The Breadwinner (12 page)

Mrs. Weera was gentle with her at first, but she had her hands full with
Homa and her grandchild.

Late in the afternoon of the second day, Shauzia showed up at
Parvana's door.

“I'm very glad to see you,” Mrs. Weera said, nodding
toward Parvana. They went out onto the landing to speak for a moment, out of
Parvana's earshot. Then they came back in and, after fetching a couple of buckets
of water, Shauzia sat down on the toshak beside Parvana.

She talked about ordinary things for awhile, how her sales had been,
people she'd seen in the market, conversations she'd had with some
of the tea boys and other working boys. Finally she said, “I
don't like working alone. The marketplace isn't the same when you're
not there. Won't you come back?”

Put to her like that, Parvana knew she could not refuse. She'd known
all along that she would have to get up. She wasn't really about to stay on that
toshak until she died. Part of her wanted to slip away from everything, but another part
wanted to get up and stay alive and continue to be Shauzia's friend. With a little
prodding from Shauzia, that was the part that won.

Parvana got out of bed and carried on as before. She did her work in the
market, fetched water, listened to Mrs. Weera's stories and got to know Homa. She
did all these things because she didn't know what else to do. But she moved
through her days as though she were moving through an awful nightmare—a nightmare
from which there was no release in the morning.

Then, late one afternoon, Parvana came home from work to find two men
gently helping her father up the steps to the apartment. He was alive. At least part of
the nightmare was over.

The man who came back from prison was barely recognizable, but Parvana
knew who he was. Although his white shalwar kameez was now gray and tattered, although
his face was drawn and pale, he was still her father. Parvana clung to him so tightly
she had to be pulled away by Mrs. Weera so that her father could lie down.

“We found him on the ground outside the prison,” one of the
men who had brought him home said to Mrs. Weera. “The Taliban released him, but he
was unable to go anywhere on his own. He told us where he lived, so my friend and I put
him on our karachi and brought him here.”

Parvana was down on the toshak with her father, clinging to him and
weeping. She knew that the men stayed to tea, but it wasn't until they were
getting up to leave, to make it back to their homes before curfew, that she remembered
her manners.

She got to her feet. “Thank you for bringing my
father back,” she said.

The men left. Parvana started to lie back down beside her father, but Mrs.
Weera stopped her. “Let him rest. There will be time to talk tomorrow.”

Parvana obeyed, but it took days of Mrs. Weera's careful nursing
before Father even started to get well. Most of the time he was too ill and weary to
talk. He coughed a lot.

“That prison must have been cold and damp,” Mrs. Weera said.
Parvana helped her make a broth and fed it to her father hot, off a spoon, until he was
able to sit up and eat.

“Now you are both my daughter and my son,” Father said when he
was well enough to notice her new appearance. He rubbed his hand over her cropped hair
and smiled.

Parvana made many trips to the water tap. Father had been beaten badly,
and the poultice bandages Mrs. Weera put over his wounds had to be changed and washed
frequently. Homa helped, too, mostly by keeping Mrs. Weera's granddaughter quiet
so Father could rest.

Parvana didn't mind that he was unable to talk right away. She was
overjoyed just to have
him home. She spent her days earning money,
and her evenings helping Mrs. Weera. When her father felt better, she would read to him
from his books.

Homa knew some English from studying it in school, and one day Parvana
came home from work to hear Homa and Father talking English to each other. Homa
hesitated a lot, but Father's words flowed smoothly into each other.

“Did you bring us home another educated woman today?” Father
asked Parvana, smiling.

“No, Father,” Parvana replied. “I just brought home
onions.” For some reason, everyone thought that was funny, and there was laughter
in Parvana's home for the first time since her father's arrest.

One thing in her life had been repaired. Her father was home now. Maybe
the rest of the family would come back, too.

Parvana was filled with hope. In the market she chased after customers
just like the real boys did. Mrs. Weera suggested some medicine for Father, and Parvana
worked and worked until she had earned the money to buy it. It seemed to help.

