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Brew City Magazine | |
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Guidelines About the Magazine Editor-in-Chief:
Managing Editor: Associate Editor:
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“Hush little brother, hush.” As I settle on the ground of our sun-dried mud brick house, my head covered with an orange printed-cotton shawl, my bare feet tucked under my body, I pray, invoking Allah’s help. My sister, Firyuza, shivers like a chinar leaf in the desert wind. Voices of strange men resonate among the village walls. I see Mama’s lips moving against the cotton of her shawl, as she cuddles my whimpering baby-brother. Shouting something in Dari, a fox faced, bearded Taliban fighter with empty eyes, and a black turban, storms in as in a buzkashi game without a horse. Mama rocks the baby fast, but Masoud screams, frightened by the commotion. Fox Face notices Firyuza and me huddled in the corner. With an insolent grin, he steps toward us. My Mama resembles a lioness of the Five Lions valley as she springs to her feet and shields us with her body. Pushing her out of his path, Fox Face hits Mama but she pounces back again, ready to guard and protect us. Then the unthinkable happens… His face black, the Taliban man walks up to Mama. He puts a bullet though her head. Just like that. As if she were a dog, or a rat. Mama falters, clutching Masoud to her breast. She slumps to the ground. I want to run to her, but Firyuza stops me. Next to our inert mother, the baby yells. The Empty Eyes approaches Masoud, and I cover myself with my shawl. The baby’s cry subsides.
*** The dream comes every night and makes me scream. But I stayed silent when all this really happened. They had killed Mama and the baby Masoud, but the Taliban men spared Firyuza and me. The soft and warm bundle concealed under my long skirt, reminds me of the terror of that day. My fawn eyes, filled with sparks Mama had loved so much, are quiet now. They can only have the horrors of the past pressed into them, like the patterns on my printed-cotton shawl.
*** “Salaam.” A Pakistani relief worker squats beside me. “My name is Binazir.” She offers me a bowl of rice salvaged from the relief transport, but I only shrink at her gesture of friendship. “She’s been like this ever since we found her,” says Vahida, the girl whose family has brought me to the camp. “She doesn’t talk. She only sings lullabies and sad ballads when she thinks we are asleep and can’t hear her.” Then Vahida adds in a whisper, “They killed everyone in her village.” I stiffen in the corner of the makeshift tent. Not everyone. Not Firyuza. Not her! But Firyuza is dead now, so I remain silent. I buried Firyuza with her bundle. I look at my hands, scratched and with dirty fingernails—a testimony to the frenzy with which I had clawed dirt for Firyuza’s shallow grave. “Does she ever cry?” Binazir asks, arranging her veil. Papa had told us women in Kabul wore veils. Papa was so good to us. Whenever he went to Kabul, he brought us gifts. Last time, he gave Mama a new shawl. She blushed like a young bride and said, “Thank you Husband, but I am an old woman. Next time, bring scarves for your daughters instead.” But I knew the shawl made Mama happy. She wore it the following Friday, for everyone to see. For dinner, she prepared Papa’s favorite dish—chicken with dates and saffron-rice. The shoes Papa got for Firyuza were too small, and she offered them to me. I hugged my new rag doll Papa had brought, and then I gave it to Firyuza, so she also would have something from Kabul. Firyuza was two years older than me, but I knew she would enjoy the doll. Firyuza didn’t take pleasure in learning the alphabet Papa tried teaching us. He wrote two letters in the dirt. Then, pointing at one of them, he asked, “Which letter is this?” I stared at Firyuza, willing her into knowing the answer, but she only looked at the ground. “Look Firyuza,” I said, tracing the shape with my finger, ”This one, with the cap on, is ‘Alef’. And the one with a dot under its belly is called ‘Ba’.” “You’ll learn to read very soon,” Papa praised, proud of me. But of what use was reading in our village? I didn’t want Firyuza to feel bad she had trouble with letters. “Firyuza is best at harvesting opium,” I said. We grew opium poppy on a steep mountain slope. At harvest time, Firyuza was up before dawn and at the fields before sunrise. She was better and faster than any of us. With her small hands, she collected the golden syrup that dripped overnight to the edge of long cuts Papa had made in the poppy heads at nightfall. Opium was our livelihood. To amuse my baby-brother, I made rattles from arid opium heads. Dry seeds within clattered, making the baby smile. In the spring, the hilly incline reclaimed from the mountains became a magic carpet of orange, yellow, and white flowers. The fragile blossoms swayed and rocked in the breeze. At that time, I loved opium poppy best. Papa processed the acrid-smelling, malleable, syrupy opium poppy juice into honey-colored, finger-size rods. Papa’s opium was the best quality and he sold it in Kabul, the big city that fascinated me. They had schools in Kabul. “Papa, could I go to school in Kabul after I learn to read?” I asked. “Wouldn’t you miss your Mama, your sister, and your baby brother?” Papa looked at me, his soot-black eyes shining. “I would. But I could learn fast, become a teacher and come back to teach all of you.” I dreamt aloud. “I would build a schoolhouse and wear a veil. Papa, what color veils do women wear in Kabul?” “Black, or white with patterns of flowers.” “Like my shawl?”“No. The patterns aren’t printed like your shawl. A factory makes the fabric for veils.” “A factory?” “A big house.” My eyes grew round, as I imagined an immense mud brick house filled with veil fabric. “Kabul women must be wearing a lot of veils,” I said. “Yes, my daughter.” Papa chuckled, and patted my head. Firyuza rolled her eyes. Now, Vahida, the girl whose folks found me and brought me to the camp, sits next to Binazir. The relief worker arranges her white, factory-made veil. “Well, does she ever cry?” Binazir repeats her question. Vahida clicks her tongue in negation. She says something to Binazir, but I don’t listen, because they made me think of my papa, and all the horror that happened, and how Vahida’s family found me in the night and took me with them. Vahida’s mother, donned in a head-to-toe burqa, had padlocked her house and headed out into the night with her husband, five children and whatever provisions they could carry. On the way, they came across our village and found me, the only survivor of the Taliban massacre of our settlement. Vahida’s father had to carry me, because I had not eaten in many days. Luckily, we were not far from the Chaman crossing, and we traversed over to Pakistan and to Binazir’s refugee camp. “She should cry. She needs to cry!” Binazir says too loud, as if I couldn’t hear. “Tears cleanse the soul just as mountain streams renew the hills for spring.” I retreat further into the corner. She wouldn’t think this way if she knew what happened to us. To Firyuza and me.
