There are a lot of children in Afghanistan, but little childhood.
Though there had been moments of beauty in it, Mariam knew that life for most part has been unkind to her. But as she walked the final twenty paces, she could not help but wish for more of it.
And suddenly, just like that, hope became knowledge. I was going to win. It was just a matter of when.
But the game involves only male names. Because, if it’s a girl, Laila has already named her.
I’ll die if you go. The Jinn will come, and I’ll have one of my fits. You’ll see, I’ll swallow my tongue and die. Don’t leave me, Mariam jo. Please stay. I’ll die if you go.
I thought about you all the time. I used to pray that you’d live to be a hundred years old. I didn’t know. I didn’t know that you were ashamed of me.
Joseph shall return to Canaan, grieve not, Hovels shall turn to rose gardens, grieve not. If a flood should arrive, to drown all that’s alive, Noah is your guide in the typhoon’s eye, grieve not.
I brought Hassan’s son from Afghanistan to America, lifting him from the certainty of turmoil and dropping him in a turmoil of uncertainty.
He knew I’d seen everything in that alley, that I’d stood there and done nothing. He knew that I’d betrayed him and yet he was rescuing me once again, maybe for the last time.
She would grab whatever she could -a look, a whisper, a moan – to salvage from perishing, to perserve. But time is most unforgivving of fires, and she couldn’t, in the end, save it all .
He had the blue kite in his hands; that was the first thing I saw. And I can’t lie now and say my eyes didn’t scan it for any rips.
I ran. A grown man running with a swarm of screaming children. But i didn’t care. I ran with the wind blowing in my face, and a smile as wide as the Valley of Panjsher on my lip. I ran.
Blood is a powerful thing.
America was different. America was a river, roarng along, unmindful of the past. I could wade into this river, let my sins drown to the bottom, let the waters carry me someplace far. Someplace with no ghosts, no memories, and no sins.
The impact had cut your upper lip in two, he had said, clean down the middle. Clean down the middle. Like a harelip.
Your job today is to pass gas. You do that and we can start feeding you liquids. No fart, no food.
There will be no floating waway. There will be no other reality tonight.
No one has to know. No one would. It would be her secret, one she would share with the mountains only. The question is whether it is a secret she can live with, and Parwana thinks she knows the answer. She has lived with secrets all her life.
Quiet is turning down the volume knob on life.
It was you Nabi. It was always you. Didn’t you know?