25
“Greetings! May I enter?”
Marjan didn’t bother looking up to see who was asking. Nurses didn’t announce themselves, and she no longer expected anyone
now that Farrah and Wana had left Kabul. She expected the visitor would walk past her to the other patient in the room, a
woman who was going to have a tumor removed from her arm tomorrow. There was no privacy in the shared room beyond the thin
curtain that veiled them from each other.
Another knock.
Marjan screwed her eyes shut. She had just practiced walking on crutches for twenty minutes, and the effort had left her exhausted.
“Hello! Marjan?”
At the sound of her name, Marjan opened her eyes. She did not recognize the woman standing in the doorway. She wore a black
jacket and a headscarf in a beige-and-black checkered pattern. Her lips were a vivid raspberry color.
“Yes?” Marjan sat up as much as she could. This had to be about Hawa. Maybe the woman was one of the caregivers from the orphanage.
Hawa had been there ten days already, and Marjan had only spoken with the director on the phone a couple of times. “Is my
daughter all right?”
“Your daughter? Oh, I’m not . . . Let me introduce myself. I don’t blame you for not recognizing me. I was a mess that day.
My name is Soraya.”
And then Marjan knew why she looked familiar. She was the girl with the injured ankle, the one she and Farrah had helped escape from the building. Soraya took two steps into the room and stood at Marjan’s bedside.
“I wanted to come sooner. I should have come sooner. I want to thank you for everything you did that day. You could have left
me but you didn’t.”
“It was nothing,” Marjan said quietly. “How is your ankle?”
“Better, thank you,” Soraya replied. From behind the blue curtain came a low groan and the sound of the hospital bed creaking.
Marjan remembered her manners and pointed to the plastic chair. Soraya took a seat, folded her hands on her lap.
“I didn’t know Farrah other than being in the same class,” Soraya said. “I had to ask around until I found someone who had
her number. We lost four people from our class that day, so everyone is devastated. I’ve never attended so many fatehas in
one week. Anyway, I finally connected with her and she told me you were here.”
“I’m so sorry. You didn’t need to trouble yourself coming all the way here,” Marjan said, because it seemed the right thing
to say. Looking at Soraya’s face, her neat appearance, made Marjan even more self-conscious. She felt stale and greasy from
lying in a hospital bed, and her skin was splotchy from the persistent hives.
Soraya’s tone softened.
“It’s no trouble. I very much wanted to see you. How are you doing?” Soraya asked.
“I’m fine. I mean, it’s been one thing after another but I’m getting better. All these medications are making my face swell,”
Marjan said, her hands touching her face self-consciously.
“I know people who have paid good money to have their lips plumped up the way yours are,” Soraya whispered. “The clinic isn’t
far from my home. Kabul’s most successful doctor, I swear.”
The comment was so unexpected, Marjan laughed.
“Forgive me.” Soraya smiled. “I don’t mean to make light of what you’re going through. It was devastating what happened to
you. I feel so terrible about all of it.”
“You shouldn’t feel that way. None of this was your fault,” Marjan replied.
“I don’t know if that’s true,” Soraya said. “See, I keep thinking about what I could have done different that day. Besides
being so damned clumsy on the steps, of course. I don’t know why it took me so long to pull myself together. And if I had
thought to go through the offices and out the back door . . . maybe I wouldn’t have fallen on the stairs. And maybe you would
have been long gone by the time that bomb went off.”
“It’s also possible that you would have walked right into one of them,” Marjan said.
Soraya brushed her bangs away from her face.
“Have you been able to sleep?” she asked.
“Some,” Marjan replied.
Soraya nodded, expecting as much.
“Me too. I wake up a few times every night. It’s not always a nightmare either. Sometimes I just find myself awake. How much
longer until you’re released from the hospital?” she asked.
Marjan wasn’t sure.
“Well, I hope it’s soon. I expect the food here must be quite terrible.” Soraya pulled a plastic container from her purse.
“So, I brought a little something. This is my mother’s roat. She made it this morning and I thought I would bring you a bit.”
“That’s kind of you,” Marjan said, accepting the offering. “Please thank her for me. May your mother’s hands not ache.”
