by Kelli Estes
Soon the bustle of getting the food on the table distracted Larkin from the elephant in the room—namely, her—and she was able to sit with the others and act as if she were normal. She’d become good at acting, after all.
Kaia sat at the head of the table, her cheeks rosy from the heat of the kitchen, and presented every dish along with a bit of research she’d uncovered about the food and its history in Afghanistan. She lifted the lid of a large platter with a flourish. “This, I’ve discovered, is considered the national dish of Afghanistan. It’s called Kabuli pilau.” She hefted a large scoop onto Larkin’s plate. “You said you ate it over there, right?”
Larkin looked at the heavily spiced rice and lamb dish and felt the memories push into her mind. “Yes, I did. Sometimes the local police officers would cook for us. This dish, or a version of it, was almost always included. It’s delicious.”
Although she knew the others wanted to hear her stories from Afghanistan, it was clear no one was willing to push her on it, and for that she was grateful. She was still raw, her senses dulled. She wanted to show her appreciation for Kaia’s work, but it was all she could do to stay in her chair.
When Kaia presented a platter of bulani, Larkin reached for one of the fried pockets of bread filled with veggies. She ripped a piece off and dipped it into the ramekin of fresh yogurt that Kaia had placed at each place setting. “This was my favorite of all Afghan foods,” she managed. “Especially the ones filled with potato and garlic.” She took a bite and felt for a conflicted moment that she was standing on a Kandahar street. “Is this pumpkin?”
Kaia nodded, taking a bite herself. “And walnuts.”
“I love it.” Larkin ate the rest of the bulani hungrily and wished she could relax. As she ate, she tried to keep up with the conversation and even managed a question to Evan about work, though she wasn’t able to focus on his answer. Her body felt like spiders were crawling under her skin, and she had to concentrate hard not to let her agitation show.
After the meal, Kaia asked, “I have dessert, but should we clean up dinner first and eat it later when we have room?”
“I’m afraid we need to be leaving,” Evan said, his biceps bulging from his T-shirt sleeves as he pushed back from the table. Larkin was the only one who didn’t protest.
“Evan, an extra half hour won’t kill us,” Jenna said. “Let’s stay. I want to see what an Afghan dessert is like.”
Evan scowled, not bothering to hide his irritation. The tension in the room made Larkin ache to escape, but she stayed put and watched as Evan drew his wife to the side and hissed, “I didn’t want to come here tonight at all, but you made me. We’ve eaten dinner, and now we’re leaving.”
Jenna said something back, but Grams chose that moment to start making a racket with the dishes in the sink. Soon, Jenna was making the rounds with hugs and thanks. “That meal was phenomenal, Kaia. We should have it again sometime.”
“I’m afraid the tea won’t be any good cold, but I can wrap up some sheer pira and cardamom pastries for you to take home,” Kaia offered.
Jenna made Evan wait long enough for Kaia to place a covered paper plate in her hands, and then they were out the door. Larkin, casting a glance at the clock to see how much longer until she could also escape, asked, “Is Evan always such a dick?”
The question made Kaia laugh. Even Grams bit back a smile. “Yes,” Grams said as she filled a bowl with dog food for Bowie. “He has been that way for months now. Jenna won’t tell me what’s really going on.”
“I know they’ve been fighting about starting a family.” Kaia scooped leftover rice into a plastic container. “She wants so badly to be a mom, but he says it’s too soon.”
Larkin managed to last through the cleanup and dessert, and then she finally escaped upstairs to the solitude she so desperately needed. She felt like a reinforced door that had been bludgeoned by a battering ram for hours. The meal had indeed been delicious, but it had been too much for her on the heels of her flashback.
A bottle of gin helped her fall asleep. In her dreams she walked the marketplace. Over and over again, bombs exploded, bodies ripped apart.
“Sarah!” she screamed and jerked awake. Sweat covered her, and the blankets and sheets on her bed were in shambles.
