week passed, but there was still no sign of Tariq. Then another week came and went.
To fill the time, Laila fixed the screen door that Babi still hadn't got around to. She
took down Babi's books, dusted and alphabetized them. She went to Chicken Street with
Hasina, Giti, and Giti's mother, Nila, who was a seamstress and sometime sewing partner of
Mammy's. In that week, Laila came to believe that of all the hardships a person had to face
none was more punishing than the simple act of waiting.
Another week passed.
Laila found herself caught in a net of terrible thoughts.
He would never come back. His parents had moved away for good; the trip to Ghazni had
been a ruse. An adult scheme to spare the two of them an upsetting farewell.
A land minehad gotten to him again. The way it did in 1981, when he was five, the last
time his parents took him south to Ghazni. That was shortly after Laila's third birthday.
He'd been lucky that time, losing only a leg; lucky that he'd survived at all.
Her head rang and rang with these thoughts.
Then one night Laila saw a tiny flashing light from down the street. A sound, something
between a squeak and a gasp, escaped her lips. She quickly fished her own flashlight from
under the bed, but it wouldn't work. Laila banged it against her palm, cursed the dead
batteries. But it didn't matter. He was back. Laila sat on the edge of her bed, giddy with
relief, and watched that beautiful, yellow eye winking on and off.
On her way to Tariq's house the next day, Laila saw Khadim and a group of his friends
across the street. Khadim was squatting, drawing something in the dirt with a stick. When
he saw her, he dropped the stick and wiggled his fingers. He said something and there was
a round of chuckles. Laila dropped her head and hurried past.
"What did youdo1?" she exclaimed when Tariq opened the door. Only then did she
remember that his uncle was a barber.
Tariq ran his hand over his newly shaved scalp and smiled, showing white, slightly
uneven teeth.
"Like it?"
"You look like you're enlisting in the army."
"You want to feel?" He lowered his head.