Page 47 - And the Mountains Echoed (novel)

A Rumi poem, one from Mullah Shekib’s teachings.

They’re getting more sophisticated, Masooma said with a chuckle.
Below the poem, the boy had written I want to marry you. And, below that,
he had scribbled this addendum: I’ve got a cousin for your sister. He’s a perfect
match. They can graze my uncle’s field together.
Masooma tore the note in half. Don’t mind them, Parwana, she said. They’re
imbeciles.

Cretins, Parwana agreed.
Such effort it took to plaster a grin on her face. The note was bad enough, but
what really stung was Masooma’s response. The boy hadn’t explicitly addressed
his note to either one of them, but Masooma had casually assumed that he’d
intended the poem for her and the cousin for Parwana. For the first time,
Parwana saw herself through her sister’s eyes. She saw how her sister viewed
her. Which was the same as how the rest of them did. It left her gutted, what
Masooma said. It flattened her.

Besides, Masooma added with a shrug and a grin, I’m already taken.

Nabi has come for his monthly visit. He is the family’s success story,
perhaps the entire village’s too, on account of his working in Kabul, his driving
into Shadbagh in his employer’s big shiny blue car with the gleaming eagle’s-
head hood ornament, everyone gathering to watch his arrival, the village kids

hollering and running alongside the car.
“How are things?” he asks.
The three of them are inside the hut having tea and almonds. Nabi is very
handsome, Parwana thinks, with his fine chiseled cheekbones, his hazel eyes, his
sideburns, and the thick wall of black hair swept back from his forehead. He is
dressed in his customary olive-colored suit that looks a size or so too big on him.
Nabi is proud of the suit, Parwana knows, always tugging at the sleeves,
straightening the lapel, pinching the crease of his pants, though he has never

quite managed to eradicate its lingering whiff of burnt onions.
“Well, we had Queen Homaira over for tea and cookies yesterday,” Masooma
says. “She complimented our exquisite choice of décor.” She smiles amiably at
her brother, revealing her yellowing teeth, and Nabi laughs, looking down at his
cup. Before he found work in Kabul, Nabi had helped Parwana care for their
sister. Or he had tried for a while. But he couldn’t do it. It was too much for him.