Page 158 - And the Mountains Echoed (novel)

the full measure of what I’ve done for her. She can be

breathtakingly thoughtless, my daughter. If she knew the life
she would have had to endure, if not for me …

EB: Is your daughter a disappointment to you?

NW: Monsieur Boustouler, I’ve come to believe she’s my
punishment.

One day in 1975, Pari comes home to her new apartment and finds a small
package on her bed. It is a year after she fetched her mother from the emergency
room and nine months since she left Julien. Pari is living now with a nursing
student named Zahia, a young Algerian woman with curly brown hair and green
eyes. She is a competent girl, with a cheerful, unfrazzled disposition, and they
have lived together easily, though Zahia is now engaged to her boyfriend, Sami,
and moving in with him at the end of the semester.
There is a folded sheet of paper next to the package. This came for you. I’m
spending the night at Sami’s. See you tomorrow. Je t’embrasse. Zahia.
Pari rips the package open. Inside is a magazine and, clipped to it, another

note, this one written in a familiar, almost femininely graceful script. This was
sent to Nila and then to the couple who live in Collette’s old apartment and now
it is forwarded to me. You should update your forwarding address. Read this at
your own peril. Neither of us fares very well, I’m afraid. Julien.
Pari drops the journal on the bed and makes herself a spinach salad and some
couscous. She changes into pajamas and eats by the TV, a small black-and-white
rental. Absently, she watches images of airlifted South Vietnamese refugees
arriving in Guam. She thinks of Collette, who had protested the American war in
Vietnam in the streets. Collette, who had brought a wreath of dahlias and daisies
to Maman’s memorial, who had held and kissed Pari, who had delivered a

beautiful recitation of one of Maman’s poems at the podium.
Julien had not attended the services. He’d called and said, feebly, that he
disliked memorials, he found them depressing.
Who doesn’t? Pari had said.
I think it’s best I stay clear.
Do as you like, Pari had said into the receiver, thinking, But it won’t absolve

you, not coming. Any more than attending will absolve me. Of how reckless we