Page 144 - The Kite Runner

The Kite Runner 133

I drove us home in Baba’s old, ochre yellow Buick Century.
Baba dozed off on the way, snoring like a jackhammer. I smelled
tobacco on him and alcohol, sweet and pungent. But he sat up
when I stopped the car and said in a hoarse voice, “Keep driving to
the end of the block.”
“Why, Baba?”
“Just go.” He had me park at the south end of the street. He
reached in his coat pocket and handed me a set of keys. “There,”
he said, pointing to the car in front of us. It was an old model
Ford, long and wide, a dark color I couldn’t discern in the moon-
light. “It needs painting, and I’ll have one of the guys at the sta-
tion put in new shocks, but it runs.”
I took the keys, stunned. I looked from him to the car.
“You’ll need it to go to college,” he said.
I took his hand in mine. Squeezed it. My eyes were tearing
over and I was glad for the shadows that hid our faces. “Thank
you, Baba.”
We got out and sat inside the Ford. It was a Grand Torino.
Navy blue, Baba said. I drove it around the block, testing the
brakes, the radio, the turn signals. I parked it in the lot of our
apartment building and shut off the engine. “Tashakor, Baba jan,”
I said. I wanted to say more, tell him how touched I was by his act
of kindness, how much I appreciated all that he had done for me,
all that he was still doing. But I knew I’d embarrass him.
“Tashakor,” I repeated instead.
He smiled and leaned back against the headrest, his forehead
almost touching the ceiling. We didn’t say anything. Just sat in the
dark, listened to the tink-tink of the engine cooling, the wail of a
siren in the distance. Then Baba rolled his head toward me. “I
wish Hassan had been with us today,” he said.