What use was it? You packed your bags and sat on a boat and prayed and for what? Nothing has changed because nothing will. You tried to cut free of these vines, but they will only grow tighter around you.
Saleem said nothing to her but stood for a moment with his back to the sun, his shadow stocky and bold between the rows of tomato plants. She was wrong. Everything had changed since he’d last been on this farm. He was a true refugee now but one who had seen the ocean. He’d heard the sound of waves and smelled the salted ocean air. Every step of the journey had altered him, changed his very coding irreversibly. He had crossed the waters once and would cross them again—accompanied not by his family but by the tiny mutations in his being that gave him the strength to do it on his own.
CHAPTER 35
Fereiba
I WISH FOR NO MOTHER TO FACE THE CHOICE I HAD TO MAKE. Nothing could be harder.
I’m weighed by a guilt so heavy that it takes every ounce of strength I have to put one foot in front of the other and continue.
How Saleem found his way back to Intikal, I will not know until I see my son again. I never should have let him leave that hotel room. I should have been his mother and raised my voice and stood my ground. My skin prickled that day when he talked of going to the market. Can a mother commit a greater sin than ignoring her intuitions? I pushed it aside because I wanted to give him the space he wanted, the space his father believed he needed to become a man.
Mahmood was not always right. I can see that from here, clear as the brilliant blue sky. He made decisions with his mind. He stood for what he believed to be right and logical and good—all romantic notions that failed us. Kabul was no place for ideals. I knew that. I told him as much. Ideals and guardian angels are for children and times of peace. They have no place in this world. We should have left Kabul long ago, followed my siblings to safer places while we were still whole. I let him overturn my intuition, snubbing our noses at God’s warnings.
To hate him, though, would be another shade of blasphemy.
He is not here, and I cannot alter the path we decided on together. I cannot change the conversations we had. I stood by him because I loved him and trusted him and wanted to honor the choice we made. His goodness, the nectar he offered the world, attracted one, then two, then a swarm of bees. They circled him, humming, until that moment when they released their venom. Even after he was gone, I could still hear the sound of them, circling my family. But this was my own doing. I let Saleem, my firstborn, walk out the door and into an unforgiving world and now I cry that he has not returned. I am the mother I swore I would never be.
I have reasons for my choice. Aziz looks terrible. He has not gained weight and I see the strain in his sallow face, the tiny blue vein running across his temple, the bones of his back looking like beads on a string. I need to get him to help if he’s to live to see his brother again. He is so light in my arms. He is my last child, the one I will carry for as long as I can, because he makes me a mother for that much longer. When he is awake, I watch his movements. I see Saleem in him too. He is very much like his older brother, headstrong and resilient. Each struggles in his own way but Saleem can stand on his feet. His voice, coming from the safety of Hakan and Hayal’s home, told me he could find his own way.
I made a choice. We took the train from Athens. Could I have done things differently? I could have. But my intuition told me that Aziz could not. Forgive me, Saleem, but we could not wait for you. For your brother, the brother I know you resent and adore, I had to move on.