by Harry Parker
‘Nothing, Mother. I’m sorry about the fertiliser.’
‘That doesn’t matter,’ his father said. ‘Why did they hurt you?’
‘They pushed me over and threatened me.’
‘Why?’
‘Latif was there with them – he must be working with them all the time now.’
His father crouched beside him. ‘Why would they threaten you, Faridun?’
‘They said it was because you work for the infidels.’ He looked at his father. ‘They said they would—’
‘Would what, Faridun?’ his mother said, sitting down in front of him with a bowl.
‘They said if Father continues to work with the foreigners they will behead Lalma.’
‘What is that meant to mean?’ She looked at her husband and then glanced at the doorway and spoke more quietly. ‘What is that meant to mean, Kushan? How can they come here and threaten us like that?’ She was angry and stared at him. ‘You must go and see the governor.’
‘It is not a problem, Aadela,’ he said and stood. ‘I’m sorry you were hurt, Faridun.’
She looked up at him. ‘It is a problem, Kushan.’
‘They try to intimidate us. It is the school, and perhaps the wedding,’ he said, gazing into his garden through the window. ‘We must not let them.’
‘You will speak to Hassan, then. He has gone too far this time.’
‘It is not possible, Aadela. Things have changed.’
‘Hold still, Faridun.’ His mother dabbed his lip with a cloth, and water dripped onto me. ‘Well, you have to do something.’
Faridun brushed away her hand. ‘I’m fine, Mother. Please, give me a moment.’
‘I will not let you put this family in danger, Kushan,’ she said, pressing the cloth back on Faridun’s lip.
‘I will talk to Latif’s father again,’ Kushan Hhan said.
‘Latif doesn’t matter. That foolish boy has made his choice now. How could he do this to Faridun, to us? After everything we have done for his family. Did you not give him a job last harvest?’
‘I will discuss the checkpoints at our next meeting.’ He was dark against the window.
‘Your stupid meetings,’ she said. ‘Nothing ever gets done, you men just sit around like statues and do nothing. I’ll go and talk to Latif’s mother.’
But my owner had gone back into his garden.
In the following weeks Faridun’s lip healed. He came back from the fields each night and ate with the family. They were preparing for his younger sister’s wedding and the women sat around the room and on me sewing silks and threading jewels.
*
One day the women were singing softly, stitching the bridal dress, when Faridun came home early from work.
‘Where is Father?’ he said.
‘In the back field,’ his mother said. ‘Why?’
‘The soldiers are here. They want to speak to him.’
‘What do you mean, here?’ She pulled a thread through the silk in her lap.
‘They’re outside now. Right here, Mother.’
‘Did you bring them here, Faridun?’
But he had already left.
‘We should finish,’ she said.
She made the women and girls leave the room, tidied all the fabrics and needles from me and waited.
Kushan Hhan came back with his son.
‘What is happening?’ she said as they entered.
‘The British soldiers are here, Aadela,’ my owner said. ‘They have come to speak to me.’
She held a length of fabric to her chest. ‘Why are you here, then? Go out and see them.’
‘I have invited them in,’ he told her.
‘You will not, Kushan, I will not let you bring them into this house.’
‘They have asked to see me. We cannot forget our traditions, Aadela.’ He looked out of the door.
She was frightened. ‘It means nothing to them.’
‘Go and make tea, Aadela,’ he said firmly. ‘And do not show yourself.’
‘Do you do this for power, Kushan? It is reckless.’
‘Go,’ he said. ‘Please.’ He glanced at his son. ‘Faridun, bring in the foreigners.’
The boy brought the soldiers in. There were only three of them. The first walked in after Faridun. He was dark and massive and his aerial rattled off the top of the doorway. Once he’d taken his helmet off and pulled a band from his head and smiled, he didn’t seem so huge and strange. He placed his equipment and his rifle down by the door.
Kushan Hhan beckoned him over and they sat on me across from each other. Another soldier waited outside the door and the third man came in and sat with them. He spoke first.
‘This is Captain Tom. I am his translator,’ he said. ‘He thanks you for allowing him into your home. It is very generous of you.’
‘Tell him he is welcome,’ Kushan Hhan said and smiled, touching his hand to his chest.
The young soldier nodded. He was hot and his trousers were damp with sweat. He spoke to the translator.
‘He says he has placed his men around the house for our protection. He is sorry to have to do this. He hopes it does not mark you out.’
‘It is fine: I understand.’
‘Captain Tom is from the base beyond the village.’
‘Tell him I know the base well. I have been there before to meet with them,’ Kushan Hhan said. ‘But each time I go there it is a different man in uniform I speak to. I have never seen your captain. How long has he been here?’
The interpreter and the soldier talked.
‘He has been here for two months. He apologises that they are always changing, but it is beyond his control. I myself have had to speak for three different groups since I have worked with them. They never stay for very long.’
‘Where are you from?’ Kushan Hhan asked the interpreter.
‘From the capital. I learnt English there.’
‘You take a great risk.’
‘As do you,’ the interpreter replied and Kushan Hhan smiled.
