Aziz was not nursing well. He was sleeping more and fussy when awake. The journey to Herat had not been an easy one and we were all exhausted.
In the afternoon, I leaned over my sleeping children and kissed their foreheads gently, whispering to them to coax their eyes open. Night, the time when the border was most vulnerable to trespass, was approaching. Holes opened up and scared, desperate people crawled through. While war had turned some Afghans into lions, it had turned a good number of us into mice as well.
Shabnam gave us bread for our journey. Asim led us to the meeting point. Saleem and Samira followed his footsteps. They held hands as dusk settled in, a half-moon luminous in the cloudless sky. We stood at the storefront of a mechanic’s shop and waited. It could be minutes or hours, Asim had said with a shrug, but the van would come.
Forty minutes later, with Aziz twisting and grunting uncomfortably, a van rounded the corner. I pushed the children behind me, pressing them against the shop’s fa?ade. The van came to a stop just a few feet from us.
“Get in,” whispered the driver. “Quickly.”
This was Mahmood’s plan for us, I reminded myself, as I ushered my children into the van. Trust him that this is the right thing to do.
Two other families were packed into the van, each with four or five children. I whispered a greeting and led my family into a corner of the hollowed-out vehicle.
There was no room for idle chatter. Too much weighed on our minds. Thick silence was cut by Aziz’s noisy breathing as it harmonized with the rusted engine.
Just outside Herat, the driver stopped the van and leaned over the back of his seat.
“From here, we cross the desert and then the border. You will all pay now or be left here.” His tone was dry.
The driver got out of the van and opened the back door. He pointed at the man sitting across from me who crept out to settle his family’s fare. His wife and children watched on anxiously, nervous to be even a few feet apart from their father.
Next went the father of the second family. I looked at my children, watched them stare unabashedly at the fathers.
I must be everything to them, I told myself.
I stepped down to meet the driver, leaving Aziz on Saleem’s lap. I handed over a small envelope and waited while the driver nimbly thumbed through the bills I’d already counted and recounted.
“You and your children are traveling alone.”
I nodded.
“That’s a problem. I don’t think we can take you.”
I tried to steady my voice.
“What’s the problem? The money is all there.”
“You know how it is. I’m taking a risk by bringing people across. But you, an unescorted woman . . . you understand? This is a much bigger risk for me and not one I can do for this price. It’s not fair to me.”
Though Asim had predicted this, I seethed to hear the driver’s reasoning. If we were stopped, no one would pay a bigger price than I. But I was prepared. I would play his game.
“Please. Have mercy on me and my children. We have nothing left. What are we to do for food?”
“Sister, what is anyone to do for food? I have children too. Do I look like a king? Who will have mercy on me?”
The border was so close I could taste it.
“This is all I have left,” I said and reluctantly slipped a gold ring with a turquoise stone off my finger. “This was a wedding gift from my late mother-in-law, God give her peace. Now I pray I’ll find a way to feed my children.”
“God is great, my sister,” he said as he stole a quick glance at the stone before stuffing it in his jacket pocket. “Your children will be provided for.”
THE ROAD ROUGHENED AS WE LEFT HERAT’S LIMITS. WHEN THE van came to a stop, we all held our breath. I put my hand on Saleem’s.