Refugees (3 page)

“Will they come to our house?” Johar asked his brother on one of summer's last sunny days. He pictured their black-lined eyes and cane sticks rapping sharply at their door. So far the Taliban kept to Baghlan, but Johar and Daq lived just an hour from town on their family's farm. Johar took shallow breaths as they climbed further up the ochre rock passes to find more sparse clumps of grass for the herd of sheep they were leading.

“So what if they come?” Daq prodded the sheep back as they wandered from the path. “I am not afraid. Besides, they've kept order in Baghlan. Who knows, maybe I will even go fight for them.” Johar did not know what to make of this new side of his brother. Daq had always been moody, but after their father's death he had grown distant and willful. And since Daq had run into his old friend Naji at the chaikhana, he had become even worse. Now he flew into anger over nothing. His behavior frightened Johar.

“Well, I hate their ways,” Johar replied, spitting on the dust. “They beat Aunt Maryam at the fountain for laughing.” Johar worried constantly about Maryam and Bija's
welfare, especially now that Maryam's home school, where she continued to teach a dozen girls, was illegal under Taliban rule. The brothers visited their aunt and cousin at week's end to help with chores, but it wasn't enough. She needed more help with Bija, and they all needed more time to rest. Johar marveled at Aunt Maryam's perseverance with Bija. She was three and as hard to contain as a shooting star.

Johar went on, “If they come, I'll tell them how people ridicule them. Clerics, nonsense! Most learned nothing at madrasah but Quran. Not even how to spell. Talibs are illiterate as toads. I would tell them they would do well to learn how to read and to study the basics of human decency.”

“You? Face up to them?” Daq burst out laughing. “You're as flimsy as unspun wool. I would have to shield you from a beating with their canes.”

Johar couldn't believe his brother was seriously thinking about signing on with the army. Maybe it was just talk. “What about your radio?” he asked. “Do you like them enough to hand it over?”

“No, my radio stays with me,” Daq said firmly. The streets of Baghlan were silent after the Taliban had shut the music stalls and smashed all the popular records and tapes. As they seized the villages, they took over the radio stations and played only their insufferable sermons. Strange, Johar thought, that the Taliban forbid one to own a radio, yet they still preached their propaganda over the airwaves. Thankfully there were still free stations in the north. And Daq still played his radio every night, so softly that only the two brothers could hear, long after the night sky was strewn with stars.

“I made a better hiding place.” Daq grinned.

“Where?” asked Johar.

“Shh! Later.” Daq peered through the passes to make sure no one stood near. Johar nodded and stroked Marqa, the old ewe with the crooked jaw, as she passed. He would never forget Marqa's first day of life, years ago—the way her pink nose had quivered and her limbs had swayed as she nursed. That first day of Marqa's life in their sunny courtyard, with Aunt Maryam and his mother, had been his mother's last.

Johar recalled everything about that afternoon—how he had drunk the warm sheep's milk his mother saved for him. How he had danced around the new lamb and buried his face in her curls as the distant sound of gunfire shattered the clouds, how his aunt and mother laughed by the back door. He had watched his mother sew an ankle-length coat, called a chupa, and his aunt knit socks, thick and warm to wear under yak boots in winter. After an hour or so, everyone had been thirsty and hungry.

“I will prepare chai and gabli pilau,” Johar's mother announced.

She returned with chai but no food. “I have lamb and rice for the pilau, but the oil has run out. I'll go collect more.”

“Let me come with you,” Johar offered.

“Not this time, son. Stay and keep your aunt company.” His mother closed the gate behind her, singing with a voice as high and pure as a wooden flute. They waited for her until the sun slipped behind the stone wall, then his aunt said, “Stay here, child. Wait for Daq and your father to come with the sheep. I must go and fetch your mother. Which direction is her neighbor?”

Johar explained the way, then asked, “Has something happened?”

“No, Johar, she must have stayed to talk. Try not to worry.” Then Aunt Maryam hurried out of the gate. The last thing Johar could bear to recall was a vision of himself, crouched by the old pistachio tree, trembling. It had been simple and cruel. On her way to the neighbor's to borrow oil, Johar's mother had stepped on a buried land mine.