“I feel like I'm working for something now,”
she told Shauzia one day as they walked around looking for
customers. “I'm working to get my family back.”

“I'm working for something, too,” Shauzia said.
“I'm working to get away from Afghanistan.”

“Won't you miss your family?” Parvana asked.

“My grandfather has started to look for a husband for me,”
Shauzia replied. “I overheard him talking to my grandmother. He said I should get
married soon, that since I'm so young, I'll fetch a good bride-price, and
they will have lots of money to live on.”

“Won't your mother stop him?”

“What could she do? She has to live with them. She has nowhere else
to go.” Shauzia stopped walking and looked at Parvana. “I
can't
be married! I
won't
be married!”

“How will your mother manage without you there? How will she
eat?”

“What can I do?” Shauzia asked, the question coming out as a
wail. “If I stay here and get married, my life will be over. If I leave, maybe
I'll have a chance. There must be some place in this world where I can live. Am I
wrong to think like this?” She wiped the tears from her
face. “What else can I do?”

Parvana didn't know how to comfort her friend.

One day Mrs. Weera had a visitor, a member of the women's group who
had just come out of Mazar. Parvana was at work, but Father told her about the visit
that evening.

“A lot of people have fled Mazar,” he said. “They are
staying in refugee camps outside the city”

“Is that where Mother is?”

“It's possible. We won't know unless we go to the camps
and look.”

“How can we do that? Are you well enough to travel?”

“I will never be well enough,” Father said, “but we
should go anyway.”

“When do we leave?” Parvana asked.

“As soon as I can arrange transport. Can you carry a message for me
to the men who brought me home from prison? I think, with their help, we can be on our
way in a couple of weeks.”

Parvana had been wanting to ask her father something for awhile.
“Why did the Taliban let you go?”

“I don't know why they arrested me. How
would I know why they let me go?”

Parvana would have to be satisfied with that for an answer.

Her life was about to change again. She was surprised at how calm she
felt. She decided it was because her father was back.

“We'll find them,” Parvana said with complete
confidence. “We'll find them and bring them home.”

Mrs. Weera was going to Pakistan. “Homa will come with me.
We'll put her to work there.” They were going to link up with the members of
the women's group who were organizing Afghan women in exile.

“Where will you stay?”

“I have a cousin in one of the camps,” Mrs. Weera replied.
“She has been wanting me to come and live with her.”

“Is there a school there?”

“If there isn't, we'll start one. Life is very difficult
for Afghans in Pakistan. There is a lot of work to do.”

Parvana had an idea. “Take Shauzia with you!”

“Shauzia?”

“She wants to leave. She hates it here.
Couldn't she go with you? She could be your escort!”

“Shauzia has family here. Do you mean to say she would just leave
her family? Desert the team just because the game is rough?”

Parvana said no more. In a way, Mrs. Weera was right. That was what
Shauzia was doing. But Shauzia was also right. Didn't she have a right to seek out
a better life? Parvana couldn't decide who was more right.

A few days before they were to leave for Mazar, Parvana was sitting on her
blanket in the marketplace when something hit her on the head. It was a tiny camel made
out of beads. The Window Woman was still alive! She was all right, or at least well
enough to let Parvana know she was still there. Parvana wanted to jump up and down and
dance. She wanted to yell and wave at the painted window. Instead she sat quietly and
tried to think of a way to say goodbye.

She was almost home that afternoon when she thought of a way.

Heading back to the market after lunch, she carefully dug up some
wildflowers that were
growing among the bombed-out ruins. She had
seen them growing there in other years, and hoped she was right in thinking they were
the kind that grew year after year. If she planted the flowers in the spot where she
usually put her blanket, the Window Woman would know she wasn't coming back. The
flowers would be something pretty to look at. She hoped they would make a good
present.

