A thousand Splendid Suns

en days earlier, they could have left together. She would have been with Tariq right 
now! But that didn'tmatter now. They were goingto Peshawar-she,Mammy, and Babi-
and they would find Tariq and his parents there. Surely they would. They would process 
their paperwork together. Then, who knew? Who knew? Europe? 
 
  America? Maybe, as Babi was always saying, somewhere near the sea… 
  Mammy was half lying, half sitting against the headboard. Her eyes were puffy. She 
was picking at her hair. 
  Three days before, Laila had gone outside for a breath of air. She'd stood by the front 
gates, leaning against them, when she'd heard a loud crack and something had zipped by 
her right ear, sending tiny splinters of wood flying before her eyes. After Giti's death, 
and the thousands of rounds fired and myriad rockets that had fallen on Kabul, it was 
the sight of that single round hole in the gate, less than three fingers away from where 
Laila's head had been, that shook Mammy awake. Made her see that one war had cost 
her two children already; this latest could cost her her remaining one. 
  From the walls of the room, Ahmad and Noor smiled down. Laila watched Mammy's 
eyes bouncing now, guiltily, from one photo to the other. As if looking for their consent. 
Their blessing. As if asking for forgiveness. 
  "There's nothing left for us here," Babi said. "Our sons are gone, but we still have La-
ila. We still have each other, Fariba. We can make a new life." 
  Babi reached across the bed. When he leaned to take her hands, Mammy let him. On 
her face, a look of concession. Of resignation. They held each other's hands, lightly, and 
then they were swaying quietly in an embrace. Mammy buried her face in his neck. She 
grabbed a handful of his shirt. 
  For hours that night, the excitement robbed Laila of sleep. She lay in bed and watched 
the horizon light up in garish shades of orange and yellow. At some point, though, des-
pite the exhilaration inside and the crack of 
  artillery fire outside, she fell asleep. 
  And dreamed 
  They are on a ribbon of beach, sitting on aquilt. It's a chilly, overcast day,but it's 
warm next to Tariq under the blanket draped over their shoulders. She can see cars par-
ked behind a low fence of chipped white paint beneath a row of windswept palm trees. 
The wind makes her eyes water and buries their shoes in sand, hurls knots of dead grass 

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from the curved ridgesof one dune to another. They're watching sailboats bob in the dis-
tance. Around them, seagulls squawk and shiver in the wind. The wind whips up anot-
her spray of sand off the shallow, windwardslopes. There is a noise then likea chant,