“Who is going to notice?”
“Who is going to notice?” she said in astonishment. “You will notice! You’re the one who looks in the mirror every day. Who cares about the stupid men? Do it for yourself. That’s what I do. Every morning I make up my face and dress as stylishly as I can, as if I am going out to a party. I feel great when I look at myself, even if after that I sit quietly in a room waiting for a client to come, if I’m lucky. I feel even more like a beautiful woman inside. You must do the same for yourself. Fight them in secret; never give in to them. One day, we’ll be free and we must be ready to open that door and step out looking as if nothing has happened. And show that they could not crush our spirit. What do you wear at home?”
I shrugged. “Sometimes jeans and a sweatshirt.”
“See, that’s what I mean. Dress up as if you’re going to a fabulous party thrown by . . . by . . . Amitabh Bhachan, the great Bollywood movie star.” She stroked her blouse. “I love the touch of silk against my skin; it’s erotic, as gentle as a lover’s caress.”
I looked at myself in the mirror: a mess, with a beard.
I noticed then that her sitting room was almost a replica of her salon, though much smaller. There was only one washbasin with its chair and big mirror. On the shelves beside the mirror were all her usual magic potions—hair dyes, hair sprays, perfumes, powders, lipsticks, creams, combs, brushes, and scissors. On the walls were the old framed photographs of models showing off their hairstyles. I realized she was carrying on business as usual, in secret, for her most trustworthy clients.
She switched on her stereo. A Brahms concerto filled the silence. I sat back in the chair and she wordlessly gathered up my hair, studying how to cut it. I felt I was back in her salon.
“When did you have to close, Noorzia?”
She grimaced at the memory. “When eight or nine of the religious police showed up one morning four years ago. They forced me and my staff out, then opened fire on the mirrors, the washbasins, the chairs, the wall hangings. The noise was so frightening. They smashed every bottle, stamped on every lipstick tube. Then they went outside and shot at my beautiful sign. And they laughed while they did it. There was nothing worth saving.”
“Oh, Noorzia.”
“That’s why I defy them in here.” She smiled and gestured to the room. She placed a hand on her heart. “And in here.”
She draped a pink sheet over my body and tied the ends up behind my neck. She continued to ruffle my hair and fluff it out. “Rukhsana, you are a very intelligent woman and you know what you are doing. There is great danger in this impersonation, but there is great danger in simply being a woman, whether we obey their rules or not. And we know how random death is here. You must do whatever you can to leave this country, for your own safety. And your disguise will be a true shield, leave that to me.” She started snipping away, the scissors sounding cheerful, as if chatting along with us too. “I may be able to help with a smuggler, but not with the money.”
“Why haven’t you left? What is here for you?”
“Where would I have gone? Back to Beirut, where my husband died in a bombing and all those memories? No, for a long time there was no one for me to go to. Here, I can still earn a living with my loyal clients. And I run a small business selling lipsticks, makeup, perfumes, powders, whatever women need, including tampons and condoms.” She chuckled. “My smuggler, Juniad, brings in banned items from Dubai and takes out those who want to escape from the country. He has a very lucrative business.”
“Is he dependable?”
“What man is dependable, Rukhsana? None. Certainly not my smuggler. He’d sell his grandmother if he could make a few more dollars.” I watched her snip away at my hair, reducing it to a sad crop, close to my skull, but with enough body to give me the look of a young man. “In Beirut, I worked as a makeup artist for a television series. It was an Arabic soap opera, but I learned a lot and the pay was good. It was fun too. But there we had the Hezbollah, here we have the Talib, the mujahedeen, the warlords. Nowhere is safe.” She leaned over to whisper. “But I have a plan now too. I am in touch with a friend in Australia who wants me to go there. I’ve said yes finally. He’s sponsoring me and, like you, I’m waiting for the money and papers. It’ll come any day now and I’ll leave.”
“How much will the smuggler cost you?”
“Up to Karachi to catch the flight, about a thousand dollars.”
