When the Apricots Bloom

by Gina Wilkinson

  Huda flinched.

  “You can’t let that happen.”

  “You think I don’t know that?” Rania exhaled a shaky stream of smoke. “I went to see Kareem. I asked him if he could get Hanan a passport and an exit visa.”

  “And?”

  “He wants three thousand dollars.”

  “Three thousand?” Huda’s mouth fell open. “No one has that sort of money.”

  “Ally does.” Rania sighed. “I thought about asking her for a loan, but it’s too risky.”

  “You’re right.” Huda frowned. “The mukhabarat are monitoring her. She might let something slip. What about your mother? She must have—”

  “Debts. She has huge debts. The farm has been mortgaged twice. Her creditors are already pressuring me.”

  “I don’t understand—Khalid’s passport is not costing half that.” Huda reached across the table. “We must fix this, for Hanan’s sake.”

  The leaves in the trees hissed. Rania and Huda locked eyes. In that moment, past and future, loyalty and betrayal, all seemed to collide. Rania remembered the moment they sliced their thumbs, mingled their blood, and swore not to keep secrets.

  “Kareem and the cleric are lying to you.” Truth escaped before Rania had time to change her mind. “They’ve got no intention of giving Khalid a passport. They’re using you.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Kareem admitted it.”

  High overhead a flock of pigeons turned in a loop, like a necklace of gray beads, and then flapped toward the Tigris.

  “That means I need a new plan to keep my child safe.” Huda took a deep breath and squeezed Rania’s hand. “And so do you.”

  * * *

  Huda nudged her cigarette pack closer to Rania.

  “Then it’s agreed? If Kareem won’t help, we’ll pay people smugglers to take Hanan and Khalid across the border together. They’ll have to watch each other’s backs. I don’t see another way, do you?”

  “If only my mother . . .” Rania petered out. What sort of daughter secretly prays for death to claim her mother? she thought. Surely, I’ll burn in hell.

  “I’d take them myself,” said Huda, “but the mukhabarat are watching me too closely. At least if I stay, I can tell Abdul Amir that Khalid is having a sleepover at Bakr’s house. It will buy some time, enough for the kids to get across the border, at least.”

  “You’re sure Abdul Amir won’t help?”

  Huda shook her head.

  Rania wasn’t surprised. No one wanted to give up, flee, abandon their homeland. No matter how much they suffered, Iraqis couldn’t let go of the glorious past. They refused to admit that Mesopotamia was dust, that Babylon was desert. Was it inner strength that kept them hoping? Or was it shame that kept them from admitting the truth? Maybe both.

  “How much do you think this will cost?” said Rania. “And how do we know the people smugglers won’t take our money, then dump the kids in the desert and leave them to die of thirst?”

  “My mother may know someone who can help, but I can’t call her up and ask. The lines aren’t secure at the embassy, and I’m sure they’re monitoring my home phone. I’d have to go to Basra in person.”

  “There’s no time for that.” Rania glanced toward Hanan’s bedroom window. “All Malik need do is whisper in Uday’s ear.”

  “You’re right. We can’t delay.” Huda dug her fingers into her scalp. “I admit, I’m not surprised that Kareem and the cleric are trying to use me. I’m scared they’ll get their hooks into Khalid too.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Khalid is the sort of impressionable boy that Kareem and the cleric would love to manipulate for their own ends. Not so long ago all he cared about was Harry Potter and Star Wars. But recently he’s started going to a new mosque, and then coming home full of talk about martyrs and holy wars and how he wants to avenge his family’s suffering.”

  Huda stabbed the butt of her cigarette into the ashtray. When she looked up, a cold fire burned in her eyes.

  “I remember when his uncle Mustafa said the same thing. Three days later they bulldozed his body into a ditch.”

  Deep inside Rania, guilt flared like an old wound that should have been stitched.

  “I warn you,” Huda hissed, “if this goes wrong, you better not leave Khalid to twist in the wind. On my grandmother’s grave, if you betray my family again I’ll—”

  “I’m sorry.” Rania’s voice cracked like a tea glass dropped on a marble floor. “Truly I am. I tried to save Mustafa and Ali. I went to my father and begged him for help. I cried at his feet.”

  “Ever since you were a little girl, you had your father wrapped around your finger. He gave you everything you asked for. After your husband died, the sheikh even bought you an apartment in Basra and let you live there alone. No other widow enjoyed such freedoms. And you want me to believe he refused your pleas to save my brothers?”

  “But it’s true,” whispered Rania.

  “Your father had influence.” Huda’s eyes narrowed till they were thin and sharp as blades. “He could have gone to the authorities and convinced them to spare my brothers. But he never even tried. You were too busy helping your fancy friends, your friends with college degrees and honorable names, too busy to plead for mere village boys.”

  “I begged my father.” Rania pressed her hand to her stinging eyes. “He wouldn’t listen.”

  “The sheikh helped so many in our tribe. Why not my brothers? Why didn’t he save them?”

  “Because . . .” Rania trailed off. Many years ago, she promised Huda there’d be no secrets between them. She’d sworn a blood oath. Did she really think she could cast that aside without consequence?

  “My father refused because . . .” Rania choked up. “He wanted to protect my honor.”

  “Your honor?” Huda glared. “What are you talking about?”

  “Do you remember the first night of the rebellion?” Rania’s vision turned inward and traveled back in time to her apartment in Basra, from where she watched tracer fire carve arcs in the night sky. “It was as if the entire city was suddenly alive. We’d been squashed under the regime’s boot for so long, barely daring to breathe, let alone whisper what was truly in our hearts. But that night was different. We were frightened, yes. But that night, the first night, we had never felt so free.”

  In the eucalypt, the crow moaned and shuffled about.

  “When the fighting started, my father came to my apartment to make sure I was safe.” Rania stared at a crack running through the table, laid silent by a familiar rush of guilt. No secrets, she told herself.

  “He found me with Mustafa,” she said quietly.

  “I don’t understand.” Huda shook her head. “What was Mustafa doing at your apartment?”

  “My husband was dead, Huda. That night I was not with his brother, who was meant to take his place. I was not with one of those men with an honorable name.” Shame scorched Rania’s cheeks, her neck, and the thin skin at her chest. “I was with Mustafa. A village boy.”

  Shock rose like a moon in Huda’s eyes.

  “You mean . . . ?”

  “For some time, he’d been stopping by to see if I needed help. I had that little car, remember?” Rania’s smile was nine parts misery. “Mustafa would check the air in the tires, that sort of thing. Sometimes he would stay and drink a glass of juice. We would talk about the village, about you and your new job. He would play with Hanan. I was lonely. He was too, away from the village.”

  “You and Mustafa?” Huda stared at her, openmouthed. “How long did this go on?”

  “It was only one night.” Rania forced herself to keep going. “But you know the type of man my father was—honor, reputation, the family name—nothing was more important to him. When I came begging and pleading for him to save Mustafa, it only made it worse.”

  She stopped and dragged her hands across her face like she was wiping at a stain.

  “If the regime had not done it,” she
said, “my father would have killed Mustafa himself. And poor Ali, he was innocent of everything.”

  “This can’t be.” Huda pressed her hands to her temples. “Why didn’t you tell me before?”

  “You blamed me for Mustafa’s death—and you were right.” Rania sighed like it was her final breath. “If I had not been so weak, if I had more self-control, perhaps Mustafa and Ali would be alive today.”

  “And you encouraged them to fight, to join the rebellion.”

  “Mustafa had no idea I was involved with that. We never talked about politics, not till that night anyway. I remember the helicopters whirring overhead. From my balcony, we could see tracer fire over the Shatt al-Arab river like a thousand shooting stars.”

  A gust of wind swept through the garden and made the trees dance.

  “I let my emotions take over. But I didn’t tell Mustafa to go and fight. That was his doing.”

  Huda shook her head.

  “We were closer than sisters. Why didn’t you tell me the truth?”

  “My father threatened to kill me if anyone found out.” Rania raised her burning eyes. “Be honest. You would have blamed me too. So I packed up my things and moved to Baghdad. I thought it was best for everyone.”

  Huda opened her mouth as if she was about to argue, but then she stopped and looked away: at the mansion’s patchy roof, the insects darting about the citrus grove, the statue of the woman curled around her child. She looked everywhere but at Rania, whose face had crumpled like an old paper bag. Above them, the crow rocked back and forth on his branch, moaning like he could feel their pain.

  CHAPTER 19

  The telephone on Huda’s desk chirruped. She startled, still buffeted by the spinning top of emotions that had engulfed her since leaving Rania’s garden—regret for time lost, fear of what was to come, grief, a fragile spark of hope, and a lingering trace of distrust. Could they do this? Could they keep the vows of loyalty they pledged so many years ago, defy the regime, and keep their children safe? The phone chirruped again. Huda took a deep breath and raised the handset to her ear. Even before the caller spoke, she sensed the miles between them, static rushing down the line like wind whipping across the desert.

  “Good morning, this is John Wales. I’m calling from Dubai.” After five years working at the embassy, Huda could recognize an Australian accent. This man sounded different. British perhaps. “May I speak with Ally Wilson?”

  “Sorry, Ally is not here.” Huda knew the mukhabarat monitored the lines at every foreign embassy, and she listened for a telltale click or hum beneath the static.

  “Ally doesn’t know me,” the caller continued. “I work at Business Middle East magazine with her former colleague, Peter Francis.”

  The hair stood up on Huda’s arms. Peter Francis was the reporter from the Rashid Hotel, the one who drank tea with Ally while the mukhabarat interrogated her out back.

  “Peter is away on leave,” the journalist continued. “But the Iraqi government is keen to get more investment, so they’ve offered us another press visa.” He laughed. “Usually, they’re as rare as hen’s teeth. Would you tell Ally I’m coming? I’d love to meet her.”

  Huda couldn’t hang up soon enough, wishing she could wipe the conversation from existence. Ally had said Peter Francis was a friend of a friend, delivering books for her—not a former colleague. Had she been lying all this time?

  Huda opened the filing cabinet beneath her desk. A green folder contained a copy of Tom’s visa application, with Ally’s form paper-clipped at the rear. It listed her occupation as “housewife.”

  The phone chirruped again. Huda reached for it warily, like it might bite.

  “Is this Mrs. Huda al-Basri?” a woman demanded gruffly. “I’m calling from New Baghdad High School.”

  “Is this about Khalid?” Huda checked her watch. School was over, and Khalid should have been at the amusement park by now. For weeks, he’d been saving his pocket money so he could ride the bumper cars. “Is something wrong?”

  “Principal al-Quds wants to speak with you,” said the woman. “That’s all I know.”

  * * *

  Principal al-Quds folded her hands atop her tatty desk. The wood was scratched all over and pockmarked by deep gouges, as if it had been in a knife fight. The concrete wall behind her was bare except for a portrait of the president. The lone window was cracked. The glass had been plastered with masking tape, but the wind slipped through anyway and made a high-pitched keening sound.

  “Please, believe me, Khalid is a loyal Iraqi.” Huda fumbled with her bag, as if she might find an excuse in its pockets. “He wanted to march with his classmates in the president’s victory parade. But he was sick with fever. I made him stay in bed. His absence was my fault, not his.”

  Huda glanced at Principal al-Quds. The woman was as blank as the wall. She pried open her wallet.

  “Our family would like to make a donation to support the school’s celebrations of our president’s glorious victory.” Huda slid all the dinar she had across the battered expanse of desk. “You can decide how to use it, Principal al-Quds, for whatever purpose you think is best.”

  Principal al-Quds didn’t move. She eyed the money like it was a viper slithering among her manila folders and collection of cheap pens. Huda cringed and tucked her hands in her lap.

  “I know you have a well-paying job, Mrs. al-Basri,” said Principal al-Quds. “No doubt this allows you privileges others cannot afford. But that does not mean your son can flaunt the rules. Not when it comes to demonstrating his love for his country and his president.”

  “Of course, you’re right. It won’t happen again.”

  “Khalid’s teachers report other missed classes as well. How do you explain this?”

  “I can’t . . .” Huda shook her head in bewilderment. “His father and I will make sure he misses no more school, or any other parades. Please believe me, Khalid is a good boy. Please, give him a chance to prove himself trustworthy.”

  Principal al-Quds stared across the scarred expanse of wood. What does she see in my eyes? Huda wondered. Liar? Sinner? Traitor? Shame painted her cheeks red. She used to consider herself a moral woman. Now she lied every day, accepted payoffs from the mukhabarat, and negotiated kickbacks from merchants eager to separate Ally from her cash. She blackmailed Rania, a woman who used to be her closest friend. Now, she’d added bribery to her sins.

  “I am a mother, like you.” Principle al-Quds rapped her fingers on the desk. “So I will not report Khalid’s absence from the parade. For the moment . . .”

  “Thank you, Principal al-Quds. Blessings upon you, and blessings upon your family.”

  Bowing and mumbling apologies, Huda backed toward the door.

  “Wait.” Principal al-Quds flicked her index finger toward the wad of dinar. “Take that with you, Mrs. al-Basri. I’ll keep my morals instead.”

  * * *

  Huda waited in the parking lot of the Baghdad Fun Park, face still burning with shame, and stared across an artificial lake at the turquoise dome of Martyr’s Monument. The fountains in the lake had been switched on to celebrate the president’s victory in the referendum, and a veil of spray drifted across the water, through the parking lot, and toward the gates of the amusement park.

  Huda counted four guards standing watch at Martyr’s Monument, then she glanced at the man in the booth by the entrance to the parking lot. Two more guards slouched by the turnstiles to the amusement park. As if on cue, Khalid appeared behind them. Huda slid out of the Corolla and raised her hand. Khalid waved back and loped through the rows of parked cars.

  “I’m starving.” Khalid jogged toward her. “What’s for dinner?”

  “Is that how you greet your mother?” Huda steered him toward a bench overlooking the lake. From there, no one could approach them unnoticed. “Sit down. I want to speak with you.”

  “I’m hungry,” said Khalid. “Can’t we talk on the way home?”

  “No, we cannot,” she snappe
d. “Sit down.”

  Khalid scowled and slumped onto the bench.

  “I have just come from your school,” she said.

  Khalid shot her a startled glance, then quickly looked away, across the lake toward the glittering dome rising a hundred twenty feet into the sky.

  “I was summoned for a meeting with your principal.”

  Khalid grew very still. Huda glanced over her shoulder. The old man was still in his booth. The guards at the amusement park paid them no attention.

  “Principal al-Quds told me every student marched in the victory parade yesterday—except you. How can that be? Surely, you are not so foolish as to skip a parade honoring the president?”

  “I, uh . . .” Khalid swallowed. Out in the lake, the fountains shot jubilant jets of water high into the sky. The sun transformed every drop into its own perfect rainbow.

  “Don’t you know what happens to boys who do not attend rallies? Don’t you know their entire families can be punished?”

  Huda flicked an anxious glance at the guards across the lake.

  “Do you remember Professor Hafez who used to live on the corner of our street?”

  “Sort of . . .”

  “Professor Hafez did not march in a rally at his college. So the police came and took him away. They kept him for three days.” She turned to Khalid. “What do you think they did all that time? Do you think they drank tea and talked about soccer?”

  Khalid studied his boots.

  “When Professor Hafez eventually came home, he’d lost his job. A week later, his whole family disappeared in the middle of the night. Maybe they moved somewhere else. No one knows.” Huda glanced at the monument. “But it all happened after Professor Hafez skipped that rally.”

  “I didn’t think anyone would notice,” mumbled Khalid.

  “You must understand your actions have repercussions. For you. For me. For your father.”

  “What’s going to happen?” Khalid’s lip trembled. “Am I to be punished? Are we all going to be punished?” His words spiraled into the sky, squeaky with fear.