A thousand Splendid Suns

* * * 
 
  On the way to Ghazi Stadium, Mariam bounced in the bed of the truck as it skidded 
around potholes andits wheels spat pebbles. The bouncing hurt her tailbone. A young, 
armed Talib sat across from her looking at her. 
 
  Mariam wondered if he would be the one, this amiable-looking young man with the 
deep-set bright eyes and slightly pointed face, with the black-nailed index finger drum-
ming the side of the truck. 
 
  "Are you hungry, mother?" he said. 
 
  Mariam shook her head. 
 
  "I have a biscuit. It's good. You can have it if you're hungry. I don't mind." 

---

 
  "No.Tashakor, brother." 
 
  He nodded, looked at her benignly. "Are you afraid, mother?" 
 
  A lump closed off her throat. In a quivering voice, Mariam told him the truth. 
 
  "Yes. I'm very afraid." 
 
  "I have a picture of my father," he said. "I don't remember him. He was a bicycle repa-
irman once, I know that much. But I don't remember how he moved, you know, how he 
laughed or the sound of his voice." He looked away, then back at Mariam. "My mother 
used to say that he was the bravest man she knew. Like a lion, she'd say. 
 
  But she told me he was crying like a child the morning the communists took him. I'm 
telling you so you know that it's normal to be scared. It's nothing to be ashamed of, mot-
her." 
 
  For the first time that day, Mariam cried a little. 
 
* * * 
 
  Thousands of eyes bore down on her. In the crowded bleachers, necks were craned for 
the benefit of a better view. Tongues clucked. A murmuring sound rippled through the 
stadium when Mariam was helped down from the truck. Mariam imagined heads sha-
king when the loudspeaker announced her crime. But she did not look up to see whether 
they were shaking with disapproval or charity, with reproach or pity. Mariam blinded 
herself to them all. 
 
  Earlier that morning, she had been afraid that she would make a fool of herself, that 
she would turn into a pleading, weeping spectacle. She had feared that she might scream 
or vomit or even wet herself, that, in her last moments, she would be betrayed by animal 
instinct or bodily disgrace. But when she was made to descend from the truck, Mariam's 
legs did not buckle. Her arms did not flail. She did not have to be dragged. And when 
she did feel herself faltering, she thought of Zalmai, from whom she had taken the love 
of his life, whose days now would be shaped by the sorrow of his father's disappearan-
ce. And then Mariam's stride steadied and she could walk without protest. 
 
  An armed man approached her and told her to walk toward the southern goalpost. Ma-
riam could sense the crowd tightening up with anticipation. She did not look up. She 
kept her eyes to the ground, on her shadow, on her executioner's shadow trailing hers. 
 
  Though there had been moments of beauty in it, Mariam knew that life for the most 
part had been unkind to her. But as she walked the final twenty paces, she could not 
help but wish for more of it. She wished she could see Laila again, wished to hear the 
clangor of her laugh, to sit with her once more for a pot ofchai and leftoverhalwa under 
a starlit sky. She mourned that she would never see Aziza grow up, would not see the 
beautiful young woman that she would one day become, would not get to paint her 
hands with henna and tossnoqul candy at her wedding. She would never play with Azi-

---

za's children. She would have liked that very much, to be old and play with Aziza's 
children. 
  Near the goalpost, the man behind her asked her to stop. Mariam did. Through the cris-
scrossing grid of the burqa, she saw his shadow arms lift his shadow Kalashnikov. 
 
  Mariam wished for so much in those final moments. Yet as she closed her eyes, it was 
not regret any longer but a sensation of abundant peace that washed over her. She tho-
ught of her entry into this world, theharami child of a lowly villager, an unintended 
thing, a pitiable, regrettable accident. A weed. And yet she was leaving the world as a 
woman who had loved and been loved back. She was leaving it as a friend, a compani-
on, a guardian. A mother. A person of consequence at last. No. It was not so bad, Mari-
am thought, that she should die this way. Not so bad. This was a legitimate end to a life 
of illegitimate beginnings. 
 
  Mariam's final thoughts were a few words from the Koran, which she muttered under 
her breath. 
 
  He has created the heavens and the earth with the truth; He makes the night cover the 
day and makes the day overtake the night, and He has made the sun and the moon sub-
servient; each one runs on to an assigned term; now surely He is the Mighty, the Great 
Forgiver. 
 
  "Kneel," the Talib said 
 
  O my Lord! Forgive and have mercy, for you are the best of the merciful ones. 
 
  "Kneel here,hamshira And look down." 
  One last time, Mariam did as she was told.