When the Moon Is Low

  I took Mahmood’s hands from my back and wrapped them around my waist.

  “And I pray that it’s in my naseeb to see that day.”

  “God willing, we’ll both see that day,” I managed to get out before the lump in my throat swelled.

  CHAPTER 14

  Fereiba

  A MONTH LATER, WE MARKED THE HOLIDAY OF EID. DISTANT RELATIVES and friends had been dropping by to pay their customary visits despite the city’s somber mood. When we heard the knock at the gate, we thought nothing of it. Mahmood went to answer it, and I instinctively put a pot of water to boil for tea.

  But the people at the door were neither friends nor family.

  Gruff-looking men had barged into our courtyard and sauntered into the foyer.

  “So this is the home of the engineer,” one sneered, his words thick with distaste.

  I gasped at the sound of men’s voices booming from within our home. The teakettle fell with a clang, water pooling on the floor.

  Saleem and Samira were at my feet drawing pictures on scraps of paper. I shot them a look and pointed upstairs. Frightened, they scurried up the steps without the slightest protest.

  I threw on my burqa and looked into the living room.

  Three men had entered our living room and were eyeing our belongings contemptuously. They wore loose-hanging caftans and pantaloons in khaki and gray, drab colors that made their pitch-black beards and machine guns stand out. Their guns were slung casually over their shoulders. The tallest of the three was twirling Mahmood’s tasbeh, his worry beads, around his finger. When they caught sight of me, an azure apparition, in the doorway, they ordered me back into the kitchen.

  Mahmood looked alarmed but composed. He had stepped in front of me instinctively and gave me a quiet, pleading look to follow their command.

  I was terrified to leave my husband alone with these men who’d forced their way into our home, but I also had my mind on my two children hidden upstairs and the one I carried under my burqa. I lowered my head and backed into the kitchen, still within earshot but out of sight.

  “You are an engineer.”

  “Yes.” Mahmood’s voice was controlled.

  “And you work for the Ministry of Water and Electricity,” he said. From the soft clinks, I knew one of the men had turned his attention to the porcelain tea set in our glass curio. It had been a wedding gift from Khala Zeba. The cups were delicate, with gold leaf on the handles and dainty pastel painted flowers. We had no photographs, no television, and no radio, thank God. I hoped once they realized our home was free of contraband, they would leave.

  “Yes, I do. Is there something that I can help you with?”

  “We’re looking for Mahmood Waziri, the engineer who works for the Ministry of Water and Electricity—the man who is known to be in defiance of our Islamic laws.”

  My heart raced. I glanced up the stairs and saw the shadow of two small heads peeking around the corner. I motioned them to back away.

  “Defiance? But I have not defied any . . .”

  “You’d better come with us so we can tell you exactly the sins you’ve been charged with committing.”

  “Sins? My brothers, there must be a misunderstanding.” I detected a slight tremble in Mahmood’s voice, but nothing compared to the way I was shaking.

  “There is no misunderstanding.”

  “But, please, hear me out for one moment. I’ve done my best to comply with all the decrees that have been handed down—”

  “We will not speak here, unless you wish to bring your wife and two children into the living room to watch us charge you with your crimes.” Mahmood let out a deep sigh.

  “No, no, no. That’s not necessary. I’ll come with you.”

  “Mahmood! Please do not take him! He is an innocent man!” I cried out, my voice shrill and unnerved. I was in the doorway, on my knees.

  One of the men walked toward me, but Mahmood intervened.

  “Please!” he said sharply, before turning to me. His fingers were on my shoulders, holding me up, as he looked through the mesh of my burqa. “Fereiba-jan, I beg you, let me speak with these men. I’m sure we can clear up this misunderstanding. You are needed here.”

  When we were first married, I knew nothing about my husband. Time taught me that he was patient, nurturing, and principled. I was too bashful to look directly at him in the first month or so but in the warmth of his friendship, my guard melted. He undid all that this world had done to me. I realized, not long after our wedding, when I caught myself laughing at a joke he’d already told me twice, that I loved this man.

