Page 99 - The Kite Runner

88 Khaled Hosseini

us. I remember the last time. I was in my room, reading an abbre-
viated Farsi translation of Ivanhoe, when he knocked on my door.
“What is it?”
“I’m going to the baker to buy naan,” he said from the other
side. “I was wondering if you ...if you wanted to come along.”
“I think I’m just going to read,” I said, rubbing my temples.
Lately, every time Hassan was around, I was getting a headache.
“It’s a sunny day,” he said.
“I can see that.”
“Might be fun to go for a walk.”
“You go.”
“I wish you’d come along,” he said. Paused. Something
thumped against the door, maybe his forehead. “I don’t know
what I’ve done, Amir agha. I wish you’d tell me. I don’t know why
we don’t play anymore.”
“You haven’t done anything, Hassan. Just go.”
“You can tell me, I’ll stop doing it.”
I buried my head in my lap, squeezed my temples with my
knees, like a vice. “I’ll tell you what I want you to stop doing,” I
said, eyes pressed shut.
“Anything.”
“I want you to stop harassing me. I want you to go away,” I
snapped. I wished he would give it right back to me, break the
door open and tell me off—it would have made things easier, bet-
ter. But he didn’t do anything like that, and when I opened the
door minutes later, he wasn’t there. I fell on my bed, buried my
head under the pillow, and cried.

Hassan milled about the periphery of my life after that. I
made sure our paths crossed as little as possible, planned my day