Page 45 - And the Mountains Echoed (novel)

When the girls were nine years old, the family gathered at Saboor’s family

home for an early-evening iftar to break the fast after Ramadan. The adults sat
on cushions around the perimeter of the room, and the chatter was noisy. Tea,
good wishes, and gossip were passed around in equal measure. Old men fingered
their prayer beads. Parwana sat quietly, happy to be breathing the same air as
Saboor, to be in the vicinity of his owlish dark eyes. In the course of the evening,
she chanced glances his way. She caught him in the midst of biting into a sugar
cube, or rubbing the smooth slope of his forehead, or laughing spiritedly at
something an elderly uncle had said. And if he caught her looking at him, as he
did once or twice, she quickly looked away, rigid with embarrassment. Her
knees began to shake. Her mouth went so dry she could hardly speak.
Parwana thought then of the notebook hidden under a pile of her things at
home. Saboor was always coming up with stories, tales packed with jinns and
fairies and demons and divs; often, village kids gathered around him and listened
in absolute quiet as he made up fables for them. And about six months earlier,

Parwana had overheard Saboor telling Nabi that one day he hoped to write his
stories down. It was shortly after that that Parwana, with her mother, had found
herself at a bazaar in another town, and there, at a stall that sold used books, she
had spotted a beautiful notebook with crisp lined pages and a thick dark brown
leather binding embossed along the edges. Holding it in her hand, she knew her
mother couldn’t afford to buy it for her. So Parwana had picked a moment when
the shopkeeper was not looking and quickly slipped the notebook under her
sweater.
But in the six months that had since passed, Parwana still hadn’t found the
courage to give the notebook to Saboor. She was terrified that he might laugh or

that he would see it for what it was and give it back. Instead, every night she lay
in her cot, the notebook secretly clutched in her hands under the blanket,
fingertips brushing the engravings on the leather. Tomorrow, she promised
herself every night. Tomorrow I will walk up to him with it.
Later that evening, after iftar dinner, all the kids rushed outside to play.
Parwana, Masooma, and Saboor took turns on the swing that Saboor’s father had
suspended from a sturdy branch of the giant oak tree. Parwana took her turn, but
Saboor kept forgetting to push her because he was busy telling another story.
This time it was about the giant oak tree, which he said had magic powers. If you
had a wish, he said, you had to kneel before the tree and whisper it. And if the
tree agreed to grant it, it would shed exactly ten leaves upon your head.

When the swing slowed to a near stop, Parwana turned to tell Saboor to keep
pushing but the words died in her throat. Saboor and Masooma were smiling at