chapter 10

The first few days, Mariam hardly left her room. She was awakened every dawn for prayer by the

distant cry ofazan, after which she crawled back into bed. She was still in bed when she heard

Rasheed in the bathroom, washing up, when he came into her room to check on her before he went to

his shop. From her window, she watched him in the yard, securing his lunch in the rear carrier pack

of his bicycle, then walking his bicycle across the yard and into the street. She watched him pedal

away, saw his broad, thick-shouldered figure disappear around the turn at the end of the street.

For most of the days, Mariam stayed in bed, feeling adrift and forlorn. Sometimes she went

downstairs to the kitchen, ran her hands over the sticky, grease-stained counter, the vinyl, flowered

curtains that smelled like burned meals. She looked through the ill-fitting drawers, at the mismatched

spoons and knives, the colander and chipped, wooden spatulas, these would-be instruments of her

new daily life, all of it reminding her of the havoc that had struck her life, making her feel uprooted,

displaced, like an intruder on someone else's life.

At thekolba, her appetite had been predictable. Here, her stomach rarely growled for food.

Sometimes she took a plate of leftover white rice and a scrap of bread to the living room, by the

window. From there, she could see the roofs of the one-story houses on their street. She could see

into their yards too, the women working laundry lines and shooing their children, chickens pecking at

dirt, the shovels and spades, the cows tethered to trees.

She thought longingly of all the summer nights that she and Nana had slept on the flat roof of

thekolba, looking at the moon glowing over Gul Daman, the night so hot their shirts would cling to

their chests like a wet leaf to a window. She missed the winter afternoons of reading in thekolba with

Mullah Faizullah, the clink of icicles falling on her roof from the trees, the crows cawing outside

from snow-burdened branches.

Alone in the house, Mariam paced restlessly, from the kitchen to the living room, up the steps to her

room and down again. She ended up back in her room, doing her prayers or sitting on the bed, missing

her mother, feeling nauseated and homesick.

It was with the sun's westward crawl that Mariam's anxiety really ratcheted up. Her teeth rattled

when she thought of the night, the time when Rasheed might at last decide to do to her what husbands

did to their wives. She lay in bed, wracked with nerves, as he ate alone downstairs.

He always stopped by her room and poked his head in.

"You can't be sleeping already. It's only seven. Are you awake? Answer me. Come, now."

He pressed on until, from the dark, Mariam said, "I'm here."He slid down and sat in her doorway. From her bed, she could see his large-framed body, his long

legs, the smoke swirling around his hook-nosed profile, the amber tip of his cigarette brightening and

dimming.

He told her about his day. A pair of loafers he had custom-made for the deputy foreign minister-

who, Rasheed said, bought shoes only from him. An order for sandals from a Polish diplomat and his

wife. He told her of the superstitions people had about shoes: that putting them on a bed invited death

into the family, that a quarrel would follow if one put on the left shoe first.

"Unless it was done unintentionally on a Friday," he said. "And did you know it's supposed to be a

bad omen to tie shoes together and hang them from a nail?"

Rasheed himself believed none of this. In his opinion, superstitions were largely a female

preoccupation.

He passed on to her things he had heard on the streets, like how the American president Richard

Nixon had resigned over a scandal.

Mariam, who had never heard of Nixon, or the scandal that had forced him to resign, did not say

anything back. She waited anxiously for Rasheed to finish talking, to crush his cigarette, and take his

leave. Only when she'd heard him cross the hallway, heard his door open and close, only then would

the metal fist gripping her belly let go-Then one night he crushed his cigarette and instead of saying

good night leaned against the doorway.

"Are you ever going to unpack that thing?" he said, motioning with his head toward her suitcase. He

crossed his arms. "I figured you might need some time. But this is absurd. A week's gone and…Well,

then, as of tomorrow morning I expect you to start behaving like a wife.Fahmidi? Is that understood?"

Mariam's teeth began to chatter.

"I need an answer."

"Yes."

"Good," he said. "What did you think? That this is a hotel? That I'm some kind of hotelkeeper? Well,

it…Oh. Oh.

La illah u ilillah.What did I say about the crying? Mariam. What did I say to you about the crying?"