“Oh, her whole body aches all the time, but that doesn’t stop her. My father is no longer with us and my brothers struggle
to hold down jobs. On top of everything else, she has me as a daughter.”
“Is that so terrible?” Marjan asked.
“I’ve rejected three suitors, can’t cook to save my life, and forget my prayers all the time,” she said.
“Allah forgives easily,” Marjan reassured her.
Soraya laughed. “I hope so. Farrah told me about your daughter. I hope you don’t mind. It must be so difficult to be away
from her.”
“I will get her back the day I get out of here.” Marjan had said the same to the orphanage director, wanting her to know she wasn’t planning on giving her daughter up.
“Of course you will,” Soraya agreed. “Your daughter is lucky to have such a brave mother. You might have been the only person
who had their head on straight that day. I keep thinking about that too.”
“That’s not how I remember it,” Marjan replied. “I didn’t feel like I was thinking straight at all. And I didn’t feel brave
at all. I was terrified.”
Soraya leaned forward.
“But, Marjan, that’s precisely what makes you brave. We were all terrified. Farrah told me she froze up. But you were thinking
for all of us. And you weren’t about to let us give up.”
Soraya was just being kind, Marjan thought.
“Have you gone back yet?”
“I have,” Soraya said. “They held our class in a different room. There is still so much to clean up. And even besides all
the damage, it was just hard to be there. Someone dropped a stapler and I was ready to dive under the desk.”
“So you were there despite your fear. I think you would call that being brave, no?” Marjan asked.
Soraya hid a smile.
“Or stupid. Only time will tell,” she said, and then her tone turned serious. “I’ve had to fight to go to school. Most of
us are fighters. And you look like a fighter to me. You even have a lion’s name! Do you know about the lion who lived in our
zoo?”
“Yes, I’ve seen the statue,” Marjan says softly.
“So tell me, you lion of a woman, where will you go when you leave here?”
Marjan sighed heavily. On the other side of her bed were two duffel bags that held all her belongings. Farrah and Wana had
packed for her. It hadn’t required much effort, since she and Hawa had so little. They’d even dropped off Hawa’s clothing
at the orphanage.
“I don’t know,” Marjan said. “I mean, I don’t know yet, but I’ll figure something out.”
“Farrah said you don’t have family in Kabul,” Soraya said.
Marjan nodded, and to her surprise, Soraya didn’t ask her anything else about her family.
“Farrah also said your daughter is a firecracker of a girl. Now, she doesn’t know me at all, but I would love to meet this
child. If you want to write her a letter, I could go read it to Hawa. Or I could record a video message from you on my phone
and play it for her. I could take her some roat and play some music for her. I hear she loves the singing programs on television,
just like me. Do you think she would like a hardheaded khala paying her a visit?”
Marjan’s ache for her daughter dwarfed the ache of her broken bones. The orphanage director seemed thoughtful and kind, but
Marjan had no idea how Hawa was really faring there. If Soraya had coaxed a laugh out of Marjan today, maybe she could lift
Hawa’s spirits as well.
“I would really appreciate that,” she said, embarrassed to ask such a favor of this woman she barely knew.
“Great! And let’s do a video message so she can hear directly from you.” Soraya promptly pulled out her phone and tapped on
the camera app. Marjan sat herself up, tried to smooth down her unwashed hair, and tried not think about what her face might
look like. Soraya tapped her phone, and Marjan started to speak.
At Marjan’s request, Soraya deleted the first seven attempts at a video message. She finally settled for a brief message in
which she did not try to explain her absence.
Hawa jan, my sweet daughter, more precious to me than a breath. I know I’m far from you but I’m thinking about you all the time and
I hope that I will be with you very soon. I miss you. Please be a good girl. Soon I will . . . I miss you so much.
“A career in film might not be your destiny, but the lighting is terrible in here and you didn’t have much time to prepare
a script, so maybe we shouldn’t make final decisions today,” Soraya teased, tucking her phone into her bag.
“I don’t know why I fumbled so much. I’m sorry for the trouble,” Marjan said, surprised to find herself already looking forward to seeing Soraya again. It wasn’t easy to find reasons to smile in here.
“Well, I caused you some trouble. You’re allowed to cause me some trouble,” Soraya replied, rising from the chair and shouldering
her handbag. “That’s what friends do.”