Page 218 - The Kite Runner

The Kite Runner 207

“And Bamiyan is so close. We know people there. Forgive me,
Rahim Khan. I pray you understand.”
“Of course,” I said. “You have nothing to apologize for. I
understand.”
It was midway through tea after shorwa that Hassan asked
about you. I told him you were in America, but that I did not know
much more. Hassan had so many questions about you. Had you
married? Did you have children? How tall were you? Did you still
fly kites and go to the cinema? Were you happy? He said he had
befriended an old Farsi teacher in Bamiyan who had taught him to
read and write. If he wrote you a letter, would I pass it on to you?
And did I think you would write back? I told him what I knew of you
from the few phone conversations I had had with your father, but
mostly I did not know how to answer him. Then he asked me about
your father. When I told him, Hassan buried his face in his hands
and broke into tears. He wept like a child for the rest of that night.
They insisted that I spend the night there. Farzana fixed a
cot for me and left me a glass of well water in case I got thirsty.
All night, I heard her whispering to Hassan, and heard him sob-
bing.
In the morning, Hassan told me he and Farzana had decided
to move to Kabul with me.
“I should not have come here,” I said. “You were right, Hassan
jan. You have a zendagi, a life here. It was presumptuous of me to
just show up and ask you to drop everything. It is me who needs to
be forgiven.”
“We don’t have that much to drop, Rahim Khan,” Hassan said.
His eyes were still red and puffy. “We’ll go with you. We’ll help you
take care of the house.”
“Are you absolutely sure?”