Her bedroom door flew open and there was Grams, followed closely by Kaia, both in their pajamas, their eyes wide with panic.
“What’s wrong?” Grams got to her first, switching on the bedside lamp and reaching for Larkin, who fell against her chest, sobs she couldn’t hold back any longer pouring out.
“It’s my fault,” she cried. “It’s my fault she’s dead.”
“No, it’s not,” Grams argued and rubbed her back. “You did the best you could. It was war. These things happen.”
“You weren’t there. You don’t know,” Larkin insisted.
“So, tell me,” Grams urged. “Tell me what is hurting so deeply. Let me share your load.”
Grams’s words felt as if they scooped right into Larkin’s chest and pulled her heart out of her body, leaving her weak and defenseless. “Anahita. I killed her, too.”
She felt Grams’s body stiffen. “Who is Anahita?”
“Nahid. The boy in the street. He was Anahita.”
For several long moments Grams didn’t say anything. She simply pushed Larkin’s hair off her face and held her as she cried.
“Tell us, soldier girl,” Grams urged again when Larkin’s breath smoothed out. “Tell us what happened to you.”
Larkin opened her eyes and saw Kaia sitting on the foot of her bed, tears running down her cheeks. Seeing her cousin’s tears made the ache in her own chest grow. She never meant for her coming home to hurt anyone, yet that’s exactly what she was doing. When would it stop?
She was so tired. Tired of hurting and tired of carrying her shame around, hiding it from the world as though ignoring it would make it go away when, really, it only grew stronger.
For a moment, she thought about lying, about saying she was fine, that it was only a bad dream. But her weakness won out. She wasn’t strong enough to lie anymore. She deserved to feel their judgment and hatred once they knew the truth. She deserved to be punished.
So she told them, from the beginning, about the worst day of her entire life—the last day of Sarah’s life.
“Sarah was frustrated when she learned her deployment to Afghanistan was going to delay her promotion to captain,” she began. Pulling away from Grams, she hugged her pillow and stared at the wall as she continued, “I was secretly happy, though, because as a first lieutenant she was able to attach to my company as a platoon leader. In Afghanistan, I saw her on a regular basis when I did my rounds checking on my platoons. I was there that day when Nahid first showed up.”
She felt Grams shift so that her back rested against the headboard, but Larkin didn’t look at her. She was being pulled back to that day so many months ago, and as she told Grams and Kaia the story, she felt like she was living it again.
* * *
There were about a dozen of them. Little Afghan boys who liked to play soccer in the street outside the police station. All were clean, well fed, and obviously cared for, though Larkin never saw their parents. The kids showed up after school and played until sundown, and they reminded Larkin of herself and her cousins running wild at Gramps and Grams’s house all summer. As she emerged from the police compound with her team to go on dismounted patrol that day, the kids surrounded them with huge grins. When they discovered the soldiers were Americans, they insisted on practicing their English.
“Candy!” one of them begged, his little palm held open toward Larkin.
“Amrica,” another boasted, pointing to the flag patch on her shoulder, twisting the name but obviously proud to know the country to which it belonged.
Larkin looked at Sarah, and they both grinned. They loved this part of
their jobs, and they kept Jolly Ranchers and Tootsie Rolls in their pockets for this very reason. While the Afghan National Police grumbled under their breaths, Larkin and Sarah and the other Americans in the unit handed out candy and chatted with the boys.
It was always only boys. No girls. Girls were kept inside where they were protected and instructed on how to run a household.
One little boy pushed past the others to get to the front. He marched right up to Larkin, pointed to her name tape and sounded out what he saw there. “Buhn-net.”
She smiled and handed him a watermelon Jolly Rancher. “Bennett. I am Captain Bennett.”
“Captain Bennett,” he parroted, flawlessly.
“What is your name?” She pointed to his chest. “Name?”
His eyes twinkled in delight. He puffed with pride, pointed to his own chest, and announced, “I am Nahid.”