“One thousand!”
“Yes. If you have to go farther, then a few thousand for visas and flight tickets. And you’ll need money to live on. Five or six thousand should just be enough. Will Shaheen have the money for that?”
“I’ve only asked him for two thousand, but at least that will get me to Karachi, and maybe somewhere just beyond the border. He works for a bank in America—I can ask him for more.” But would it get here in time? I put my doubts aside. “Do you have a contact address for Juniad?”
She scribbled it on a scrap of paper and I pocketed it. She worked quickly and my hair fell to the floor. She stood back and we both studied the results. “You are a handsome young man now.” She gathered up my hair carefully and placed it on a side table. “I’ll make your new beard from your own hair and we’ll fix it with Velcro. I’ll give it enough body to make you look like a nineteen-year-old man, but not too thick. Now let’s fix your skin.”
She searched among her ointments and creams and found what she was looking for. The cream was a shade of pale coffee and she spread it gently over my face and along my throat. Under her magical fingers, I did become a shade darker, and my skin better matched the beard. Below the neckline, I was now startlingly white. Then she thickened my eyebrows, making them more masculine. She capped the cream, and gave it and the pencil to me. “Here, just spread it lightly before you go out, and do your eyebrows. By the way, what do you call yourself?”
“Babur.”
She nodded in appreciation. “It has a beautiful sound, Babur the emperor, the poet. Stand up.”
I stood, removing the sheet covering my body. She stood to the side to view my profile. “In that loose shalwar and jacket I can’t see your tits.” She reached over to tug my shalwar and jacket tighter and down. Now she noticed there was the slight bulge of my breasts.
“I don’t have big ones—no one is going to get that near to pull down my shirt and jacket.”
“Men stumble,” she said knowingly. “A man could stumble into you, knock his elbow against your tits. Men do that to me constantly but, then again, they see me as a woman. Men, you see, have highly sensitive nerves in their elbows. One bump with their elbow into your tits tells them how firm, how young, how desirable the tits are. They can even judge your cup size with an elbow. How did you protect yourself playing cricket?”
“A chest guard.”
There was an impatient knock on the front door. “Ah, Babur, it’s been a half hour,” Jahan called out.
“I’ll be with you in a minute.”
“You still have your chest guard from cricket?”
I nodded.
“Better wear it so an accidental elbow doesn’t find your tits.” Noorzia lowered her voice. “But what about your voice?”
“I’ll speak in a whisper and tell them I lost my voice in a fire, the smoke affected my throat.”
I ran my fingers through my hair; it felt strange not to feel the weight and length. I was a stranger in the mirror. My darkened skin shone slightly from the cream. I hoped men wouldn’t notice. I could tell them it was just sweat. My brows curved like scimitars above my eyes, any thicker and they would cover them completely. This wasn’t the wounded Shylock of the stage play but a brash young man glowering back at me. In my eyes, I noted the new surge of confidence; I would swagger, grin, and laugh like a young man who believed the world belonged to him.
I replaced the turban and my old beard and, wrapping my patoo around my shoulders and high enough to mask my lower face, I slipped on the spectacles. “How do you get about without a m
ahram?”
“I have an uncle who visits me once a day and takes me out for a walk, as if I were a pet dog. Without him, I’d go mad here. It was so good to see you, but you have neglected me,” she scolded with a smile. “Now you’ll have to come and see me regularly for the cream and for me to tend to your beard.”
I stood before her in an awkward silence.
“I know what you’re about to say,” Noorzia said, embracing me. “Pay me when you have the money. Or better still, send me the money in U.S. dollars.” She tapped my cheek. “I’ll keep the accounts. One moment . . .” She took up her scissors and carefully clipped a few stray hairs off my beard. “There, that’s neater.”
“Let’s see if he’ll notice the difference in my skin color.”
“Men don’t notice anything different about other men, except haircuts. And here you won’t be revealing yours, Babur. How old is Jahan?”
