Page 253 - And the Mountains Echoed (novel)

Hector’s father, Cesar, came over to our house a few days later and he and I

installed the same wheelchair ramp Cesar had built outside his own house
leading up to the front door, the American flag draped above it. I remember, as
the two of us worked on the ramp, I felt a need to apologize to Cesar for what
had happened to Hector in my father’s homeland.
“Hi,” I say. “I thought I’d check in.”
“It’s all good here,” Hector says. “We ate. We did Price Is Right. We’re
chillin’ now with Wheel. Next up is Feud.”
“Ouch. Sorry.”

“What for, mija? We’re having a good time. Aren’t we, Abe?”
“Thanks for making him eggs,” I say.
Hector lowers his voice a notch. “Pancakes, actually. And guess what? He
loved them. Ate up a four-stack.”

“I really owe you.”
“Hey, I really like the new painting, girl. The one with the kid in the funny
hat? Abe here showed it to me. He was all proud too. I was, like, damn! You
should be proud, man.”
I smile as I shift lanes to let a tailgater pass. “Maybe I know what to give you
for Christmas now.”
“Remind me again why we can’t get married?” Hector says. I hear Baba

protesting in the background and Hector’s laugh, away from the receiver. “I’m
joking, Abe. Go easy on me. I’m a cripple.” Then, to me, “I think your father
just flashed me his inner Pashtun.”
I remind him to give Baba his late-morning pills and hang up.

…

It’s like seeing the photo of a radio personality, how they never turn
out to look the way you had pictured them in your mind, listening to their voice
in your car. She is old, for one thing. Or oldish. Of course I knew this. I had
done the math and estimated she had to be around her early sixties. Except it is
hard to reconcile this slim gray-haired woman with the little girl I’ve always
envisioned, a three-year-old with dark curly hair and long eyebrows that almost
meet, like mine. And she is taller than I imagined. I can tell, even though she is
sitting, on a bench near a sandwich kiosk, looking around timidly like she’s lost.

She has narrow shoulders and a delicate build, a pleasant face, her hair pulled