“Bless Mother and her music,” he murmured now as he walked with his brother.

Up, up, and up he and Daq climbed. Here Johar liked to imagine he could touch the roof of the world. The valley below was dotted with sheep and the few mud-brick houses of the neighbors. The blinding dust of the plain was replaced by rose-colored cliffs. There were no streams here, and it wasn't the Matari Pass, yet this place made him think of the poet Khushhal every time:

Johar sat and took frugal sips from his water jug. Daq joined him as the sheep grazed on the dry grasses. Soon there would not be enough grass and water. Autumn was coming on, and the drought was worsening. Still, when the winds blew the clouds in a lazy eastward dance, Johar imagined he could hear his father's laughter and see his proud face looking down. His mother gazed down on them too but did not speak. Her melodies, as pure and high as flute song, floated to him in dreams.

Daq rose, and Johar followed. They led their sheep into a round valley, protected from gusts by the rugged branches of pistachio and mulberry trees. “This is where we
will shear the herd,” said Daq, pulling out rusty shears from his felt bag. “Hold the front feet.” Johar helped him flip a ewe to its side, then steadied her while Daq swept up and down with his shears as he held tight to her hind feet. The ewe became docile, as if she liked the strong hold, and by the time one side was done, a pile of curly wool lay in Daq's shawl. Johar helped him flip her over, and Daq repeated the process, his muscled arms flexing under his thick kameez. After each shearing, Johar placed the wool in Daq's shawl and folded it over, securing it with rocks from the wind. Marqa was the only difficult one. She was old, and they had to be careful not to turn her too roughly.

When they were done, Johar asked, “Why are we shearing so early this year?”

“Everything is unsure, little brother,” Daq replied as he removed the rocks, rolled his shawl tightly, and strapped the bundle to his pack. “I feel an early winter coming. It's best that Maryam should have the wool early.”

An early winter? Everything unsure? If only his father were still alive, thought Johar, he might not feel so chilled by Daq's words.

When the village warlords had swept into Baghlan eight years back in the civil unrest before the Taliban, and just after the Soviets had been defeated, Johar was still a child. There were dreadful battles for power during that time to grab land and leadership that the Soviets had finally given up. Johar's family heard many tales of murders and looting. One day stood out as sharp in Johar's mind as the crack of a Kalashnikov gun.

A Pashtun warlord and his Hizbi Islami crew had rounded up the elders of the village, his father among them, and ordered the women to stay in the courtyard. With the
wide end of their guns, the gang pushed the men forward— Johar's father and Uncle Khosal, Maryam's husband; Malik, the tailor; Rashid, the storyteller; and three others. “March! You heard us, you pigs. If you think now that the Soviets are gone that your Jamiati Islami party will rule this town, think twice. You belong with the worms.”

Later, Daq, who knew some Pashto, had translated their words. Johar's family spoke Dari, but Johar knew from the harshness of their tone that something bad was happening. He ran to his father's side and clung to his shawl until one of the men pried him away.

Then, speaking in broken Dari, that warlord had turned to Daq, only ten. “You, boy. Hold your brother back unless you want him hurt.” Daq's skin was damp with sweat and the color drained from his cheeks. Johar prayed his brother would not be mad enough to fight these men. If Daq obeyed quietly, maybe they would let his father go.

Daq pulled Johar back, and as their father passed he brushed their foreheads with his leathery hand. “My sons,” he murmured, tears clouding his eyes, “may Allah protect you.” In his father's tormented face there was no clue as to what Johar and Daq should do. The mujahidin thugs beat him on.

Daq, clutching Johar's hand, pursued them up the steep mountain path. The brothers stood there helplessly as the soldiers lined up the village men along a dusty ridge.

“No!” Johar cried out. He broke away from Daq and ran for his father, but they were too far away. The soldiers went mechanically down the row
—ping, crack, crack—
until every last man had fallen forward, eyeballs staring, teeth biting the red dirt where sheep had grazed that unholy morning.

Shouts snapped Johar back to the present.