“Just sixteen.”
“What a huge burden for such a boy. And your cousins?”
“Not much older.”
“I’m so frightened for you,” she said, tears coming to her eyes. “I’ll pray one of them will not betray you. Honor is a double-edged sword for our men. They will use it to protect you and then turn it around to slash your throat. Be very careful.”
We hugged. I didn’t want to leave the sanctuary of her home, the pleasure of her buoyant company, the sanity of her life in her little house.
“Now, let yourself out—I don’t want to have to cover myself so your brother won’t turn to stone when he sees me.”
“I’ll do what you do from now on at home. Dress up and put on my makeup.”
“You must.”
When I left her room, Jahan was waiting impatiently by the front door. He stood back, scrutinizing my face. “You look darker and your eyebrows are thicker.”
“And I had my hair cut.”
“How can I see that under the turban? I get my hair cut in five minutes.”
“Women’s hair always takes longer,” I said and smiled.
“You can trust her?”
“Yes. She hates the Talib. And she does have a smuggler but doesn’t guarantee that he is dependable. She says I will need five thousand if I want a visa, plane tickets, a chance to get as far from Kabul as possible.”
“Five . . . ,” he said breathlessly. “You only asked for two.”
“We’ll bargain the smuggler down—and it is one thousand just to get to Karachi. I might at least be able to get over the border until I can get more from Shaheen.” I gave him the paper.
“He’s in the old city,” he said on reading the address. “I’ll meet him tomorrow and discuss the price. Then you will be ready to leave when you get the money.” Jahan looked back at the house. “Can she loan us . . .”
“She doesn’t have the money.”
“I am worried about Noorzia talking. Women talk a lot,” he added with a boy’s contempt.
“She won’t—you just have to trust me.”
“Whatever happens I must see you married to Shaheen.” He spoke with such authority. “You can’t marry Wahidi, it’s against mine and Maadar’s wishes. I must get you out.”
I was surprised by his agenda. He was now talking as if he were my father, not my little brother, carrying the burden of my future, sending the bride to the groom’s home.
“That’s what I’ve always planned to do,” I said as we walked, aware that Shaheen was not in my heart but was a family obligation. Despite our closesness, I could not confess the truth to my brother. “You’re risking your life too if Droon finds out you’re defying him.”
“I haven’t forgotten that Droon threatened me, and Maadar, with Pul-e-Charkhi if I didn’t agree,” he continued in his commanding tone. “Father would do the same. You looked after me all these years and now I must take care of you. You’re the only family I have left after Maadar.”
“And you, mine. We’ll make it together somehow, God willing.” I wanted to take his hand and squeeze it out of my love and gratitude for his caring.
WE CAUGHT A BUS home, and I felt more confident beneath the layer of darkened skin and thickened eyebrows, believing I was now invisible among the men we passed. They didn’t even glance at us.
But back at the house, in my room, I removed the turban and mourned for my hair. I had only snatched a glance in Noorzia’s mirror, but now I could inspect it in private. She had left the central part, but on either side my hair lay flat and short, above my ears, exposing the sides of my head, which I had never seen before. At the back, I felt my skull and my bare nape. When I covered my face from my eyebrows down, I saw a boy’s head sticking up. I carefully removed the beard and lay it on my desk tenderly, as I would a sleeping kitten. It even curled up like one. My face now had two shades, my darker makeup outlining the contours of the beard.
Still dressed as Babur, I made lunch, a pilau with quorma, naan, and a salad, and took it up to Mother and Dr. Hanifa.
They were playing cards.
We helped Mother sit up, and added more pillows for her back. She peered at me. “What happened to your hair?”
“Half your face looks darker—or is it the light?” Dr. Hanifa said.
“Noorzia cut it and put on darker makeup,” I said.
“Noorzia!” my mother said, instantly brightening. I served my mother her usual helping. “But you had such beautiful hair.” She sighed.
“It will grow back,” I answered. “Eventually.”
