A Thousand Splendid Suns

(Nancy Kaufman) #1

Laila lets the children out of the house, locks the door. They step out into the cool
morning. It isn't raining today. The sky is blue, and Laila sees no clumps of clouds in the
horizon. Holding hands, the three of them make their way to the bus stop. The streets are
busy already, teeming with a steady stream of rickshaws, taxicabs, UN trucks, buses, ISAF
jeeps. Sleepy eyed merchants are unlocking store gates that had been rolled down for the
night Vendors sit behind towers of chewing gum and cigarette packs. Already the widows
have claimed their spots at street corners, asking the passersby for coins.
Laila finds it strange to be back in Kabul The city has changed Every day now she sees
people planting saplings, painting old houses, carrying bricks for new ones. They dig
gutters and wells. On windowsills, Laila spots flowers potted in the empty shells of old
Mujahideen rockets rocket flowers, Kabulis call them. Recently, Tariq took Laila and the
children to the Gardens of Babur, which are being renovated. For the first time in years,
Laila hears music at Kabul's street corners, rubab and tabla, dooiar, harmonium and
tamboura, old Ahmad Zahir songs.


Laila wishes Mammy and Babi were alive to see these changes. But, like Mil's letter,
Kabul's penance has arrived too late.


Laila and the children are about to cross the street to the bus stop when suddenly a black
Land Cruiser with tinted windows blows by. It swerves at the last instant and misses Laila
by less than an arm's length. It splatters tea colored rainwater all over the children's shirts.


Laila yanks her children back onto the sidewalk, heart somersaulting in her throat.
The Land Cruiser speeds down the street, honks twice, and makes a sharp left.
Laila stands there, trying to catch her breath, her fingers gripped tightly around her
children's wrists.


It slays Laila. It slays her that the warlords have been allowed back to Kabul That her
parents' murderers live in posh homes with walled gardens, that they have been appointed
minister of this and deputy minister of that, that they ride with impunity in shiny,
bulletproof SUVs through neighborhoods that they demolished. It slays her.


But Laila has decided that she will not be crippled by resentment. Mariam wouldn't want
it that way. What's the sense? she would say with a smile both innocent and wise. What
good is it, Laila jo? And so Laila has resigned herself to moving on. For her own sake, for
Tariq's, for her children's. And for Mariam, who still visits Laila in her dreams, who is
never more than a breath or two below her consciousness. Laila has moved on. Because in
the end she knows that's all she can do. That and hope.




Zamanis standing at the free throw line, his knees bent, bouncing a basketball. He is
instructing a group of boys in matching jerseys sitting in a semicircle on the court. Zaman
spots Laila, tucks the ball under his arm, and waves. He says something to the boys, who
then wave and cry out,"Salaam, moalim sahib!"
Laila waves back.

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