Laila
Laila was aware of the face over her, all teeth and tobacco and foreboding eyes. She was dimly
aware, too, of Mariam, a presence beyond the face, of her fists raining down. Above them was the
ceiling, and it was the ceiling Laila was drawn to, the dark markings of mold spreading across it like
ink on a dress, the crack in the plaster that was a stolid smile or a frown, depending on which end of
the room you looked at it from. Laila thought of all the times she had tied a rag around the end of a
broom and cleaned cobwebs from this ceiling. The three times she and Mariam had put coats of white
paint on it. The crack wasn't a smile any longer now but a mocking leer. And it was receding. The
ceiling was shrinking, lifting, rising away from her and toward some hazy dimness beyond. It rose
until it shrank to the size of a postage stamp, white and bright, everything around it blotted out by the
shuttered darkness. In the dark, Rasheed's face was like a sunspot.
Brief little bursts of blinding light before her eyes now, like silver stars exploding. Bizarre
geometric forms in the light, worms, egg-shaped things, moving up and down, sideways, melting into
each other, breaking apart, morphing into something else, then fading, giving way to blackness.
Voices muffled and distant.
Behind the lids of her eyes, her children's faces flared and fizzled. Aziza, alert and burdened,
knowing, secretive. Zalmai, looking up at his father with quivering eagerness.
It would end like this, then, Laila thought. What a pitiable end-But then the darkness began to lift.
She had a sensation of rising up, of being hoisted up. The ceiling slowly came back, expanded, and
now Laila could make out the crack again, and it was the same old dull smile.
She was being shaken.Are you all right? Answer me, are you all right? Mariam's face, engraved
with scratches, heavy with worry, hovered over Laila.
Laila tried a breath. It burned her throat. She tried another. It burned even more this time, and not
just her throat but her chest too. And then she was coughing, and wheezing. Gasping. But breathing.
Her good ear rang.
* * *
The first thing she saw when she sat up was Rasheed. He was lying on his back, staring at nothing
with an unblinking, fish-mouthed expression. A bit of foam, lightly pink, had dribbled from his mouth
down his cheek. The front of his pants was wet. She saw his forehead.
Then she saw the shovel.A groan came out of her. "Oh," she said, tremulously, barely able to make a voice, "Oh, Mariam."
* * *
Laila paced, moaning and banging her hands together, as Mariam sat near Rasheed, her hands in her
lap, calm and motionless. Mariam didn't say anything for a long time.
Laila's mouth was dry, and she was stammering her words, trembling all over. She willed herself
not to look at Rasheed, at the rictus of his mouth, his open eyes, at the blood congealing in the hollow
of his collarbone.
Outside, the light was fading, the shadows deepening. Mariam's face looked thin and drawn in this
light, but she did not appear agitated or frightened, merely preoccupied, thoughtful, so self-possessed
that when a fly landed on her chin she paid it no attention. She just sat there with her bottom lip stuck
out, the way she did when she was absorbed in thought.
At last, she said, "Sit down, Laila jo."
Laila did, obediently.
"We have to move him. Zalmai can't see this."
* * *
Mariam fished the bedroom key from Rasheed's pocket before they wrapped him in a bedsheet.
Laila took him by the legs, behind the knees, and Mariam grabbed him under the arms. They tried
lifting him, but he was too heavy, and they ended up dragging him. As they were passing through the
front door and into the yard, Rasheed's foot caught against the doorframe and his leg bent sideways.
They had to back up and try again, and then something thumped upstairs and Laila's legs gave out. She
dropped Rasheed. She slumped to the ground, sobbing and shaking, and Mariam had to stand over
her, hands on hips, and say that she had to get herself together. That what was done was done-After a
time, Laila got up and wiped her face, and they carried Rasheed to the yard without further incident.
They took him into the toolshed. They left him behind the workbench, on which sat his saw, some
nails, a chisel, a hammer, and a cylindrical block of wood that Rasheed had been meaning to carve
into something for Zalmai but had never gotten around to doing-Then they went back inside. Mariam
washed her hands, ran them through her hair, took a deep breath and let it out. "Let me tend to your
wounds now. You're all cut up, Laila jo."
* * *
Mahiam said she needed the night to think things over. To get her thoughts together and devise a
plan.
"There is a way," she said, "and I just have to find it."
"We have to leave! We can't stay here," Laila said in a broken, husky voice. She thought suddenly of
the sound the shovel must have made striking Rasheed's head, and her body pitched forward. Bile surged up her chest.