  Fereiba, do you know what the most beautiful word for spouse is in our language?

  What is it?

  Hamsar. Think of it. “Of the same mind.” That’s what we are, isn’t it?

  That’s what Mahmood did. He took rusted, tired words—things people could say to one another without feeling a thing—and turned them over in the palm of his hand. He would blow the dust off and make them shine with meaning so moving you were ashamed to have overlooked it.

  He asked me questions and listened for my answers. He had his mother’s generous heart and his father’s wit. He did not live in fear of God because, he reasoned, a merciful God would not create us only to punish us for trivial earthly matters. Mahmood was logical and determined. He loved his children. He would discipline them and later chuckle at their mischief. He would stroke my forehead before we went to sleep, a touch light enough to make my eyes heavy but ardent enough to make me want to be awake. He wanted his work to be his footprint in Afghanistan, something his children would be proud of.

  With no children to distract us in the early years of our marriage, I learned my husband well. I could hear Mahmood’s thoughts when I looked into his eyes.

  He was my hamsar.

  With the men barking at him to follow, I turned to Mahmood’s face—the blue grid of my burqa invading the most precious, private moment of our married lives. There was so much to say. His eyes whispered to me in a way only a hamsar could.

  Take care of our children, janem. I will do what I can to make this right. I’m sorry I’ve brought this upon us. I would give anything to stay at your side.

  My husband was escorted out of our home and into the blackest night of our lives. The men slammed the door behind them. Two porcelain teacups rattled off the shelf and smashed to the floor, leaving shards of white and pastel in their wake.

  I heard frantic footsteps upstairs and knew Saleem had run over to the window. I never asked him what he saw. If I know my husband, he was conscious of his children watching him being led away. He would do nothing to make that night any uglier than it forever would be in their minds.

  CHAPTER 15

  Fereiba

  SALEEM TIPTOED TO ME. I HAD SLIPPED THE BURQA OFF MY HEAD and slumped to the floor. I’d heard the car’s engine hum into the distance. They’d taken Mahmood with them. My son sat beside me, and Samira watched from a safe distance. When Saleem could bear the quiet no longer, he broke the silence.

  “Madar-jan . . .” he whispered.

  I stopped him before he could say anything else. I had no answers.

  “My son, go on back upstairs with your sister and sleep. I’ll wait for your father.”

  I knew he was scared. I knew he wanted to be useful. He wanted to do things that would make Mahmood proud.

  Samira was just nine years old on that night. She was an extension of me. Her moods ebbed and flowed in response to my own, just as the tides respond to the moon. If I brooded, Samira quieted, blowing her dark bangs away from her crinkled forehead. If I was happy, my daughter walked with a skip in her step. On that night, Samira became silent and trembled. With her hands drawn into tight, little fists, tears darkened her pillowcase.

  SALEEM WOKE AT DAWN AND FOUND ME ON THE LIVING ROOM couch. I sat with my head against the wall. I cannot imagine what I must have looked like to him.

  “Madar-jan?”

  He had to call out to me twice
.

  “Yes, Saleem,” I said. My throat was dry and raw.

  Saleem hadn’t known what to say. He simply felt obligated to break the silence and gauge the situation.

  “Did you sleep, Madar-jan?”

  I sat with my hands wrapped around the round of my belly; my swollen feet barely reached the floor.

  “Yes, my son.”

  He looked doubtful and offered to bring me tea. I looked at Saleem, his hands wringing behind his back, his face knotted with fear. It was time for me to be a mother again.

  “It is early still,” I’d said. “It would be good to pray for your father.”

  We didn’t bother to heat the water for the ablutions.

  “In the name of God . . .” I whispered and began to wash my hands, mouth, and nose. I steeled myself against the icy touch of the water. I would not show weakness. I washed my face, behind my ears, my hands and feet.

  With a rehearsed rhythm, Saleem and I stood, kneeled, and bowed as we mouthed the phrases we’d both memorized very early in our lives. I could feel my eyes glaze as I thought of the previous night.

  I didn’t know if my husband would ever be returned.

  Our home froze in time, waiting for a sign.