*** Binazir, the lady with the kind smile who always talks about tears, visits the tent I share with Vahida’s family. She has noticed I’m hiding something under my skirts. Binazir offers me rice again. The rice smells good, especially after having known the stench of the cooked orach plant, barely edible spinach like weed boiled in foul-smelling water. Before the relief arrived, we had no flour, no rice, and no oil. Now we can eat fragrant, mouth-watering rice, but it churns my stomach, and I turn away. Binazir puts her fingers in the bowl, forms a little ball of rice, and presses it at my tightly closed lips, just like Mama would have done. I sense the touch of her cold, slim, and smooth fingers on my lip, they feel so unlike the contact with Mama’s hands, chapped and rough from hard work. The beloved hands that smelled of lentil stew, baby skin, and fresh laundry, washed with rocks in the mountain stream--Mama’s loving hands. “Eat and cry, that’s the remedy for you, little girl,“ Binazir says gently, and I want to shout that I turned 10 last No Ruz, our New Year. But when I open my mouth, she squeezes in a few grains of rice. If she only realized what I have in my bundle, she wouldn’t be so kind to me.
*** Binazir is persistent. She comes to feed me every day. She sits next to me Indian style in her trousers and a long over blouse. They suit her. I like her raven hair covered with a red dupatta she had changed the veil for. Binazir pushes rice morsels into my mouth and with each grain of rice I like her more. “You are like a daughter to me,” she says. Her kind hand travels to my silk braids. “I heard you singing last night. You have a voice of a nightingale.” Binazir is so learned, yet she doesn’t know I hum his favorite lullabies for Masoud, so he won’t cry in Heaven. Sometimes I also sing ballads for my sister Firyuza, wherever she might be. I want her to know I understand why she pierced her heart with a knife.
*** Binazir gives me some goat milk. As I sip the milk, I think of my Mama, and how ashamed she was to ask me to save milk for the baby Masoud. I hear Mama’s voice now. To ward off evil spirits, she burns esfand, and she says, “Aziza, please, keep the milk for your little brother to make him grow big and strong, so that he can protect us in our old age.” I was Mama’s darling daughter. Her Aziza. Esfand saved Mama from witnessing her beloved daughter’s shame. But Firyuza saw. And she killed herself. Because of me, and of what they had done to both of us. Binazir doesn’t know. She holds the warm milk to my lips. It smells of goat fur. I feel protected and safe, as if I were still little. Binazir smiles at me; happy I have drunk the milk. Warm inside, I touch my bundle to push it off my already hot tummy. If I could only display my shameful secret, perhaps I could finally sing her favorite ballad for Mama, so she wouldn’t miss me too much in Heaven, where no doubt she lives now with baby Masoud. I could also forgive Firyuza for abandoning me in such a sinful way. Can I show my bundle to Binazir? Do I trust her enough?***Binazir’s whole face shines with affection. She seems to have love for every one, even for snotty little boys with dusty hands and feet. Her large eyes are also the “fawn” kind of eyes. You can trust a person with an open face and fawn eyes, my Mama always said. You have to love her. Oh, Mama, I miss you so! “What are you hiding there?” Binazir asks suddenly, pointing at the place where I wrapped my arms around my secret bundle. Our eyes meet. Like in a dream, I pull out a crumpled, bloody gown from underneath my skirt. I spread my shame on the ground, in front of her. Crying comes easily now. Stinging, bitter-tasting tears flood my cheeks. “The men, they did this to me,” I sob. “And to Firyuza. First to her. Then they made her watch, when...” My words dissolve into an incomprehensible mumble. I can hear Firyuza scream. Her squeals and yelps echo in the mountains like those of some wild animal, captured by a poacher’s trap. I feel the unbearable, piercing pain. Blood flows between my legs. I hope we are both going to die. I wish we died! My tearful face wets Binazir’s blouse as she cradles and rocks me like a small child, which I am. I sense the grains of light return and make my fawn eyes sparkle again. I smell esfand burning.
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