* * *

The next morning, after Rasheed left for work, Mariam unpacked her clothes and put them in the

dresser. She drew a pail of water from the well and, with a rag, washed the windows of her room and

the windows to the living room downstairs- She swept the floors, beat the cobwebs fluttering in the

corners of the ceiling. She opened the windows to air the house.

She set three cups of lentils to soak in a pot, found a knife and cut some carrots and a pair of potatoes, left them too to soak. She searched for flour, found it in the back of one of the cabinets

behind a row of dirty spice jars, and made fresh dough, kneading it the way Nana had shown her,

pushing the dough with the heel of her hand, folding the outer edge, turning it, and pushing it away

again. Once she had floured the dough, she wrapped it in a moist cloth, put on ahijab, and set out for

the communal tandoor.

Rasheed had told her where it was, down the street, a left then a quick right, but all Mariam had to

do was follow the flock of women and children who were headed the same way. The children

Mariam saw, chasing after their mothers or running ahead of them, wore shirts patched and patched

again. They wore trousers that looked too big

or too small, sandals with ragged straps that flapped back and forth. They rolled discarded old

bicycle tires with sticks.

Their mothers walked in groups of three or four, some in burqas, others not. Mariam could hear their

high-pitched chatter, their spiraling laughs. As she walked with her head down, she caught bits of

their banter, which seemingly always had to do with sick children or lazy, ungrateful husbands.

As if the meals cook themselves.

Wallah o billah,never a moment's rest!

And he says to me, I swear it, it's true, he actually says tome…

This endless conversation, the tone plaintive but oddly cheerful, flew around and around in a circle.

On it went, down the street, around the corner, in line at the tandoor. Husbands who gambled.

Husbands who doted on their mothers and wouldn't spend a rupiah on them, the wives. Mariam

wondered how so many women could suffer the same miserable luck, to have married, all of them,

such dreadful men. Or was this a wifely game that she did not know about, a daily ritual, like soaking

rice or making dough? Would they expect her soon to join in?

In the tandoor line, Mariam caught sideways glances shot at her, heard whispers. Her hands began to

sweat. She imagined they all knew that she'd been born aharami, a source of shame to her father and

his family. They all knew that she'd betrayed her mother and disgraced herself.

With a corner of herhijab, she dabbed at the moisture above her upper lip and tried to gather her

nerves. For a few minutes, everything went well-Then someone tapped her on the shoulder. Mariam

turned around and found a light-skinned, plump woman wearing ahijab, like her. She had short, wiry

black hair and a good-humored, almost perfectly round face. Her lips were much fuller than

Mariam's, the lower one slightly droopy, as though dragged down by the big, dark mole just below the

lip line. She had big greenish eyes that shone at Mariam with an inviting glint.

"You're Rasheed jan's new wife, aren't you?" the woman said, smiling widely.

"The one from Herat. You're so young! Mariam jan, isn't it? My name is Fariba. I live on your street,

five houses to your left, the one with the green door. This is my sonNoor."The boy at her side had a smooth, happy face and wiry hair like his mother's. There was a patch of

black hairs on the lobe of his left ear. His eyes had a mischievous, reckless light in them. He raised

his hand."Salaam, Khala Jan."

"Noor is ten. I have an older boy too, Ahmad."

"He's thirteen," Noor said.

"Thirteen going on forty." The woman Fariba laughed. "My husband's name is Hakim," she said.

"He's a teacher here in Deh-Mazang. You should come by sometime, we'll have a cup-"

And then suddenly, as if emboldened, the other women pushed past Fariba and swarmed Mariam,

forming a circle around her with alarming speed

"So you're Rasheed jan's young bride-"

"How do you like Kabul?"

"I've been to Herat. I have a cousin there"

"Do you want a boy or a girl first?"

"The minarets! Oh, what beauty! What a gorgeous city!"

"Boy is better, Mariam jan, they carry the family name-"

"Bah! Boys get married and run off. Girls stay behind and take care of you when you're old"

"We heard you were coming."

"Have twins. One of each! Then everyone's happy."

Mariam backed away. She was hyperventilating. Her ears buzzed, her pulse fluttered, her eyes

darted from one face to another. She backed away again, but there was nowhere to go to-she was in

the center of a circle. She spotted Fariba, who was frowning, who saw that she was in distress.

"Let her be!" Fariba was saying. "Move aside, let her be! You're frightening her!"

