“In here. What's in here.” Then it fell flaccid. “You just don't know.”
18.
A week passed, but there was still no sign of Tariq.
Then another week came and went. To fill the time, Laila fixed the screen door that Babi still hadn't got around to.
She took down Babi's books, dusted and alphabetized them.
She went to Chicken Street with Hasina, Giti, and Giti's mother, Nila, who was a seamstress and sometime sewing partner of Mammy's.
In that week, Laila came to believe that of all the hardships a person had to face none was more punishing than the simple act of waiting.
Another week passed. Laila found herself caught in a net of terrible thoughts.
He would never come back. His parents had moved away for good; the trip to Ghazni had been a ruse.
An adult scheme to spare the two of them an upsetting farewell. A land mine had gotten to him again.
The way it did in 1981, when he was five, the last time his parents took him south to Ghazni.
That was shortly after Laila's third birthday. He'd been lucky that time, losing only a leg; lucky that he'd survived at all.
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