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Hawa watches her mother limp across the living room. Why is she limping? Hawa would ask if she thought she was capable of
speech, but for the moment she is not. The Talib’s eyes follow her mother, who looks shrunken in his presence. The Talib whom
Hawa saw while they were in the taxi was at least separated from her by the car’s window. This one moves comfortably around
their apartment, his boots leaving dirty prints on their burgundy carpet. Hawa has never seen anyone enter a home without
removing their shoes.
The Talib looks at the framed Quranic verse on the wall. As he moves toward the small television in their living room, Hawa
takes a step backward. Her mother is at her side now, nudging her toward the bedroom. The Talib is standing before their narrow
three-shelf bookcase. Hawa keeps her schoolbooks on the bottom shelf, along with a pencil case and a box of markers she has
not yet opened. He looks at the top and middle shelves, at the books her mother has collected.
“Whose books are these?” he demands. The Talib behind him looks up from his phone briefly. He is growing impatient, moving
in and out of the apartment as if he is eager to bang on another door.
“Those belong to my husband,” Marjan replies meekly. She knows all too well how to play the part of a docile housewife. “I’m
not to touch them ever.”
“What does he read about?” he asks, picking up Marjan’s paperback copy of Pride and Prejudice. The title is written in scrolling letters and bears no images that would give away the story.
“He tells me they are about history,” she says, as if she has no way of confirming this. “And business.”
What are men to rocks and mountains? Elizabeth had exclaimed.
Marjan feels this in her bones as she watches the Talib drop the book to the floor.
Marjan detects resentment. She is willing to bet he cannot read. The education of a Talib involves time spent reciting verses
of the Quran, naming God’s enemies, and firing weapons. Not long ago, word got out that a Taliban leader was displeased with
the increasing literacy among their bands of fighters. Nothing good could come of too many men who could read and write, he
warned. And besides, throughout history, men kept track of their women, sheep, and weapons without so much as a sheet of paper.
“Call your husband. Tell him to come home now,” the Talib orders.
“Forgive me, but I cannot. He does not permit me to have a phone,” Marjan explains. The Talib does not bat an eye at this
claim.
“If there’s nothing here, let’s go!” the other soldier calls from the kitchen. He emerges with a butter cookie. Marjan had
purchased a tin for Hawa, a special treat for the high marks she received last quarter. Hawa had decided to allow herself
one every Friday to make the tin last longer.
“Give me a cookie!” the Talib near Marjan demands. His partner nods his head in the direction of the kitchen, telling him
to help himself.
“Let’s go. This cripple doesn’t have anything helpful to offer us,” he says, a sprinkle of crumbs and sugar crystals caught
in his beard. But the closer Talib has his eye on the bedroom.
“Out of the way,” he barks at Hawa, who steps fully into the living room and stands by her mother. Marjan winces at the violation
of her private space. She hears him taking steps around the small room, imagines what he might be looking at. Her clothing
on the bed. Their duffel bag in the bottom drawer of the dresser. Hawa’s hairbrush by the window. She thinks of her ID under
the flowerpot and tries to control her breathing.
She hears the soft protest of rickety drawers and tossed belongings.
“Find anything interesting?” the other Talib asks. Even more footprints that will have to be swept away. He is taller than
the man in the bedroom. Marjan and Hawa both recoil at the sharp smell emanating from his body. Hawa starts to cough, and
Marjan sidesteps the man and practically shoves Hawa into the bathroom.
“Excuse me, my daughter is unwell. Some kind of lung infection, but I cannot afford the medications,” she says woefully.
As soon as the bathroom door closes, Hawa coughs again, sensing she should go along with her mother’s lie. She presses her
ear to the door and tries to hear what the men are saying. For a few moments, there is nothing but heavy footsteps and mumbling.
Then Hawa hears a buzzing sound.
Her mother hasn’t completely silenced her phone. Hawa coughs again to cover up any other sounds the phone might make. She
gingerly opens the small cabinet, reaches into the package of sanitary napkins and extracts her mother’s phone. She silences
it and then wonders if she should try to get help somehow. She cannot call the police. She knows this much. But she feels
desperate to let someone know that her mother is in the living room with two Talibs.