While the young man talked to his interpreter, my owner studied another soldier guarding the door into his garden.
‘Captain Tom would like to hear about the school you have opened,’ the interpreter said. ‘He says he wants to support you in this.’
Kushan Hhan still looked out of the door but then turned to the soldier sitting on the other side of me. The man was smiling but Kushan Hhan could tell he wasn’t comfortable being here. ‘Tell the captain that there will be time for talk of schools and government and bombs. Tell him I will bring tea for us to drink together.’
He motioned to Faridun, who went through the back door and returned with a tray holding three small cups of tea, which he put down on me. Kushan Hhan leant forward to drink. The captain did the same, twisting awkwardly in his armour to pick up his cup.
‘He thanks you,’ the interpreter said. ‘He says it is refreshing.’ They all sipped tea and waited.
Kushan Hhan let the silence fill and listened to the water running in the channels through his garden.
Suddenly the captain started talking to his translator. He seemed to mean well but was impatient. He would want to do business quickly – like everything else they did. Fix it and then move on. Build, repair, leave. He looked straight at Kushan Hhan as the interpreter spoke.
‘He is very interested in the school, if you would like to talk about it?’ he said.
Kushan Hhan sighed and put his cup back down on the tray. ‘Ask the captain how many children he has.’
The two men spoke, then the interpreter said, ‘He is not yet married, but hopes that one day he might be.’
‘Not married? How old is he?’
‘I told him you were surprised,’ the interpreter said after speaking to the captain again. ‘He is twenty-five. He has yet to meet the right woman. Their traditions are very different.’
‘His father has not found a woman for him?’
‘He says he wishes it was that simple.’ The
interpreter smiled. ‘He has to do all the hard work himself.’ The young man grinned as his words were translated.
‘It should be simple,’ Kushan Hhan said, ‘but rarely is. Still, it makes for strong families.’ He pointed at his son. ‘This is my son, Faridun. He is seventeen. I will have to find him a bride soon.’
Faridun sat by the window. He did not smile but stared at the captain’s strange clothes and the armour that encased him.
‘The captain says he likes your garden,’ the interpreter said. ‘It is the most beautiful thing he has seen since he has been here. It reminds him of his father’s garden.’
‘Your father has a garden like this?’ Kushan Hhan said.
‘The captain says it helps his father think after work.’
‘Yes.’ Kushan Hhan looked out into the courtyard. ‘It is the one thing I have some control over here. And who my children marry, of course.’
The young man smiled at the translation.
They continued to talk about the garden, the surrounding fields and what the farmers were growing. The captain asked about the harvest and how good it had been. Then they talked of family and the men Kushan Hhan was close to. They discussed the village and how the market was doing and he told the soldier how the bombs under the road made everything difficult for them.
The captain fidgeted on me and had to stretch out his legs. My owner smiled at his discomfort and suggested he should get used to sitting on the floor. He could tell the man wanted to leave; without his weapon he was worried and he glanced at his watch and then at the soldier guarding the door.
So Kushan Hhan told him about the school.
‘The building has been destroyed and it is too difficult to rebuild without any security,’ he said. ‘I have tried, but I lack the support of the other families. They feel threatened.’
‘The captain understands,’ the interpreter told him. ‘He will do what he can to help but he is aware 0f the difficulties. He feels the school is important for the area. He has funds.’
Kushan Hhan looked down at me and rubbed my pile. ‘It is always about money.’ He was angry. ‘Funds do not keep them from beating the children who attend the school, or ripping out doors and windows, or setting fire to the roof. You think dollars will solve all our problems.’
‘He says they will do everything they can. He understands it is not easy for you. But we must be going soon or our journey back to the base will be more dangerous. He thanks you for the tea,’ the interpreter said, putting his cup down on me.
‘Tell him that he will walk out of here, back to his base, and before sunset I will be visited by them. They will come in here, sit where he has been sitting and ask me what the soldier wanted and what I said. Tell your captain that.’
The soldier looked at him and spoke slowly to his interpreter.
‘He says he hopes you have not taken too grave a risk.’
‘We will talk more of the school when we next meet,’ Kushan Hhan said. ‘If he is still here and it is not some other captain.’
‘He hopes he can continue to talk to you. Captain Tom says he realises how hard it is for you to invite him into your home and he is thankful,’ the interpreter said.
‘For each time I speak to a captain or a major like him, and hear their promises about security and education and bridges and new roads, about money, I have to speak to the insurgents five times.’ Kushan Hhan stood up. ‘The insurgents come here to tell me how I should lead my people and to threaten me and my family. They will punish me for inviting you in here today.’
‘I understand,’ the interpreter said.
‘But does he understand?’ Kushan Hhan pointed at the captain, then called over his shoulder, ‘Lalma, come here.’
There were whispers from behind the back door and then Lalma walked in. She stood next to him, her bare feet on me. She glanced up at the soldier, then looked down and pulled her green headscarf up to her eyes. Faridun shifted in the corner.
‘This is my daughter. She is to be married,’ Kushan Hhan said. ‘They have threatened to hurt her if I talk to these foreigners.’