Daq waved from up ahead on the path. “Little brother! Are you dreaming of flowers and birds again?” When Johar drew near, Daq's face lit up in a forgiving smile. “Come,” he said. “The sheep will want one last grazing.”

W
aiting by her bedroom window for Victor to leave, Dawn glanced impatiently at the fog as it rolled in from the Pacific. Inhaling the sea air, she tried to find a hint of sun peeking from the haze. Dawn wouldn't get trapped in melodrama. Jude's head might be swirling with emotion, but hers was screwed on tightly, with a no-tamper top, thanks to the hardball life at Epiphany. When she finally heard the dull thud of the door and saw Victor shuffle down Santa Marisa, she felt the slightest twinge of guilt. Then a rush of excitement pulsed through her. Jude had talked Pax's musician friends into giving them a ride east! She'd have to hurry to meet them in the Mission in half an hour. Dawn checked her pack a third and final time. In it was her flute and sheet music, the award for musicianship that she'd won last year
at Urban, her disc player, some CDs, a book she'd taken from the group home with her roomies' farewell inscriptions, clothes, an extra pair of shoes, and a rain parka. She counted her chore and allowance money: four hundred in bills that she was saving to buy a Gemeinhardt, the best flute made. Where could she store it? Cash should be stashed in multiple places so that if she was robbed she wouldn't lose it all. Dawn pushed one wad inside her sock, another bunch in her bra, and the rest into her hip pocket.

She wandered into Louise's office, on the first floor, looking for paper to write a note. No crumpled papers or dirty teacups for Louise; her desk was immaculate. Dawn's eyes wandered to a bank of photos on the wall. Here was Louise in her glory, saving the world: Louise hugging a flood victim, Louise giving a typhoid shot to a Peruvian patient, Louise helping dig out a family's injured collie in the San Francisco quake. Then there was a happy one of Victor and Louise from an earlier time. They were sitting on the beach with his arm encircling her.
I won't make you unhappy anymore,
thought Dawn. Her eyes moved to another photo, set off from the others. It was a photo taken on Dawn's second day at the house on Santa Marisa Place. In it Louise was smiling stiffly, her arm swung around a staring Dawn.
Why the hell do I look so blank?
She spotted a stack of
Family Circle
magazines on a side table by Louise's desk and tried to stifle an unpleasant stirring.
Why does it have to end up like this?
Dawn was tempted to climb into one of the easy chairs and sleep, but she refused to wimp out now.

There had been a moment yesterday when her resolve faltered. New York City might be too big, too far. But how many options did she really have? Victor hadn't wanted her in the first place. Louise had wanted her, but why? As some vile experiment in raising a cracked-up kid? Dawn
needed a mother who didn't stare at her like she was some third-world refugee. Besides, her real mom was out there, maybe even in New York. And if it came to it, Dawn would rather live on the street than go back to a group home for another depressing three years.

When her birth mother left, Dawn supposed, it must have been for a good reason. You didn't just leave your little girl with strangers for kicks. Someday Dawn would find her, and then she'd know why. Blood was thicker than water; that's what everyone said. It was the mystical bond that would draw them together, and when they looked at each other for the first time it would be like cauterizing a torn vein. Blond hair cascading down, red lips, the scent of powder, and heels that clicked were all Dawn could remember of her mother. It was as if the memory section of Dawn's brain had short-circuited. She'd been five when she went to Epiphany House. That was old enough to recall something! If her mother's face was clear in her mind, why couldn't she remember her mother talking, some events? Dawn would give anything for just one lousy memory of a birthday party.

She continued to drift through Louise's office. Her gaze fixed on the satellite phone. If she took it and she got desperate, it could be sold for lots of money. Pushing away a wave of guilt, Dawn stuffed the phone in her pack, which was now so full it wouldn't snap until she sat on it. Dawn searched the hall closet for a sleeping bag and strapped that to the pack. With the bag it was a struggle to lift the bundle onto her back.

Now for the note. Back in Louise's office, Dawn stood for a moment by the corner-section of shelf where Victor had his books. She would need to keep him from wondering where she was until she could call with an excuse. No doubt he'd be relieved to have her gone. Dawn tore off a page from Louise's memo pad and wrote: