Refuge

by N G Osborne

“You think it’s easy feeding six kids,” the woman says.

  “I’m sure the school can help—”

  “You think we can afford to keep a girl around who has her nose stuck in books all day.”

  “You don’t understand—”

  “No, it’s you who doesn’t.”

  The woman shoves Noor so hard that Noor topples over, her head whiplashing against a guide rope on the way down. Noor struggles back up onto her feet.

  “You can’t do this,” Noor says. “It’s not right.”

  The woman swings her fists at Noor’s face. Noor grabs a hold of the woman’s wrists and holds her off.

  “Please,” Noor says.

  The woman shrieks, and, out the corner of her eye, Noor sees the tent flap open, and another woman emerge. Kamila’s mother breaks Noor’s grip and digs her nails into Noor’s cheek. Noor cries out. The second woman punches Noor in the stomach. Noor tumbles over and the blows begin raining down. Noor guesses that a third woman, perhaps even a fourth, has joined the fray. Hands punch her in the ears, rip at her breasts, pummel her in the back, pull at her hair, dig their nails into her buttocks.

  Oh Lord, I’m going to die right here.

  Noor tries to crawl away, however a hand yanks her head up and drives her face into the ground. Her nostrils fill with dirt. She can’t breathe.

  And then just like that the blows stop.

  Noor twists on her back expecting a final coup de grace. It never comes. The women have gone. She looks towards the mosque; the men are returning from evening prayers. She crawls in between two tents and realizes Kamila’s mother likely meted out a similar beating on Kamila. Noor begins to cry. Miss Suha was right. She hasn’t helped these girls, she’s only brought greater despair into their lives.

  ***

  AAMIR KHAN GLANCES at the carriage clock on the mantelpiece. Twenty past ten.

  “Where are you?” he mutters.

  For the last hour he’s told himself that Noor’s still at school, forced to work late after her ten day absence, but as the minutes have ticked by that explanation’s become ever more fanciful.

  “Where are you? Dear God, where are you?”

  Scenes play out in his mind, scenes he’s had many years to hone. Noor walking home. A car coming up behind her, a couple of young men up front; mustaches, no beards, youthful attempts at looking debonair. They are blasting Indian pop music, passing a cigarette laced with hashish between them. One of them notices Noor and says something to his friend. The car arcs in the road, and Noor stands there frozen in its headlamps. The men throw her in the back. She screams, and the passenger punches her in the head. When she comes to they’re dragging her into a room where each has his way with her. Noor begs for mercy, but they don’t stop. Finally sated one slits her throat. They throw her back in the trunk and dump her on some waste ground. Another dead Afghan refugee no one will give a damn about.

  No one but me.

  Aamir Khan swallows, his mouth dry, his breathing labored. He knows there’s no point in going to the police. A missing refugee in a city of millions; there could be no lower priority. Worse yet they could be involved. The scenes replay in his mind except this time the car is a police pick-up and the men sweat-stained police officers.

  ‘Look after them for me’—those had been Mariam’s final words to him.

  “Oh Mariam,” he cries out, “how I have failed you.”

  Aamir Khan forces himself up out of his chair. He spies the wooden frame he’s been crafting for Noor to place her university diploma in. On it are scenes of women with their heads gloriously unveiled, in a lecture hall, working alongside men in an architect’s office, playing tennis.

  “You fool.”

  He throws the frame against the wall and it shatters. He stretches his hands out in the air.

  “O Allah, please spare Noor, place her in your ever merciful embrace and protect her from those who seek to hurt her. I know I have sinned, I know I have spent my life with my head in the clouds, but even I know you are the embodiment of forgiveness and you love to pardon, so pardon me. O Allah, please I beg you, bring home my daughter…”

  Aamir Khan curls up on the floor and sobs. He hears Noor say ‘Baba’.

  Is she now speaking to me from the grave?

  “Baba?”

  He looks up. Noor’s blurred form stands in the doorway. He laughs. It doesn’t seem possible. He uses his sleeve to wipe his eyes, and she comes towards him. He can now make out her face; her right cheek lined with scratches, her left eye half closed, its eyelid purple as if it’s been smeared with ink.

  “Oh my love,” he says.

  She kneels down beside him and wraps her arms around him.

  “What happened?” he says.

  She doesn’t reply and squeezes him tighter. He buries his nose in her hair and breathes in her scent. This isn’t a dream, Allah has returned her to him.

  “I have to get out of here,” Noor says.

  “You will,” Aamir Khan says. “I promise, you will.”

  THIRTY-FOUR

  CHARLIE PULLS UP in the Pajero. He takes a moment to take in his house. It seems strange in the full light of day, its bricks glistening white, the meandering vines a lustrous green, the bougainvillea bright and cheerful.

  What was Skeppar thinking when he rented this place?

  He glances at the dashboard. Three ten. Noor won’t be home yet. He turns to Wali.

  “Ready?”

  “I was about to ask the same question of you,” Wali says.

  Charlie gets out and lifts the wheelchair out of the trunk. He staggers backwards, and it clatters to the ground.

  “You should feel the weight of this thing.”

  “That is because it was built in the Soviet Union. It was the Russians’ final revenge against the Afghan people.”

  “Their final revenge against the American people, you mean. You’re not the one pushing it.”

  Charlie places Wali in it and pulls him up the front steps one onerous clunk at a time. The front door opens. Aamir Khan stands there with Bushra.

  “Sorry,” Charlie says, “took longer than I thought. Wali insisted on thanking every nurse and doctor in the place.”

  “And so he should,” Aamir Khan says. “They are truly the most marvelous of people. Now, Wali, may I introduce to you my daughter, Bushra.”

  “It’s wonderful to meet you,” Wali smiles.

  “You too,” Bushra says blushing.

  Charlie starts for the SUV.

  “Charlie, I was so hoping to show you the parallel bars,” Aamir Khan says. “Mukhtar and I finished them just this morning.”

  “Well I suppose I got time.”

  “Marvelous. Bushra, would you please push Wali for me.”

  Bushra gets behind the chair, and Aamir Khan leads them through the house and out onto the verandah. Down on the lawn below are the freshly painted set of waist-high parallel bars.

  “They’re awesome,” Charlie says.

  “They will allow you to build upper body strength,” Aamir Khan says to Wali.

  “Then I must try them immediately,” Wali says.

  Wali wheels away from Bushra and flies down the ramp. The chair lurches onto one wheel and for a moment it seems as if Wali is going to tumble onto the lawn. Bushra screams. Just in time the wheelchair restores its balance and comes to a skidding halt right in front of the parallel bars.

  “No way you’re going on those things,” Charlie says.

  Wali grabs a hold of one of the bars.

  “Please, Mr. Matthews, just one minute on this magnificent contraption.”

  “No. The only reason you got out early is because you promised to rest up. Aamir Khan? Bushra?”

  “Charlie is most correct,” Aamir Khan says.

  Wali slumps back into his chair.

  “Fine, but someone has to try them.”

  Charlie looks over at Aamir Khan.

  “Fancy a spin?”

  “Oh, I think that wou
ld be most injudicious of me.”

  “Then it must be you,” Wali says.

  “I haven’t done this stuff since I was in high school,” Charlie says.

  “Kindly give them a try.”

  “Okay, just for you.”

  Charlie places a hand on each of the bars.

  “Can you go from one end to the other?” Wali says.

  “I’d hope so.”

  Charlie works his way down the length of the bars and twists around to face them. Wali claps.

  “See you’re a natural. Now please you must show us some other tricks.”

  “Like what?”

  “Can you walk upside down?”

  “When I was seventeen.”

  Out the corner of his eye, Charlie sees someone coming down the verandah. From her erect, purposeful stride he knows it’s Noor. He feels his pulse quicken. She reaches the ramp and gives him a curious look.

  “So are you going to do it?” Wali says.

  Charlie jolts out of his trance.

  “Yeah, why not.”

  He makes his way to the center of the bars and begins swinging his legs back and forth. Noor comes up beside her father and sister.

  “As-Salaam Alaykum” Noor says.

  Wali twists around in his chair, and for one of the few times in his life is struck dumb.

  She really is that beautiful.

  “Charlie is about to show us a gymnastic trick from his youth,” Aamir Khan says.

  “Do you think that’s a good idea?” she says.

  Charlie gives his legs an extra jerk and flips upside down. He has to concentrate so hard on keeping his position that he hears nothing they’re saying. His arms begin to shudder.

  Noor glances up at him, and for the first time Charlie notices the garish yellow bruise around her right eye and the fading network of scratches across her cheeks. It’s as if someone’s tried to deface a masterpiece; they have failed miserably. In that moment every reason he’s constructed for staying away from her is obliterated.

  What the hell was I thinking?

  Charlie’s left arm wobbles, and he falls, his right shoulder plowing into the ground. A stab of unimaginable pain shoots down his right side.

  “Ah, fuck me,” he screams.

  Noor crouches down beside him.

  “Charlie, are you alright?”

  He looks up into her eyes, and the agony subsides only for it to return as if some animal is trying to tear his right arm from his body. He roars so loudly that Bushra squeals.

  “Did you hear anything crack?” Noor says.

  “Think I just dislocated my shoulder,” Charlie says.

  “I will take him to the hospital,” Aamir Khan says.

  “No‌—‌all I need is a wall. Aamir, help me up.”

  Aamir Khan puts his arm underneath Charlie’s good shoulder and lifts him up. Charlie stands there swaying.

  “I advise you to go to the hospital,” Noor says.

  “Hate hospitals,” Charlie says.

  He staggers towards the house, his arm hanging limp. Noor runs after him.

  “Charlie,” Noor says.

  “Don’t worry I’ve done this before.”

  A hot sweat envelops his body. He stumbles into the sitting room but doesn’t see a good place for a run up.

  “Please, Charlie.”

  He continues on down the corridor. The wall at the far end is perfect.

  “Baba, come stop this madness,” Noor shouts.

  Charlie grits his teeth and sprints towards it, angling his shoulder upwards.

  “Charlie,” Noor screams.

  A torrent of pain shoots through Charlie’s shoulder, and he blacks out.

  ***

  NOOR ENTERS CHARLIE’S bedroom with a tray of food in her hands. Over by the balcony doors, Charlie sits hunched over his desk, sketching in his pad. She stands there and watches him. He looks like an expat from the 1920s. He sees her and smiles. She sets her face in as stern an expression as possible.

  “The doctor was clear, you’re not to use your arm to do anything.”

  “One more minute.”

  “Charlie, you’re my patient and you’ll do what I say.”

  “When did we agree on that?”

  “When you came back from the hospital.”

  “I was high on Vicodin.”

  “You agreed, and that’s all that matters.”

  Charlie slaps his pad shut and turns to face her. His hair is as long as she’s ever seen it, hanging over his forehead and curling around the back of his ears.

  It suits him.

  “I brought you some lunch,” she says.

  She places the tray on his desk. It’s simple, a glass of milk with some grilled chicken breast and rice. She didn’t trust herself to make anything more complicated this time around.

  “Thanks, you didn’t need to do that,” he says.

  “Is there anything else I can get you?”

  “No, all good.”

  “Then I’ll have Mukhtar come back later and collect it.”

  Noor heads for the door.

  “How’s it going with Wali and your dad?” Charlie says.

  Noor turns back.

  “Good, they’re already inseparable.”

  “Knew they’d get along.”

  “And surprisingly Bushra’s helping out too. I think the opportunity to be of use has really galvanized her.”

  “Well I’m glad it’s all working out. You want to sit a moment.”

  Whenever a man is alone with a woman the Devil makes a third. Wasn’t that the Prophet’s admonition?

  “I don’t know—”

  “Come on, five minutes, I hate eating alone.”

  Charlie stares at her with those puppy dog eyes of his.

  “Fine, five minutes.”

  She sits in his armchair, her hands clasped in her lap.

  “What happened to your face?” he says.

  She touches the bruise over her eye.

  “It’s of no concern.”

  “But I am concerned. I mean that’s okay, isn’t it?”

  “Of course, but I’d rather not talk about it if you don’t mind.”

  “Are you in danger?”

  She shakes her head.

  “Fine. That’s all that matters.”

  Charlie picks up his fork and starts eating the way she assumes most soldiers do; fast and mechanically. She looks at his bedside clock. By this time tomorrow Kamila will be married, and her husband will have had his way with her.

  Just like Ameena.

  She trembles. She hasn’t thought of Ameena in years.

  “When I was twelve,” she finds herself saying, “a family from Ghazni moved in next door to us.”

  Charlie stops eating and gives her his full attention.

  “At dawn the father and their four children would go to the local dump and sort through the garbage, and every night on their return they’d wash themselves in a tub of warm water their mother had prepared. Their daughter, Ameena, was a year older than me and while she waited for her father and brothers to bathe first, we’d lean against the side of our hut and talk.”

  “About what?”

  “Girl stuff mainly. I loved her, she had this infectious imagination, believed that a couple of princes would come along and whisk us from the camp. Then one day, she whispered to me that she’d…”

  Noor looks down at her hands in her lap.

  Oh Lord, why did you start this story?

  “What?” Charlie says.

  “It’s not important.”

  “You can’t stop once you’ve started.”

  Noor looks him in the eye.

  “She whispered that she’d begun menstruating. Of course she didn’t say it like that, at the time she thought she was dying. Anyway I calmed her down, told her what was really going on.”

  “How did you know?”

  “Baba had explained it all to us.”

  And I’ll never forget how mortified he’d be
en when he did it.

  “I told Ameena it was normal, that she should share the news with her mother. I didn’t see her the next couple of nights, and so the next day I went over to her hut. Ameena came to the door and explained that her father had ordered her to stay inside until she stopped bleeding. ‘And then you’ll go back out with them?’ I asked. ‘Oh no, that’d be impossible,’ she replied. She held up a burqa and told me her father was insistent she wear it from now on. I told Baba all this and I’ll never forget the blood rushing to his head. ‘Believe me, Noor,’ he said ‘it’s not an article of clothing these men make their women wear but a set of chains, and on Judgement Day Allah will ask them what the hell they were thinking’. The next day I returned home early from school and went over to Ameena’s hut. She was all alone, and we started chatting, and at some point I asked if I could try on her burqa. She thought it a marvelous idea. ‘It’ll be good practice for when you have to wear one,’ she said. I didn’t bother telling her there was little likelihood of that ever happening.”

  Until now.

  “I pulled it down, and giggling, Ameena pushed me out the door. It took me a moment to get my bearings but when I did, to my horror, I saw Baba coming up the path. He looked in my direction, and I thought for certain I’d been caught. But then the most amazing thing happened; he kept walking. I felt giddy, as if I was a spy, but then my foot caught in the burqa’s hem and I went sprawling.

  “‘Noor,’ I’ll never forget him saying. ‘I know it’s you.’ I scrambled to my feet, and he proceeded to tell me what a disgrace I was. I began sobbing, and for the first time in my life Baba didn’t comfort me. He ripped the burqa off my head and told me not to leave the hut until he said so. My father slept outside that night. He was ashamed of me and the more I realized that the more I cried. The next day Tariq and Bushra left for school, and the fact I wasn’t going with them spoke to the severity of my crime. Morning stretched into afternoon, and just as I began to fear that I was going to be imprisoned forever he opened the door and told me to come with him to his bench.

  “‘I thought I’d taught you well,’ he said to me, ‘but right now I don’t even recognize my own daughter.’ I began to cry, and once again he failed to comfort me. He told me he was postponing my studies and instead wanted me to read the three books in his hand and write him a five thousand word essay on why women were men’s equals.”