A Thousand Splendid Suns

Zalmai's new goat. Laila watched the rain slide off Zalmai's scalp-he has
asked that he be shaved, like Tariq, who is in charge now of saying the
Babaloo prayers. The rain flattened Aziza's long hair, turned it into
sodden tendrils that sprayed Zalmai when she snapped her head.
Zalmai is almost six. Aziza is ten. They celebrated her birthday last
week, took her to Cinema Park, where, at last, Titanic was openly
screened for the people of Kabul.
* * *
"Come on, children, we're going to be late," Laila calls, putting their
lunches in a paper bag-It's eight o'clock in the morning. Laila was up at
five. As always, it was Aziza who shook her awake for morning namaz.
The prayers, Laila knows, are Aziza's way of clinging to Mariam, her way
of keeping Mariam close awhile yet before time has its way, before it
snatches Mariam from the garden of her memory like a weed pulled by
its roots.
After namaz, Laila had gone back to bed, and was still asleep when
Tariq left the house. She vaguely remembers him kissing her cheek.
Tariq has found work with a French NGO that fits land mine survivors and
amputees with prosthetic limbs.
Zalmai comes chasing Aziza into the kitchen.
"You have your notebooks, you two? Pencils? Textbooks?"
"Right here," Aziza says, lifting her backpack. Again, Laila notices how
her stutter is lessening.