clutching her ear. Her stomach turned when she thought of that afternoon, lying on the floor
with the spoke of a bicycle wheel between her legs. How close she'd come. It was
unthinkable to her now that she could have even entertained the idea. Her son was a
blessing, and Laila was relieved to discover that her fears had proved baseless, that she
loved Zalmai with the marrow of her bones, just as she did Aziza.
But Zalmai worshipped his father, and, because he did, he was transformed when his
father was around to dote on him. Zalmai was quick then with a defiant cackle or an
impudent grin. In his father's presence, he was easily offended. He held grudges. He
persisted in mischief in spite of Laila's scolding, which he never did when Rasheed was
away.
Rasheed approved of all of it. "A sign of intelligence," he said. He said the same of
Zalmai's recklessness when he swallowed, then pooped, marbles; when he lit matches;
when he chewed on Rasheed's cigarettes.
When Zalmai was born, Rasheed had moved him into the bed he shared with Laila. He
had bought him a new crib and had lions and crouching leopards painted on the side panels.
He'd paid for new clothes, new rattles, new bottles, new diapers, even though they could
not afford them and Aziza's old ones were still serviceable. One day, he came home with a
battery run mobile, which he hung over Zalmai's crib. Little yellow and black bumblebees
dangled from a sunflower, and they crinkled and squeaked when squeezed. A tune played
when it was turned on.
"I thought you said business was slow," Laila said.
"I have friends I can borrow from," he saiddismissively.
"How will you pay them back?"
"Things will turn around. They always do. Look, he likes it. See?"
Most days, Laila was deprived of her son. Rasheed took him to the shop, let him crawl
around under his crowded workbench, play with old rubber soles and spare scraps of
leather. Rasheed drove in his iron nails and turned the sandpaper wheel, and kept a
watchful eye on him. If Zalmai toppled a rack of shoes, Rasheed scolded him gently, in a
calm, half smiling way. If he did it again, Rasheed put down his hammer, sat him up on his
desk, and talked to him softly.
His patience with Zalmai was a well that ran deep and never dried.
They came home together in the evening, Zalmai's head bouncing on Rasheed's shoulder,
both of them smelling of glue and leather. They grinned the way people who share a secret
do, slyly, like they'd satin that dim shoe shop all day not making shoes at all but devising
secret plots. Zalmai liked to sit beside his father at dinner, where they played private games,
as Mariam, Laila, and Aziza set plates on the sojrah. They took turns poking each other on
the chest, giggling, pelting each other with bread crumbs, whispering things the others
couldn't hear. If Laila spoke to them, Rasheed looked up with displeasure at the unwelcome
intrusion. If she asked to hold Zalmai or, worse, if Zalmai reached for her Rasheed
glowered at her.
Laila walked away feeling stung.
Then one night, a few weeks after Zalmai turned two, Rasheed came home with a
television and a VCR. The day had been warm, almost balmy, but the evening was cooler