Mariam clutched the dough close to her chest and pushed through the crowd around her.

"Where are you going,hamshira?"

She pushed until somehow she was in the clear and then she ran up the street. It wasn't until she'd

reached the intersection that she realized she'd run the wrong way. She turned around and ran back in

the other direction, head down, tripping once and scraping her knee badly, then up again and running,

bolting past the women."What's the matter with you?"

"You're bleeding,hamshiral"

Mariam turned one corner, then the other. She found the correct street but suddenly could not

remember which was Rasheed's house. She ran up then down the street, panting, near tears now,

began trying doors blindly. Some were locked, others opened only to reveal unfamiliar yards, barking

dogs, and startled chickens. She pictured Rasheed coming home to find her still searching this way,

her knee bleeding, lost on her own street. Now she did start crying. She pushed on doors, muttering

panicked prayers, her face moist with tears, until one opened, and she saw, with relief, the outhouse,

the well, the toolshed. She slammed the door behind her and turned the bolt. Then she was on all

fours, next to the wall, retching. When she was done, she crawled away, sat against the wall, with her

legs splayed before her. She had never in her life felt so alone.

* * *

When Rasheed came home that night, he brought with him a brown paper bag. Mariam was

disappointed that he did not notice the clean windows, the swept floors, the missing cobwebs. But he

did look pleased that she had already set his dinner plate, on a cleansofrah spread on the living-room

floor.

"I madedaal" Mariam said.

"Good. I'm starving."

She poured water for him from theafiawa to wash his hands with. As he dried with a towel, she put

before him a steaming bowlof daal and a plate of fluffy white rice. This was the first meal she had

cooked for him, and Mariam wished she had been in a better state when she made it. She'd still been

shaken from the incident at the tandoor as she'd cooked, and all day she had fretted about thedaal'%

consistency, its color, worried that he would think she'd stirred in too much ginger or not enough

turmeric.

He dipped his spoon into the gold-coloreddaal.

Mariam swayed a bit. What if he was disappointed or angry? What if he pushed his plate away in

displeasure?

"Careful," she managed to say. "It's hot."

Rasheed pursed his lips and blew, then put the spoon into his mouth.

"It's good," he said. "A little undersalted but good. Maybe better than good, even."

Relieved, Mariam looked on as he ate. A flare of pride caught her off guard. She had done well -

maybe better than good, even- and it surprised her, this thrill she felt over his small compliment- The

day's earlier unpleasantness receded a bit."Tomorrow is Friday," Rasheed said. "What do you say I show you around?"

"Around Kabul?"

"No. Calcutta."

Mariam blinked.

"It's a joke. Of course Kabul. Where else?" He reached into the brown paper bag. "But first,

something I have to tell you."

He fished a sky blue burqa from the bag. The yards of pleated cloth spilled over his knees when he

lifted it. He rolled up the burqa, looked at Mariam.

"I have customers, Mariam, men, who bring their wives to my shop. The women come uncovered,

they talk to me directly, look me in the eye without shame. They wear makeup and skirts that show

their knees. Sometimes they even put their feet in front of me, the women do, for measurements, and

their husbands stand there and watch. They allow it. They think nothing of a stranger touching their

wives' bare feet! They think they're being modern men, intellectuals, on account of their education, I

suppose. They don't see that they're spoiling their ownnang andnamoos, their honor and pride."

He shook his head.

"Mostly, they live in the richer parts of Kabul. I'll take you there. You'll see. But they're here too,

Mariam, in this very neighborhood, these soft men. There's a teacher living down the street, Hakim is

his name, and I see his wife Fariba all the time walking the streets alone with nothing on her head but

a scarf. It embarrasses me, frankly, to see a man who's lost control of his wife."

He fixed Mariam with a hard glare.

"But I'm a different breed of man, Mariam. Where I come from, one wrong look, one improper word,

and blood is spilled. Where I come from, a woman's face is her husband's business only. I want you

to remember that. Do you understand?"

Mariam nodded. When he extended the bag to her, she took it.

The earlier pleasure over his approval of her cooking had evaporated. In its stead, a sensation of

shrinking. This man's will felt to Mariam as imposing and immovable as the Safid-koh mountains

looming over Gul Daman.

Rasheed passed the paper bag to her. "We have an understanding, then. Now, let me have some more

of thatdaal."