Page 192 - And the Mountains Echoed (novel)

dirt path, the sound of his loud, confident voice. He was often distracted during

his morning lessons, his concentration lapsing as he thought of the games they
would play later, the stories they would tell each other. He worried he would
lose Gholam. He worried Gholam’s father, Iqbal, wouldn’t find steady work in
town, or a place to live, and Gholam would move to another town, another part
of the country, and Adel had tried to prepare for this possibility, steel himself
against the farewell that would then follow.
One day, as they sat on the tree stump, Gholam said, “Have you ever been
with a girl, Adel?”
“You mean—”

“Yeah, I mean.”
Adel felt a rush of heat around his ears. He briefly contemplated lying, but he
knew Gholam would see right through him. He mumbled, “You have?”
Gholam lit a cigarette and offered one to Adel. This time Adel took it, after
glancing over his shoulder to make sure the guard wasn’t peeking around the
corner or that Kabir hadn’t decided to step out. He took a drag and launched
immediately into a protracted coughing fit that had Gholam smirking and

pounding him on the back.
“So, have you or not?” Adel wheezed, eyes tearing.
“Friend of mine back at the camp,” Gholam said in a conspiratorial tone, “he
was older, he took me to a whorehouse in Peshawar.”
He told the story. The small, filthy room. The orange curtains, the cracked
walls, the single lightbulb hanging from the ceiling, the rat he had seen dart
across the floor. The sound of rickshaws outside, sputtering up and down the
street, cars rumbling. The young girl on the mattress, finishing a plate of biryani,

chewing and looking at him without any expression. How he could tell, even in
the dim light, that she had a pretty face and that she was hardly any older than
he. How she had scooped up the last grains of rice with a folded piece of naan,
pushed away the plate, lain down, and wiped her fingers on her trousers as she’d
pulled them down.
Adel listened, fascinated, enraptured. He had never had a friend like this.
Gholam knew more about the world than even Adel’s half brothers who were
several years older than him. And Adel’s friends back in Kabul? They were all
the sons of technocrats and officials and ministers. They all lived variations of
Adel’s own life. The glimpses Gholam had allowed Adel into his life suggested

an existence rife with trouble, unpredictability, hardship, but also adventure, a
life worlds removed from Adel’s own, though it unfolded practically within
spitting distance of him. Listening to Gholam’s stories, Adel’s own life