In her spot in the market, Parvana dug up the hard soil first by pounding
into it with her ankle. She used her hands, too, as well as a rock she found nearby.

The men and boys in the market gathered around to watch her. Anything
different was entertainment.

“Those flowers won't grow in that soil,” someone said.
“There are no nutrients in it.”

“Even if they grow, they will be trampled.”

“The marketplace is no spot for flowers. Why are you planting them
there?”

Through the voices of derision came another voice. “Do none of you
appreciate nature? This boy has undertaken to bring a bit of beauty into our gray
marketplace, and do you thank him? Do you help him?” An old man pushed
his way to the front of the little gathering. With difficulty, he
knelt down to help Parvana plant the flowers. “Afghans love beautiful
things,” he said, “but we have seen so much ugliness, we sometimes forget
how wonderful a thing like a flower is.”

He asked one of the tea boys hovering nearby for some water from the tea
shop. It was fetched, and he poured it around the flowers, soaking the earth around
them.

The plants had wilted. They didn't stand up properly.

“Are they dead?” Parvana asked.

“No, no, not dead. They may look scraggly and dying now,” he
said, “but the roots are good. When the time is right, these roots will support
plants that are healthy and strong.” He gave the earth a final pat, and Parvana
and one of the others helped him up. He smiled once more at Parvana, then walked
away.

Parvana waited by her flowers until the crowd had gone. When she was sure
no one was watching, she looked up at the window and waved a quick goodbye. She
wasn't sure, but she thought she saw someone wave back.

Two days later they were ready to leave.
They were
going to travel by truck, just as the rest of the family had done.

“Am I traveling as your son or your daughter?” Parvana asked
Father.

“You decide,” he said. “Either way, you will be my
little Malali.”

“Look at what's here!” Mrs. Weera said. After making
sure the coast was clear, she took several copies of Mother's magazine out from
under her burqa. “Isn't it beautiful?”

Parvana flipped through the magazine quickly before hiding it again.
“It's wonderful,” she said.

“Tell your mother that copies are being sent out to women all over
the world. She has helped to let the world know what is happening in Afghanistan. Be
sure you tell her that. What she did was very important. And tell her we need her back,
to work on the next issue.”

“I'll tell her.” She gave Mrs. Weera a hug. Both Mrs.
Weera and Homa were wearing burqas, but she could tell by hugging them who was who.

It was time to leave. Suddenly, just as the truck was ready to pull out
onto the road, Shauzia appeared.

“You made it!” Parvana said, hugging her
friend.

“Goodbye, Parvana,” Shauzia said. She handed Parvana a bag of
dried apricots. “I'm leaving soon, too. I met some nomads who will take me
to Pakistan as a shepherd. I'm not waiting until next spring. It would be too
lonely here without you.”

Parvana didn't want to say goodbye. “When will we see each
other again?” she asked in a panic. “How will we keep in touch?”

“I've got it all figured out,” Shauzia said.
“We'll meet again on the first day of spring, twenty years from
now.”

“All right. Where?”

“The top of the Eiffel Tower in Paris. I told you I was going to
France.”

Parvana laughed. “I'll be there,” she said. “We
won't say goodbye, then. We'll just say so long for now.”

“Until next time,” Shauzia said.

Parvana hugged her friend one last time, then climbed into the truck. They
waved to each other as the truck rolled away.

Twenty years from now, Parvana thought. What would happen in those twenty
years?
Would she still be in Afghanistan? Would Afghanistan finally
have peace? Would she go back to school, have a job, be married?

The future stretched unknown down the road in front of her. Her mother was
somewhere ahead with her sisters and her brother, but what else they would find, Parvana
had no idea. Whatever it was, she felt ready for it. She even found herself looking
forward to it.

Parvana settled back in the truck beside her father. She popped a dried
apricot into her mouth and rolled its sweetness around on her tongue. Through the dusty
front windshield she could see Mount Parvana, the snow on its peak sparkling in the
sun.