Book Two
The Team
AFTER LUNCH, PARWAAZE AND QUBAD LED MY other cousins into the mardaana. I waited on the stairs, the wings of the house, until Jahan signaled. I counted heads; there were seven. With Jahan, Parwaaze, and Qubad that made ten. They sat on the floor with slouched shoulders and bowed heads. They were family, my childhood friends, and now my teammates, young men with incipient beards and frowns between their eyes—I had to trust them. They looked up, curious, scared, hopeful, as I entered the room. Their eyes wandered, uncertain where to settle on me—face, feet, hands, turban, chest. Finally, settling for my eyes, I held them there. I didn’t let a moment pass.
“You are here to learn cricket. I can only do that dressed as a man. I am risking my life only because of Jahan. I want you to win and take him out with you. If you tell the Talib what I am doing, I will get a bullet in my head.”
I began to pace slowly in front of them. “But remember, you are all implicated and you will be punished too, though not as severely as me, if we are caught. I don’t have to tell you how the Talib will treat you, as you all know this regime. If any of you are afraid, tell me and leave now before any harm befalls you because of me.”
The room was silent. They knew of the cruelties and I saw them hesitate. One or two wavered enough to shift uneasily, as if wanting to rise and run away before they were harmed because of me. I waited.
I asked again, “Do any of you want to leave?”
The cousins began to look at each other to see if anyone was getting up. No one moved.
Parwaaze came to my side. “We have sworn to protect you and not tell anyone. If anyone does, it will be against our family honor.”
They all straightened slightly at the mention of the family.
Parwaaze continued, “They are all against you marrying the Talib and will do what they can to help you escape when the time comes.”
“Thank you—I will teach you, knowing your lives are in my hands just as my life is in your hands from now on.”
Each one met my eyes and held them as I asked them one last time if they were ready to join the team. I waited for each answer before moving to the next.
“Have you told your parents?” I asked them.
“I warned them not to,” Parwaaze said.
“We need you,” Atash said. “We have long planned to get out, and this is our chance. Why would we report you?”
“But can we win?” Namdar demanded from the back.
“Why not? You are as capable of th
is win as anyone else.” The others murmured in agreement.
“Do they play cricket in Australia?” Bilal wanted to know.
“Yes. They are the champions today.”
“Then they’ll be happy to have us.” Daud smiled and it passed over all their faces.
“You are a brave woman, Rukhsana,” Royan said admiringly.
“We must get used to calling Rukhsana Babur,” Parwaaze corrected him quickly.
“You all swear you’ll look after my sister?” Jahan demanded.
“We will,” they said.
“I will try my best to coach you until the day before the preliminary matches. But if it becomes too dangerous for me, I may leave earlier to join Shaheen and you’ll have to teach each other. Now, I want to tell you why I love this game so much and I hope you will too as you master it.” I gave them the same passionate talk I had given the day before. They listened intently and their interest flickered a bit more brightly.
After I finished, Parwaaze took me aside. “I know we’re a player short, but there won’t be any problem finding one more.”
“Two more,” I said. “A team always has twelve, even thirteen players, in case of injuries and to carry drinks and towels onto the field. Who else do you have in mind?”
KABUL UNIVERSITY WAS A fifteen-minute walk away and, like children crossing a dangerous street, we looked both ways before we stepped out of the compound. The few pedestrians paid no attention to us. Parwaaze insisted on carrying the cricket bat and I distributed my pads, gloves, and ball to the others. I walked in the center of them, with Jahan beside me. I was part of this group of young men, learning to see the world with the same confidence that they possessed as their right. I copied their behavior, or tried to, the confident slouch as they moved, talking to each other, and the quick shy glances at the covered women passing us. And yet I felt detached from them, constantly aware of both my identity and the danger. I sensed their tension too as they protected me, not getting too close but always checking to see that I was still among them. And closing in when men approached, parting when they passed.
The Taliban Cricket Club Page 14