Abdul Rahim checked his watch nervously. We were on a timeline. Our neighbors had offered to escort us to the bus terminal. If we were stopped, Abdul Rahim would say he was my brother.
I carried a bag in one hand and had Aziz tucked under my burqa. Saleem had a knapsack strapped to his back and held Samira’s hand, following behind Abdul Rahim but walking ahead of me. He and Samira both looked back frequently, as if they thought I might wander off.
The terminal was a widened road with buses parked in haphazard rows. At the front door of each bus, a man stood calling out the bus’s destination. We found our bus and saw that it was filling quickly.
“How long is the ride, Madar-jan?” Saleem whispered.
“Very long. Try to sleep — the time will pass more quickly.”
The children and I filed on. I went to the women’s section in the back with Samira and Aziz while Saleem took an empty seat in the men’s section up closer to the driver. I kept Aziz on my lap, and Samira sat beside me. Seats were limited, and more than a few of the younger women were forced to stand.
The bus rumbled onto the main road. Burqas lifted like theater curtains as conversations picked up.
In the second hour, Samira fell asleep, despite the bumps and jumps the bus took on the rough road. Even Aziz and I dozed for a few minutes, waking only when the chatter grew in intensity. Then I realized we were no longer moving.
My right leg burned with pins and needles.
After three hours of tinkering and cursing, the bus driver was able to restart the engine. We were back on the road but moving at a snail’s pace. Twice more the bus driver had to disembark and curse the engine back into working order.
THREE DAYS LATER, WE FINALLY REACHED OUR DESTINATION, the cantankerous driver yelling for everyone to gather their belongings and exit.
We were in Herat.
“Your father used to come here a few times each year, on behalf of the ministry,” I told my children. “He was leading one of the projects in this area.”
Saleem kicked at the dirt as he followed the blue shadows off the bus.
“Why didn’t he ever tell me about it?”
“It was long ago,” I said, taking note of the resentment in his question.
We waited, as Abdul Rahim had instructed us, and an hour after our arrival, we were approached by a couple. A short man in his fifties whispered my name as a question.
“Khanum Fereiba?” he asked.
“Yes,” I confirmed with relief.
“Abdul Rahim and Raisa-jan have told me to expect you.” He motioned for his burqa-clad wife to join him.
I ushered my children ahead of me, and we followed Asim and Shabnam to their home. Shabnam was Raisa’s sister, their voices and matronly figures remarkably similar. We would stay with them for just a night. By the following evening we would be on a bus headed for the Afghan-Iran border. Saleem and Samira were disappointed, especially once they’d met the couple’s young children. Samira played with the girls while Saleem held Aziz and listened in on Asim’s warnings for the treacherous road ahead.
“You must be wary of the people you will meet,” he cautioned sternly. He swirled the tea leaves in his glass prophetically and continued. “Herat is the doorway to Iran, so we hear and see much of the traffic that passes. The Taliban are present here and look for any opportunity to make an example out of someone. You know, of course, their rules on mahram escorts. And they know that many people are trying to make their way into Iran, so keep your eyes open and try not to attract attention.”
Asim and Shabnam lived in a three-room home that had not gone unscathed in the rocket attacks. Parts of the roof had been patched, and the windows were boarded up. With her burqa off, Shabnam’s resemblance to Raisa was even more apparent. Saleem and Samira smiled to see her familiar face. I listened intently as Asim went on.
“You’ll be traveling in a small van. Usually, they are very full and there’s hardly room to breathe, so keep your little ones at your side. They’ll be nervous. The driver should take you across the border and into Iran. The price for the passage has already been settled, but they will try to wheedle more from you. Keep all your monies and valuables well hidden. Look very reluctant and give him a little token piece. Make the driver believe that’s the very last thing you have.”
I looked at Saleem, wanting to tell him to run off and play so he could be spared this conversation. On the other hand, maybe he deserved to know what he was about to be involved in.
“Bear in mind that the van will only take you to the border. You’ll have to walk across on foot. The smugglers make the crossing under cover of night. Once you get to the Iranian side, there will be another van waiting for you. This van will take you to Mashhad. I believe Abdul Rahim has given you the address for your contact there. There are many Afghans in Mashhad and, inshallah, they will help you to find your way. I understand that you’ll be going on to Europe. The road ahead of you is difficult, but many have traveled it.”
I sighed heavily. Saleem took notice.
“I pray God will make us among the many who successfully pass through it. This is the only way I see for my children. I hope I’m making the right decision.”
Shabnam nodded sympathetically.
“You are a mother and a mother’s heart never guides her children down the wrong path,” Shabnam reassured, her plump hand squeezing mine.
The children, exhausted from the bus ride, slept well while I nodded off, waking periodically to find myself still in Herat, unable to believe that I’d actually set off on a journey so dangerous with three small children. In the dark room, amid the hush of night breathing, I still wondered if I’d made the right choice.
What was it that my orchard angel had promised me so many years ago?
In the darkness, when you cannot see the ground under your feet and when your fingers touch nothing but night, you are not alone. I will stay with you as moonlight stays on water.
I closed my eyes and prayed he hadn’t forgotten me.
CHAPTER 17. Fereiba
THERE WASN’T MUCH TIME FOR ME TO RECONSIDER. IF I’D HAD just one more day, I might have lost my nerve. The desert before us made me dizzy with fear.
Aziz was not nursing well. He was sleeping more and fussy when awake. The journey to Herat had not been an easy one and we were all exhausted.
In the afternoon, I leaned over my sleeping children and kissed their foreheads gently, whispering to them to coax their eyes open. Night, the time when the border was most vulnerable to trespass, was approaching. Holes opened up and scared, desperate people crawled through. While war had turned some Afghans into lions, it had turned a good number of us into mice as well.
Shabnam gave us bread for our journey. Asim led us to the meeting point. Saleem and Samira followed his footsteps. They held hands as dusk settled in, a half-moon luminous in the cloudless sky. We stood at the storefront of a mechanic’s shop and waited. It could be minutes or hours, Asim had said with a shrug, but the van would come.
Forty minutes later, with Aziz twisting and grunting uncomfortably, a van rounded the corner. I pushed the children behind me, pressing them against the shop’s façade. The van came to a stop just a few feet from us.