He held the soldier’s gaze as the translator explained what he had said.
The captain nodded and put his equipment and helmet back on. He looked at Kushan Hhan with his beautiful daughter standing beside him and said he hoped they would meet again soon. Kushan Hhan watched him pick up his rifle and step out into the courtyard; he looked aggressive again with his eyes shadowed by his helmet and his weapon at his side. He wondered if the man’s father really did have a garden like his.
When they had gone his wife came in through the back door and hugged Lalma close to her. She watched him silhouetted by the window. ‘How was it, Kushan?’
‘You know how it was, Aadela,’ he said softly. ‘You were listening to every word.’
‘I thought it went well. Perhaps they might help us – maybe they do have money?’
‘Maybe,’ he said.
‘And you didn’t promise them anything, Kushan. I think Hassan will understand that you had no choice.’
Kushan Hhan wasn’t sure that Hassan would understand and he walked across me and went to sit on the veranda and look at his garden.
25
I had been on her table for over a week. She’d tried to write on me but never got beyond Dear Tom.
She was back now, leaning over me and reflected in the mirror. Yawning, she put on her makeup, brushed her hair and tied it back. She slipped her earrings in and glanced down at me and then out of the window at the rusted blue gas-storage tower by the park beyond the flats. A train cut through the rooflines and the bin truck’s lights flashed as it crawled up the wet street.
She felt excited whenever she thought of him and how she’d smiled at him when they met. They had talked but other friends were there too and he wasn’t interested, so they’d circled around the party at a distance – she couldn’t stop looking at him. He won’t want to hear from me, she thought. He was abroad and wouldn’t be back for months. But he had smiled back and lingered near her before leaving with his mates.
And then she picked up the biro and started to write. She wrote fast and the pen looped across me. She smiled once and put the end of the pen to her mouth before turning me over and continuing down my other side. When she had nearly covered me, she paused and then wrote: With love from Anna. x
She looked at her watch and rushed to fold me in three. Her tongue licked my tabs, wetting my glue, and she pressed down my edges. Then she wrote his rank, name and address on the front of me. It occurred to her how strange it was that the four-digit number could deliver me all the way to where he was.
At the postbox she looked at me again and paused, suddenly nervous at the thought of him reading me, and then she said what the hell under her breath and I dropped through the dark slot.
I was taken to a sorting office and fed through a machine that recognised the letters and numbers she’d written on my front, and I was pulled down a track of belts and wheels and fell into a bucket. Next a man picked me up and put me in a sack.
I was projected across the world by trucks and planes and sorted again, then I went on a helicopter and was thrown off the back through a cloud of dust. The bag was opened outside a small mud building under camouflage netting and I was put in a pile with a parcel and three others the same as me.
A man was handed all of it and he smiled and walked over to a camp bed, where he sat down and sifted through us. He opened the parcel first, ripping through the cardboard and examining the bottle of chilli sauce, nuts, oatcakes, the tin of pate and the chocolate bars. He had a bite of chocolate as he read a card and smiled.
He picked me up and frowned at the handwriting. Then a friend called to him, so he tossed me aside and jogged out of the courtyard.
There were shouts and laughter. A ball arced into the courtyard and bounced around, and he ran back to pick it up from between jerry cans. He threw it over the wall and disappeared again.
He return
ed with another man and their T-shirts were dark with ovals of sweat. They sat opposite each other on their beds and talked. He offered him something from the parcel and then started to read me.
Dear Tom,
I read an article in the paper about where you are. It sounds really awful and, well, I thought I’d write. I know we’ve only met a few times but I asked Jess for your address. I hope you don’t mind!?
The last time was at her party – do you remember, we talked for a while?
I’m not sure what about but I enjoyed meeting you. I think it was a few weeks before you went. It must be so difficult leaving it all and heading out there. No one really talks about it; we just carry on at work or in the pub.
Just so you know, I have thought about you.
It seems odd. I’m about to walk to the bus and go to work. It looks like it’s going to rain again and I will probably be late (I’m always late!) and the biggest decision of my day is what sandwich I have for lunch. I can’t imagine what you’re doing except that the sun is probably out and it’s hot and you probably wish it wasn’t. The article made it sound like it is getting harder and we don’t know what we’ve let ourselves in for being there, and more people than we realise get hurt – I had no idea really.
Don’t write back if you don’t want, but it would be nice to see you when you’re home. Jess says it won’t be for a few months – maybe not until Christmastime. Could we have a Christmas drink? I love that time of year.
I best get to the bus stop before it’s so crammed I have to spend my journey in someone’s armpit. Stay safe, Tom.
With love from Anna. x
PS. Long blonde hair, quite short and stared at you a lot during Jess’s party – if you can’t remember!
He put me down on the bed under the mosquito net and continued to eat from the parcel and thought about the girl.
Over the next few weeks he tried to write back. And he read me over and over, but all he could manage was Dear Anna, thank you for your letter before he had to head out again or fell asleep or didn’t know what else to write. And then he didn’t come back and I was packed away into a cardboard box.