A thousand Splendid Suns

Even your own sons going to war. Howl pleaded with you. Bui you buried your nose in 
those cursed books and let our sons go like they were a pair of haramis. 
 
  Babi pedaled up the street, Laila on the back, her arms wrapped around his belly. As 
they passed the blue Benz, Laila caught a fleeting glimpse of the man in the backseat: 
thin, white-haired, dressed in a dark brown suit, with a white handkerchief triangle in 
the breast pocket. The only other thing she had time to notice was that the car had Herat 
license plates. 
 
  They rode the rest of the way in silence, except at the turns, where Babi braked cautio-
usly and said, "Hold on, Laila. Slowing down. Slowing down. There." 
 
* * * 
 

---

  In class that day, Laila found it hard to pay attention, between Tariq's absence and her 
parents' fight. So when the teacher called on her to name the capitals of Romania and 
Cuba, Laila was caught off guard. 
 
  The teacher's name was Shanzai, but, behind her back, the students called her Khala 
Rangmaal, Auntie Painter, referring to the motion she favored when she slapped stu-
dents-palm, then back of the hand, back and forth, like a painter working a brush. Khala 
Rangmaal was a sharp-faced young woman with heavy eyebrows. On the first day of 
school, she had proudly told the class that she was the daughter of a poor peasant from 
Khost. She stood straight, and wore her jet-black hair pulled tightly back and tied in a 
bun so that, when Khala Rangmaal turned around, Laila could see the dark bristles on 
her neck. Khala Rangmaal did not wear makeup or jewelry. She did not cover and for-
bade the female students from doing it. She said women and men were equal in every 
way and there was no reason women should cover if men didn't. 
  She said that the Soviet Union was the best nation in the world, along with Afghanis-
tan. It was kind to its workers, and its people were all equal. Everyone in the Soviet 
Union was happy and friendly, unlike America, where crime made people afraid to le-
ave their homes. And everyone in Afghanistan would be happy too, she said, once the 
antiprogressives, the backward bandits, were defeated. 
  "That's why our Soviet comrades came here in 1979. To lend their neighbor a hand. To 
help us defeat these brutes who want our country to be a backward, primitive nation. 
And you must lend your own hand, children. You must report anyone who might know 
about these rebels. It's your duty. You must listen, then report. Even if it's your parents, 
your uncles or aunts. Because none of them loves you as much as your country does. 
Your country comes first, remember! I will be proud of you, and so will your country." 
 
  On the wall behind Khala Rangmaal's desk was a map of the Soviet Union, a map of 
Afghanistan, and a framed photo of the latest communist president, Najibullah, who, 
Babi said, had once been the head of the dreaded KHAD, the Afghan secret police. The-
re were other photos too, mainly of young Soviet soldiers shaking hands with peasants, 
planting apple saplings, building homes, always smiling genially. 
 
  "Well," Khala Rangmaal said now, "have I disturbed your daydreaming,Inqilabi Girl?" 
 
  This was her nickname for Laila, Revolutionary Girl, because she'd been born the 
night of the April coup of 1978-except Khala Rangmaal became angry if anyone in her 
class used the wordcoup. What had happened, she insisted, was aninqilab, a revolution, 
an uprising of the working people against inequality.Jihad was another forbidden word. 
According to her, there wasn't even a war out there in the provinces, just skirmishes 
against troublemakers stirred by people she called foreign provocateurs. And certainly 
no one,no one, dared repeat in her presence the rising rumors that, after eight years of 
fighting, the Soviets were losing this war. Particularly now that the American president, 
Reagan, had started shipping the Mujahideen Stinger Missiles to down the Soviet heli-
copters, now that Muslims from all over the world were joining the cause: Egyptians, 
Pakistanis, even wealthy Saudis, who left their millions behind and came to Afghanistan 
to fight the jihad. 
  "Bucharest. Havana," Laila managed. 
 
  "And are those countries our friends or not?" 
 

---

  "They are,moolim sahib. They are friendly countries." 
 
  Khala Rangmaal gave a curt nod. 
 
* * * 
 
  When school let out. Mammy again didn't show up like she was supposed to. Laila en-
ded up walking home with two of her classmates, Giti and Hasina. 
  Giti was a tightly wound, bony little girl who wore her hair in twin ponytails held by 
elastic bands. She was always scowling, and walking with her books pressed to her 
chest, like a shield. Hasina was twelve, three years older than Laila and Giti, but had fa-
iled third grade once and fourth grade twice. What she lacked in smarts Hasina made up 
for in mischief and a mouth that, Giti said, ran like a sewing machine. It was Hasina 
who had come up with the Khala Rangmaal nickname-Today, Hasina was dispensing 
advice on how to fend off unattractive suitors. "Foolproof method, guaranteed to work. I 
give you my word." 
  "This is stupid. I'm too young to have a suitor!" Giti said. 
 
  "You're not too young." 
 
  "Well, no one's come to ask formy hand." 
 
  "That's because you have a beard, my dear." 
 
  Giti's hand shot up to her chin, and she looked with alarm to Laila, who smiled pit-
yingly-Giti was the most humorless person Laila had ever met-and shook her head with 
reassurance. 
 
  "Anyway, you want to know what to do or not, ladies?" 
 
  "Go ahead," Laila said. 
 
  "Beans. No less than four cans. On the evening the toothless lizard comes to ask for 
your hand. But the timing, ladies, the timing is everything- You have to suppress the fi-
reworks 'til it's time to serve him his tea." 
 
  "I'll remember that," Laila said. 
 
  "So will he." 
 
  Laila could have said then that she didn't need this advice because Babi had no intenti-
on of giving her away anytime soon. Though Babi worked at Silo, Kabul's gigantic bre-
ad factory, where he labored amid the heat and the humming machinery stoking the 
massive ovens and mill grains all day, he was a university-educated man. He'd been a 
high school teacher before the communists fired him-this was shortly after the coup of 
1978, about a year and a half before the Soviets had invaded. Babi had made it clear to 
Laila from ayoung age that the most important thing in his life, after her safety, was her 
schooling. 
  I know you're still young, bull waniyou to understand and learn this now,he said.Mar-