  Saleem helped with some chores and, though he was young, with going to the market for our basic needs. I was isolated. My siblings had fled Afghanistan along with KokoGul. My father stayed behind to look after his orchard, an hour from where Mahmood and I had settled. Mahmood’s family was similarly dispersed, his sisters living in Australia. All we had left were distant cousins who were struggling, as we were, to feed their families and survive Kabul’s new order. I sent word to our families. They were distraught, but not in any position to help. Mahmood’s sisters begged me to keep them informed if I heard from their brother.

  RAISA, ABDUL RAHIM’S WIFE, CAME BY FREQUENTLY AFTER HEARING the news of Mahmood’s disappearance. Some days, she sent a plate of butter or a small pot of rice. Raisa had always been a dear friend, but I dreaded her visits after his disappearance. Her eyes, moist with pity, were brutal reminders of everything that was wrong.

  She had a matronly softness, a bosom that offered to pull you in and rock you to sleep as if you were one of her many children. On those bleak days, Raisa would stop by for short visits. Without a pause in conversation, she would tidy the kitchen and make a quick dish with whatever she could find in our cupboards.

  “Fereiba-jan, any word?” she would ask vaguely.

  “Not yet, but I’m sure any day now,” I would say and I believed it. Mahmood was a marvel. I had no reason to expect anything less from him.

  “Well, if there’s anything that you and the children need . . .”

  I steeled myself. I tried to keep the house in order, to give my children a way to sleep easy in the night. Samira mirrored my composure during the day but at night, her dark bangs clung to the cold sweat of her forehead. She whimpered and wailed in her sleep, a language I understood but refused to speak.

  I FOUND SALEEM’S NOTEBOOK. THERE WERE HASH MARKS ON THE back cover. He was counting the days since that night. There were forty-seven marks.

  We were a home without a patriarch, the type of creature Kabul’s beasts devoured on sight. On the day I was struck with sharp pains, I realized just how isolated we were without a man in the home. For hours, I’d turned my face to the wall when the pressure overwhelmed me. The children said nothing. We each played our part in the charade of normalcy.

  But the fear of losing my unborn, of having Mahmood return to find me without his child, was enough to drive me out of the house without a proper escort. I slipped on my burqa and took Saleem by the hand. I left Samira with Raisa-jan, who pulled my daughter against her chest and nodded. She could offer nothing else.

  “Saleem-jan, forgive me if I squeeze your hand too hard, bachem.” The pain was sharp and came with such force, I nearly doubled over.

  “Are you very sick, Madar-jan?” Saleem asked quietly once we’d turned off our street.

  “No, bachem. I’m sure it’s fine. Everything will be better once your father comes home.”

  The look of doubt on Saleem’s face did not go unnoticed. My confidence was beginning to stutter and stumble. Samira had sensed it too. Every day, she retreated further into herself.

  “Is the baby coming now?” Saleem questions were practical. He was so much like his father. I hadn’t realized just how much he’d grown in the last year.

  “God forbid, bachem. It’s still too soon. Babies need nine months and nine days. Nine months and nine days,” I repeated, hearing my mother-in-law’s voice. There was much she’d shared with me before she’d left us, squeezing a lifetime of mothering into a few short years. She’d been the one to hurry the midwife to our home when my labor pains began with Saleem and Samira. She’d held my hand as I’d brought her grandchildren into the world. As the time grew near for this child, I felt her absence more and more.

  With one hand on my belly and my eyes to the ground, I did not notice the three men round the corner. We were just a hundred meters from the hospital entrance.

  “Have you no self-respect, woman? Where is your mahram?” A glob of saliva landed at my feet. I took a step back. My son’s grip tightened on my fingers. I tried to position myself in front of him.

  “This is my son. He is escorting me to the hospital. I am in severe pain and am in a . . . condition.”

  Were these the men who had come for Mahmood? Would they know anything about his whereabouts? Before I dared to ask, a stick cracked on my shoulder. I doubled over, my hands covering my belly.

  “Please don’t!” Saleem cried as he threw himself over my crouched form.

