breath. Maybe tomorrow I'll feel better, or the day after. We'll see." He never bothered to
feign a single raspy breath. Often, as he turned back and marched home, he lit a cigarette.
Laila would have to tail him home, helpless, trembling with resentment and impotent rage.
Then one day he told Laila he wouldn't take her anymore. "I'm too tired from walking the
streets all day," he said, "looking for work."
"Then I'll go by myself," Laila said. "You can't stop me, Rasheed. Do you hear me? You
can hit me all you want, but I'll keep going there."
"Do as you wish. But you won't get past the Taliban. Don't say I didn't warn you."
"I'm coming with you," Mariam said.
Laila wouldn't allow it. "You have to stay home with Zalmai. If we get stopped...I don't
want him to see."
And so Laila's life suddenly revolved around finding ways to see Aziza. Half the time, she
never made it to the orphanage. Crossing the street, she was spotted by the Taliban and
riddled with questions What is your name? Where are you going? Why are you alone?
Where is your mahram? before she was sent home. If she was lucky, she was given a
tongue lashing or a single kick to the rear, a shove in the back. Other times, she met with
assortments of wooden clubs, fresh tree branches, short whips, slaps, often fists.
One day, a young Talib beat Laila with a radio antenna. When he was done, he gave a
final whack to the back of her neck and said, "I see you again, I'll beat you until your
mother's milk leaks out of your bones."
That time, Laila went home. She lay on her stomach, feeling like a stupid, pitiable animal,
and hissed as Mariam arranged damp cloths across her bloodied back and thighs. But,
usually, Laila refused to cave in. She made as if she were going home, then took a different
route down side streets. Sometimes she was caught, questioned, scolded two, three, even
four times in a single day. Then the whips came down and the antennas sliced through the
air, and she trudged home, bloodied, without so much as a glimpse of Aziza. Soon Laila
took to wearing extra layers, even in the heat, two, three sweaters beneath the burqa, for
padding against the beatings.
But for Laila, the reward, if she made it past the Taliban, was worth it. She could spend as
much time as she liked then hours, even with Aziza. They sat in the courtyard, near the
swing set, among other children and visiting mothers, and talked about what Aziza had
learned that week.
Aziza said Kaka Zaman made it a point to teach them something every day, reading and
writing most days, sometimes geography, a bit of history or science, something about
plants, animals.
"But we have to pull the curtains," Aziza said, "so the Taliban don't see us." Kaka Zaman