told myself things would be better once we escaped Kabul’s toxic air.
I sent word to my father that we would be traveling to Herat. I wanted to see him once more before we set off. But Padar-jan was a man who preferred to live in the comforts of yesterday. The letter I got back was nothing more than I had come to expect from my father. The orchard was in such bad shape I would hardly recognize it, he said. Armies of beetles had tunneled through the wood. He had taken to sleeping some nights in the grove, hoping his presence would scare them away but they were quite brazen. The past winter had been especially harsh and he would need to do much coaxing if he wanted to see even a single basket of apricots this year. They were more delicate than children, he believed. It saddened him that he could not do more for us now, but he looked forward to seeing us on our return.
People have different ways of saying good-bye, especially when it is forever.
A FEW WEEKS EARLIER, ABDUL RAHIM HAD KNOCKED ON OUR door and handed me a large envelope. Raisa was with him. Her moist eyes belied the encouraging smile on her face.
The passports Mahmood had purchased were enclosed, even his own. I had touched his photograph, the size of my thumb, and hurt anew that he was not here to make this journey with us. I made the painful decision to ask Abdul Rahim to sell it back to the Embassy for whatever he would give. There was no room for sentimentality. Now the time had come to leave.
“WEAR YOUR STURDIEST SHOES. TODAY IS THE DAY WE BEGIN OUR travels. And remember, if anyone asks you, we are going to visit your aunt in Herat. Say a prayer. We will need God to watch over us.”
When Saleem reached into the closet for his winter hat, I caught a glimpse of Mahmood’s watch on his wrist. I opened my mouth to say something but decided against it. It was best to leave the matter between father and son.
There was much we could not take with us: Saleem’s soccer ball, Samira’s set of plastic dolls, the fractured china set my mother-in-law had gifted us. I looked at my pots and pans, blackened with fire. The handwoven carpet in the living room had watched us grow from bride and groom to a full family, and then bore witness to the night we were undone. Tears of joy, tears of heartbreak had melted into its pattern. I left it all, the pieces of our broken life, for Raisa. I knew our home would not remain vacant long. Once Mahmood’s cousins learned of our escape, one of them was sure to claim it. Kabul had become a game of musical chairs with squatters, militants, and relatives plopping into an empty house before someone else could claim it.