  “Only loose women speak of such matters so openly! Have you no shame in front of your son? Where is his father? Or maybe he does not have one.”

  My body quaked with rage, but I said nothing. I had to be practical too.

  “We ask your forgiveness. Please let us be on our way,” I said through gritted teeth.

  “Get back to your home. Go home with your boy and try to carry yourself as a respectful Muslim woman. You have no need for the hospital. Keep your woman troubles to yourself and spare your son the shame of being seen with you.”

  Sharp pains pierced my pelvis and shoulder, but I got back on my feet. I pulled my bewildered son by the hand and turned around. After just one step, I felt a snap against my back. They’d lashed out twice more, for good measure. I squeezed Saleem’s hand, anticipating his reaction.

  “Madar!” He was angry.

  “Say nothing, bachem,” I whispered. “Let’s be on our way, my love. I am fine.”

  Saleem’s face burned with fury. It hurt him to do nothing, even if it was what I asked. In bringing him as my escort, I’d asked him to be the man of our home. In telling him to do nothing, I’d struck him back down to a boy. He supported me as I hobbled back home. For an Afghan, pride is harder to swallow than a bag of nails.

  We stopped several times so I could catch my breath and rest against a wall. The way home was much longer than I remembered.

  I LAY IN BED FOR THREE DAYS, PRAYING FOR GOD TO WATCH OVER me and my child. The pains waxed and waned. Raisa stayed at the house until nightfall and made simple meals for the children. She put wet cloths on my forehead and made me drink water from a copper bowl engraved with a sura from the Qur’an. Saleem and Samira were somber and inseparable. They clung to each other like two lost travelers trying to keep warm on a bitterly cold night.

  On the third day, Raisa burst into our home with fresh determination. She pulled a small pouch from her pocket and dropped a handful of small, dark seeds into a bowl. As she trickled boiling water into the bowl, she whispered prayers into the musky steam. Raisa sat behind me with her back to the wall, propped me up in her lap like an infant, and brought the bowl to my parched lips. I hadn’t the strength to ask what she had brewed and let the warmth make its way down my throat.

  Raisa made a meal of stale bread and added more wa
ter to the meat broth we’d been drinking for four days. We had money, but there was no food to be found in the markets. Two days of rocket fire had sent all the street vendors and shop owners into hiding and left the city’s stomachs grumbling behind blackened windows.

  I woke in the night, a sliver of moonlight catching my face. I took a deep breath and felt the baby stir. The pain in my back and flank had subsided. As I pushed myself to sit, my head spun just slightly, then steadied itself.

  I thanked God.

  Saleem looked at me with cautious optimism. He didn’t trust this world, and I couldn’t find the words to restore his faith. Maybe it was more than words I was lacking.

  I sent Saleem next door to thank Raisa-jan for her help and to let her know she could tend to her own family without worry. Saleem returned with news that Abdul Rahim and Raisa would be coming over shortly.

  I boiled water for tea and searched the cupboards for something to serve them. We would not have survived the week without their kindness.

  They knocked on our front gate quietly. I met them in the courtyard and led them into the living room, eager to show Raisa that I was very much back on my feet.

  “You should be resting still, Ferei-jan,” she chided.

  “Allah bless your family with many happy years.” I hugged her tightly and kissed her cheeks. “I don’t know how to thank you for everything you’ve done. You’ve put me back on my feet and kept my children fed when you have a household of your own. Mahmood and I will never forget this.”

  Raisa looked as if she had just taken a bite of something horrid and was waiting for the right moment to spit it out.

  “Fereiba-jan, let us sit and talk,” Abdul Rahim said. “Saleem-jan, look after your sister for a bit, bachem.”

  When Abdul Rahim, the gentle giant who lived next door, called Saleem my boy, I knew. Everything I needed to know was in that seemingly trivial endearment, the word he’d slipped in instinctively wanting to fill a sorry void. Abdul Rahim, a loving father, knew the needs of a young man. A young man needs someone to tousle his hair, to put a hand on his shoulder, to watch him fiddle with a broken watch.