Surprised by his grasp of English, Larkin handed him another candy. “Nice to meet you, Nahid.”
He popped the candy into his mouth where it bulged his cheek out as he answered, “Nice to meet you, Bennett.”
As the patrol moved out, Nahid led the other boys back into the soccer game. Every time Larkin saw him after that, he was always at the head of the pack and the first to sound out new English words. Some of the guys in the unit liked to teach the kids American swear words, and the boys always giggled as though they knew they were being naughty. Nahid was bold and would say the words with confidence.
From that day on, Larkin kept an eye out for Nahid, and whenever she saw him, she made sure to stop and talk with him and share her candy. Sometimes he shared his naan with her. His smile was always ready and endearing. He was brash, loud, and funny, and she looked forward to seeing him every day she was in his neighborhood.
But then one day he wasn’t there. When Larkin asked Sarah about him, she said she hadn’t seen him for weeks. Larkin figured he must have been sick or needed at home, and she didn’t worry until two weeks later when she stopped in again and he still wasn’t there. Sarah had not seen him in all that time. No one had.
“Fahim!” Larkin called to Nahid’s buddy as she waved him over and handed him a Tootsie Roll. “Where is Nahid?”
Fahim, wearing western-style jeans and a puffy jacket with a pillbox hat on his head, gave a nonchalant shrug of his shoulders. “Nahid bacha posh. Now Anahita. Married.” Before Larkin could ask another question, he ran off to join the others.
The words made no sense. Larkin didn’t speak Pashto or Dari, the languages of Afghanistan, so later she asked the terp what bacha posh meant. Her answer shocked Larkin and Sarah both. Bacha posh literally translated to “dressed like a boy.” It was a term given to little girls who were being raised as boys. The practice was, apparently, not uncommon in Afghanistan, where producing a son was the only way for a woman to gain respect from the community and her own family. Sons were revered because they were the ones who would inherit property and secure the family’s future. Daughters were lost to their husband’s family and were considered worthless until they produced a son of their own.
In families that produced only daughters, it was believed that dressing one of the girls as a boy would bring honor to the family and good luck so that the next child born would be a boy. Until then, or until the girl reached puberty, she took on the role of the family’s honored son. With that change in status, she was able to live as a boy, running free in the streets, riding in the front seat of a car, sitting with the men, speaking her opinion, cutting her hair, and laughing out loud…all things denied girls. When she reached puberty, she was changed back into a girl and married off, every one of her freedoms stripped away in a single moment.
“But she’s too young,” Larkin protested after hearing all this.
The terp shrugged. “If she has started to bleed, she is not too young for marriage.” The terp turned back to her work and forgot about Nahid/Anahita, clearly not as disturbed by the news as Larkin was.
Larkin stopped into that police station a week later, and when she asked, none of the boys had seen Anahita. Larkin had not been able to stop thinking about the poor girl. That day, the team planned a dismounted patrol of the local open-air market, and Larkin was happy to tag along, partly because she loved interacting with the locals and observing her officers in action, but also because she hoped to run into Anahita. Patrols like this one had the dual purpose of establishing a police presence in the community so locals felt safe and learned to trust the police, while allowing the ANP officers to pick up on any whisperings of insurgents in the area.
They were an hour into the patrol when they paused for the terp and some ANP to question a man with a suspicious package strapped to his motorcycle. Larkin felt comfortable leaving it to them and had turned toward a mango stand, thinking she should buy a couple to take back to the compound for Sarah, who had stayed behind. A voice she recognized spoke beside her, “Asalaam u aleikum, Bennett.”
The voice was so quiet, she wondered if she’d imagined it. But, when she turned, a burqa-clad woman stood next to her. “Nahid?”
The blue head nodded and turned to look at a knot of women gathered together at the next vendor’s stand, five yards away. In a low voice so no one would overhear, she said, “I am now Anahita. I should not be talking with a khareji, a foreigner. My husband would not approve.”