Mariam waited patiently until Laila felt better. Then she had Laila lie down, and, as she stroked
Laila's hair in her lap, Mariam said not to worry, that everything would be fine. She said that they
would leave-she, Laila, the children, and Tariq too. They would leave this house, and this unforgiving
city. They would leave this despondent country altogether, Mariam said, running her hands through
Laila's hair, and go someplace remote and safe where no one would find them, where they could
disown their past and find shelter.
"Somewhere with trees," she said. "Yes. Lots of trees."
They would live in a small house on the edge of some town they'd never heard of, Mariam said, or
in a remote village where the road was narrow and unpaved but lined with all manner of plants and
shrubs. Maybe there would be a path to take, a path that led to a grass field where the children could
play, or maybe a graveled road that would take them to a clear blue lake where trout swam and reeds
poked through the surface. They would raise sheep and chickens, and they would make bread together
and teach the children to read. They would make new lives for themselves-peaceful, solitary lives-
and there the weight of all that they'd endured would lift from them, and they would be deserving of
all the happiness and simple prosperity they would find.
Laila murmured encouragingly. It would be an existence rife with difficulties, she saw, but of a
pleasurable kind, difficulties they could take pride in, possess, value, as one would a family
heirloom. Mariam's soft maternal voice went on, brought a degree of comfort to her.There is a way,
she'd said, and, in the morning, Mariam would tell her what needed to be done and they would do it,
and maybe by tomorrow this time they would be on their way to this new life, a life luxuriant with
possibility and joy and welcomed difficulties. Laila was grateful that Mariam was in charge,
unclouded and sober, able to think this through for both of them. Her own mind was a jittery, muddled
mess.
Mariam got up. "You should tend to your son now." On her was the most stricken expression Laila
had ever seen on a human face.
* * *
Laila found him in the dark, curled up on Rasheed'sside of the mattress. She slipped beneath the
covers beside him and pulled the blanket over them.
"Are you asleep?"
Without turning around to face her, he said, "Can't sleep yet. Baba jan hasn't said theBabaloo prayers
with me."
"Maybe I can say them with you tonight."
"You can't say them like he can."
She squeezed his little shoulder. Kissed the nape of his neck. "I can try.""Where is Baba jan?"
"Baba jan has gone away," Laila said, her throat closing up again.
And there it was, spoken for the first time, the great, damning lie.How many more times would this
lie have to be told? Laila wondered miserably. How many more times would Zalmai have to be
deceived? She pictured Zalmai, his jubilant, running welcomes when Rasheed came home and
Rasheed picking him up by the elbows and swinging him round and round until Zalmai's legs flew
straight out, the two of them giggling afterward when Zalmai stumbled around like a drunk. She
thought of their disorderly games and their boisterous laughs, their secretive glances.
A pall of shame and grief for her son fell over Laila.
"Where did he go?"
"I don't know, my love."
When was he coming back? Would Baba jan bring a present with him when he returned?
She did the prayers with Zalmai. Twenty-oneBismallah-e-rahman-erahims -one for each knuckle of
seven fingers. She watched him cup his hands before his face and blow into them, then place the back
of both hands on his forehead and make a casting-away motion, whispering, Babaloo,be gone, do not
come to Zalmai, he has no business with you. Babaloo,be gone. Then, to finish off, they saidAilah-u-
akbar three times. And later, much later that night, Laila was startled by a muted voice:Did Babajan
leave because of me? Because of what I said, about you and the man downstairs?
She leaned over him, meaning to reassure, meaning to sayIt had nothing to do with you, Zalmai. No.
Nothing is your fault. But he was asleep, his small chest rising and sinking.
* * *
When Laila "went to bed, her mind was muffled up, clouded, incapable of sustained rational thought.
But when she woke up, to the muezzin's call for morning prayer, much of the dullness had lifted.
She sat up and watched Zalmai sleep for a while, the ball of his fist under his chin. Laila pictured
Mariam sneaking into the room in the middle of the night as she and Zalmai had slept, watching them,
making plans in her head.
Laila slipped out of bed. It took effort to stand. She ached everywhere. Her neck, her shoulders, her
back, her arms, her thighs, all engraved with the cuts of Rasheed's belt buckle. Wincing, she quietly
left the bedroom.
In Mariam's room, the light was a shade darker than gray, the kind of light Laila had always
associated with crowing roosters and dew rolling off blades of grass. Mariam was sitting in a corner,
on a prayer rug facing the window. Slowly, Laila lowered herself to the ground, sitting down across
from her."You should go and visit Aziza this morning," Mariam said.
"I know what you mean to do."
"Don't walk. Take the bus, you'll blend in. Taxis are too conspicuous. You're sure to get stopped for
riding alone."
