still with him. He still had them.
The ceiling fan lashed the air around the bedroom. In the faint light of the night lamp Homa sprawled on her back, head turned to one side, each limb flung out in its own direction. Ahmad crawled in and coiled himself as close to Homa as he could, and listened to her breathing until he fell asleep.
* * *
—
THE NEXT MORNING, HOMA WOKE up with a strange feeling that it was late. The clock showed twenty past eight, over an hour after she usually woke. Maybe she had forgotten to unlock the alarm. Then she realized that Ahmad was not at work, but lying beside her. His alarm had not gone off either; both had overslept on the same day. “Up, up, honey, it’s late!” She shook Ahmad on the shoulder and sprang out of the bed to check on the girls. Ready in their school uniforms, Leyla sat in an armchair in the living room, hugging her bag, while Lalah hopscotched on an imaginary court on the rug. Leyla had prepared breakfast for both of them, dressed her sister, and sat down to wait. Homa was hurriedly getting ready when Ahmad stepped out of the room and motioned for them to stop, announcing that Wednesday was off. “What do you mean?” Homa asked, baffled, already standing at the door in her navy-blue dress and black pumps, with puffy eyes and barely combed hair. “The kids have school.” But Ahmad was serious in his jovial good mood. They would later call the principal and explain, but they were going to spend the day together. Once the bewilderment of Ahmad’s strange proposal turned into the acceptance of an unexpected holiday, it was not easy to make an excited Lalah wait. She quickly changed out of her school uniform into her favorite green dress and kept calling, “Is it time yet,” while standing ready at the door.
Two hours later, the taxi pulled over by the side of the road and the family stepped out. To their left were high rocky hills and to their right trees spotting a green strip of land that stretched along a riverbank. Ahmad paid the driver and asked him to return late in the afternoon. They laid the blanket in the shade of the tree. Ahmad tied a strong rope to a bough. Homa folded a sheet into a seat and sat on the swing first. The girls took turns pushing her. They played tag. Lalah found a turtle and loaded its shell with three rocks. In the changing room Homa devised—holding up the sheet against her body—the girls changed into their swimming suits and ran for the stream. Leyla splashed Lalah and Ahmad. Lalah cut her toe and cried. They dried up as they ate lunch. Homa climbed a walnut tree, sat on a branch, and as she swung her legs, dared anyone to climb as high. The girls tried and failed to get a foothold on the tree. “Come on, girls!” she called down at them and then teased them more: “I thought you’d beat me. Oh, it’s so beautiful up here.” Ahmad sprang up and sat by Homa’s side. The branch bent dangerously under the weight of the two adults who had arms around each other’s shoulders. The girls looked up at the soles of their parents’ dirty feet. In the afternoon, they waited by the roadside for the taxi. Cars zoomed past in both directions. Ahmad’s glance shifted from his watch to the end of the road. Tired and bad-tempered, Lalah rested her head on her sister’s chest. Leyla threw an arm around her. “We can try the passing cars,” Homa said to Ahmad, touching him on the arm. She was tired, but happy. “Someone’s bound to take us.”
But then their taxi appeared far away in the bend of the road.
* * *
—
THE RIPS IN AHMAD’S RELATIONSHIP with the Great Zia’s circle were mended. Before every parliamentary session, the messenger boy rode his moped to Ahmad’s, rang the bell, and handed Ahmad the papers from the Great Zia. They tell me what to say, Ahmad wrote to Homa after dinner one night. They tell me what to think. That’s what they wanted from the beginning, a puppet who would raise his hand when they pull the string. He threw the papers to the floor.
“This is their condition for their continued support,” Mr. Zia said on the other end of the line each time they spoke. “I say