“U aleikum salaam,” Larkin responded to her original greeting, albeit delayed, with her hand over her heart as was customary. “Are you happy, Anahita?” Larkin kept her eyes on the mangoes, picking one up, squeezing and discarding it, continuing the motion over and over without thought.
“I miss Nahid.” Anahita stopped, as though deciding whether to say more. “I do not like cooking and cleaning and being watched.”
Larkin thought about this. In Anahita’s place, she would be losing her mind. “Is your husband kind to you?” In the corner of her eye she saw Anahita’s entire body shrink.
“No,” she whispered. “I do not please him.”
Larkin carefully set the mango down and clenched her hands into fists. “Does he hurt you?”
“Anahita!” a voice cut between them, making them both jump.
Larkin turned to find three women standing behind them, all wearing burqas matching Anahita’s. The one in the middle was larger than the other two and clearly the woman in charge. She stood ramrod straight and a full step in front of the others. Although Larkin could not see their faces, not even their eyes, she could feel hatred and suspicion pouring from them. The middle woman unleashed a stream of Pashto onto Anahita, berating her. Before Anahita could say a single word, the woman grabbed her arm and led her away, quickly disappearing into the crowd of shoppers.
Larkin was furious. This poor little girl had been married off to a man who abused her, and overnight she’d gone from a fun, carefree soul to having her every move monitored.
Back at the FOB, Larkin asked the cultural experts and her Afghan friends what could be done for Anahita and learned there was nothing she, nor anyone, could do. Anahita was now her husband’s property, and she must abide by his wishes. Pashtunwali, the way of living for Pashtun people, fiercely protected a woman’s honor and that of her family. If Larkin, a foreigner, tried to intervene, she would dishonor all involved and Anahita would likely pay the price.
Four days later, one of the soccer players outside the police compound arrived with a note for Larkin. Sarah was there and read it, then got on the comm system to track Larkin down and tell her about it. The note was from Anahita asking Larkin to meet her in the marketplace the following day.
Larkin should have reported it up the chain of command, but she didn’t. She told herself that Anahita was a harmless and lonely little girl who she might be able to help. Larkin was scheduled to stop into Sarah’s station in the coming week anyway, so she arranged her schedule so she could tag along on their marketplace patrol the next day. Only Sara
h knew Larkin was planning to meet Anahita.
The morning chill had already burned away, and heat was rising by the minute. The ANP were in charge of the patrol, and the Americans were there for support and backup. Altogether, there were six ANP, four guys from Sarah’s squad, and Sarah and Larkin.
At first, everything went routinely. The stench of burning garbage filled the air as they stepped over gutters filled with rotting food and raw sewage. They made their way around locals carrying bundles of goods and handed out candy to the kids, all while keeping a hand on their weapons and being alert for threats or anything suspicious. It was a day like any other on the crowded street.
But then, something changed. Some unspoken message was delivered, or some secret signal released. Suddenly, the shoppers were hurrying away, and the vendors started closing their shops. Those with pushcarts dashed away so rapidly that many of them dropped merchandise but didn’t stop to pick it up.
Larkin, Sarah, and the ANP knew what this meant. An attack was pending. The patrol went on high alert. The attack could come from a VBIED—a vehicle-borne improvised explosive device—coming their direction or already parked on the street awaiting a cell-phone signal to detonate it. Or it could be a rocket attack, snipers on the rooftops, or an insurgent wearing an S-VEST—a suicide bomb strapped to his chest. Whatever might be about to happen, it was their job to remove the threat before it caused damage and took innocent lives.
Larkin ducked against a building, using the corner as a shield between herself and the street. Everyone else found defensive positions of their own behind cars or mud walls or buildings. Peering around the corner, she scanned the street, the rooftops, everything within her line of sight, and could see no threats. But there was one. She had no doubt.
And then Larkin saw her.
A lone figure was walking toward them down the middle of the street. It was Anahita, fully revealed with no burqa or even a chador, dressed like a boy. She had a bomb strapped to her chest.