"What you promised last night…"
Laila could not finish. The trees, the lake, the nameless village. A delusion, she saw. A lovely lie
meant to soothe. Like cooing to a distressed child.
"I meant it," Mariam said. "I meant it foryou, Laila jo."
"I don't want any of it without you," Laila croaked.
Mariam smiled wanly.
"I want it to be just like you said, Mariam, all of us going together, you, me, the children. Tariq has a
place in Pakistan. We can hide out there for a while, wait for things to calm down-"
"That's not possible," Mariam said patiently, like a parent to a well-meaning but misguided child.
"We'll take care of each other," Laila said, choking on the words, her eyes wet with tears. "Like you
said. No. I'll take careof you for a change."
"Oh, Laila jo."
Laila went on a stammering rant. She bargained. She promised. She would do all the cleaning, she
said, and all the cooking. "You won't have to do a thing. Ever again. You rest, sleep in, plant a
garden. Whatever you want, you ask and I'll get it for you. Don't do this, Mariam. Don't leave me.
Don't break Aziza's heart."
"They chop off hands for stealing bread," Mariam said "What do you think they'll do when they find
a dead husband and two missing wives?"
"No one will know," Laila breathed. "No one will find us."
"They will. Sooner or later. They're bloodhounds." Mariam's voice was low, cautioning; it made
Laila's promises sound fantastical, trumped-up, foolish.
"Mariam, please-"
"When they do, they'll find you as guilty as me. Tariq too. I won't have the two of you living on the
run, like fugitives. What will happen to your children if you're caught?"
Laila's eyes brimming, stinging."Who will take care of them then? The Taliban? Think like a mother, Laila jo. Think like a mother. I
am."
"I can't."
"You have to."
"It isn't fair," Laila croaked.
"But itis. Come here. Come lie here."
Laila crawled to her and again put her head on Mariam's lap. She remembered all the afternoons
they'd spent together, braiding each other's hair, Mariam listening patiently to her random thoughts and
ordinary stories with an air of gratitude, with the expression of a person to whom a unique and
coveted privilege had been extended "Itis fair," Mariam said. "I've killed our husband. I've deprived
your son of his father. It isn't right that I run. Ican't. Even if they never catch us, I'll never…" Her lips
trembled. "I'll never escape your son's grief How do I look at him? How do I ever bring myself to
look at him, Laila jo?"
Mariam twiddled a strand of Laila's hair, untangled a stubborn curl.
"For me, it ends here. There's nothing more I want. Everything I'd ever wished for as a little girl
you've already given me. You and your children have made me so very happy. It's all right, Laila jo.
This is all right. Don't be sad."
Laila could find no reasonable answer for anything Mariam said. But she rambled on anyway,
incoherently, childishly, about fruit trees that awaited planting and chickens that awaited raising. She
went on about small houses in unnamed towns, and walks to trout-filled lakes. And, in the end, when
the words dried up, the tears did not, and all Laila could do was surrender and sob like a child over-
whelmed by an adult's unassailable logic. All she could do was roll herself up and bury her face one
last time in the welcoming warmth of Mariam's lap.
* * *
Later that morning, Mariam packed Zalmai a small lunch of bread and dried figs. For Aziza too she
packed some figs, and a few cookies shaped like animals. She put it all in a paper bag and gave it to
Laila.
"Kiss Aziza for me," she said. "Tell her she is thenoor of my eyes and the sultan of my heart. Will
you do that for me?"
Laila nodded, her lips pursed together.
"Take the bus, like I said, and keep your head low."
"When will I see you, Mariam? I want to see you before I testify. I'll tell them how it happened. I'll
explain that it wasn't your fault. That you had to do it. They'll understand, won't they, Mariam? They'll understand."
Mariam gave her a soft look.
She hunkered down to eye level with Zalmai. He was wearing a red T-shirt, ragged khakis, and a
used pair of cowboy boots Rasheed had bought him from Mandaii. He was holding his new
basketball with both hands. Mariam planted a kiss on his cheek.
"You be a good, strong boy, now," she said. "You treat your mother well." She cupped his face. He
pulled back but she held on. "I am so sorry, Zalmai jo. Believe me that I'm so very sorry for all your
pain and sadness."
Laila held Zalmai's hand as they walked down the road together. Just before they turned the corner,
Laila looked
back and saw Mariam at the door. Mariam was wearing a white scarf over her head, a dark blue
sweater buttoned in the front, and white cotton trousers. A crest of gray hair had fallen loose over her
brow. Bars of sunlight slashed across her face and shoulders. Mariam waved amiably.
They turned the corner, and Laila never saw Mariam again.