Khala Soraya would know what to do.
Fingers trembling, Hawa unlocks the phone and goes to her mother’s messaging app. She is about to search for Khala Soraya’s
name when she notices a message from an unnamed number.
You will be in grave danger, sister. The men have already shaken hands with the new masters. They will get what they need
from this arrangement, as they always do. I am not the only one who thinks of you often. Do what you can to save yourself
and your daughter from him. If I do not send you another message, it will only be for your safety.
Who is thinking of her mother often?
She does not understand what she’s read. She starts to tap out a message to Khala Soraya, ready to hide the phone in her underwear
if a Talib were to barge into this small space.
On the other side of the door, Marjan still holds the tip of her headscarf across her face. She keeps her eyes averted, maintains her timidity.
“The man has to come home sometime,” the Talib says. “If it’s him, we’ll get him. Let’s go.”
He’s just emerged from the bedroom with one of Hawa’s sweaters caught on his boot. He reaches down, growls, and rips it off,
tossing it aside with a child’s petulance.
“Tell your husband we’ll be back. He’ll have to answer for himself,” he vows. The two Talibs walk out then. Marjan counts
to five and then tiptoes across the apartment and quietly closes the door. Like Hawa in the bathroom, she presses her ear
to the door, trying to hear if they are approaching Ingrid’s apartment. She hears their heavy footsteps on the stairs and
breathes a sigh of relief.
“Madar?” Hawa calls out. She pokes her head out of the bathroom, her face drained of color.
“Come, my sweetheart,” Marjan whispers, arms open. Hawa lets herself be embraced, wants to confirm that her mother’s arms
still have the strength to wrap around her. Hawa’s mind is racing. For some reason, she had not anticipated that the Talibs
roaming the street would breach the privacy of their home. What else could they do? Then there was the curious text message
on her mother’s phone and her mother’s behavior around the Talib foot soldiers.
“Why were you limping?” Hawa asks, clearly confused by her mother’s act of weakness.
In her mind, Marjan hears echoes of her crippled aunt’s laughter.
Even now, she can remember the look of distaste on her father’s face whenever he would come in to see Khala Shaima sitting in their living room, her crooked spine pressed against the cold wall of their home.
No man ever asked for her hand. She was pitied, dismissed as something other than a woman.
But in overlooking her, they had both underestimated her and liberated her.
It was Khala Shaima who had the freedom to visit Marjan even after she had been married off to Abdul Khaliq.
In those visits, Khala Shaima fed her niece stories of their ancestor, the legendary Bibi Shekiba, who was disfigured, orphaned, abused, and yet found her way to become a guard of the king’s harem.
Those stories and her blood ties to Bibi Shekiba were the sustenance that kept Marjan alive in the worst of times. She could
not have prayed for a more precious inheritance.
Marjan is struck by the realization that in trying to protect her daughter, she is depriving her of that very gift. She must
find a way to share the lessons, even if she does not—just yet—feel it is safe to share the stories.
What are men to rocks and mountains?
What are men to girls and women? Marjan thinks.
She has worked hard to make sure her daughter always has a warm coat in the winter, crisp notebooks for the first day of school,
and fresh vegetables to help her grow. She has purchased for herself only the barest necessities. She has worn the same clothes
for years. In their kitchen, they have two plates, two mugs, one pot, and one frying pan. She chose this apartment because
she wanted to give Hawa the safety of neighbors, the appearance of financial stability. She has taken Hawa to bookstores and
gardens, wanting her to feel the freedom of ideas, the comfort of birdsong, the taste of indulgence.
She has provided well for her daughter. She has also deprived her.
With the Taliban roaming the streets around them, Marjan feels the pressure of time. Her heartbeat is a ticking clock. She
looks into her daughter’s eyes, pools of wonder.
“Sometimes,” Marjan says, hoping her explanation will make sense, “sometimes we must keep our strength hidden. It’s better
if they believe we are weak.”
“How long before they stop believing?” Hawa asks, still holding on to her. It is plain she is her mother’s daughter, because
Marjan is wondering the same.