When the Moon Is Low(94)

Samira’s hands are warm. The sweater she’s wearing is one Najiba’s daughter has outgrown. My daughter looks like a new girl in it. Her face has already started to fill in. What a difference it makes to see her bangs drawn back with a new tortoiseshell barrette that her aunt brought for her. It is a luxury to think about hair and clothes. I remember the clothing I used to wear in my first years with Mahmood. Now, I think of just how unimportant clothes are . . . and yet how life changing they can be.

Truths can be wholly contradictory, the blackest black and the whitest white all at once.

It’s now been two hours. The faces around us have been kind and unjudging. Their words slow and patient. The nurses smiled at Samira and she smiled back. It made it easier for me to see my youngest child led away. He watched me as he was rolled away, his fingers writhing, pulling at my heartstrings. The nurse put a hand on my arm and squeezed gently, saying wordlessly that she, too, was a mother and they would take good care of my son.

If they can mend his heart, there is hope for me.

In the few weeks since our arrival, much has happened. The hardest part was the first step—approaching the customs officer with nothing but the bare truth of why we were there, a white flag begging for mercy. The customs officer scowled and huffed and led us away as others watched, thankful not to be in our shoes and craning their necks to hear what was being said. We were a curiosity. I kept my eyes on the officer, unable to meet the onlookers’ stares.

We spent hours in one room before being shuttled off to another. At some point, they brought in an Iranian man. He translated my words into English, dryly and mechanically. Not once did he smile or offer a word other than what he was asked to say. He was not there to be our friend or advocate and made certain that point would not be misunderstood.

The process had begun. We were sent to a shelter, a building with small rooms and shared bathrooms. There were other refugees there, all in the same process. People of all different colors and tongues. Unable to communicate, we eyed one another with cautious distrust, as if we were vying against one another for a single opportunity, as if there could be only one winner among us. We wondered who had the most compelling story. Who among us was most worthy of this country’s sympathy? It was a disturbing, silent rivalry.

We were interviewed again. I gave every detail. I told them about my husband and the work he did and the enemies he’d somehow made. I told them of the night the men came to our home and took him away. Samira stared at the floor and listened. We’d not spoken of that night since it happened. The interpreter relayed our story to a woman who made notes, nodded her head, and moved on to the next page of questions. I told them about Saleem and how he disappeared along the way. I told them so they would have a record of my son for when he appears. They confirmed names and dates of birth and names of family members and addresses and all kinds of details. I was asked again and again for the same information, so many times that I thought I might trip over my answers, even though they were truths.

My sister Najiba was permitted to visit us. I fell into her arms. To be around family is to feel the possibility of growing roots again. When they asked about Saleem, my heart dropped. I’d been hoping he’d somehow made it to England ahead of me and was already in his aunt’s home, waiting for us to make our way there. My sister held me tightly. Her family came with her, Hameed and the children. The reunion was bittersweet, clouded by Mahmood’s absence. Hameed wiped away tears to see me without my husband, his cousin. For the moment, everything else between us, the twisted way he’d married into our family, was pushed aside. I had other, more pressing worries. Saleem was still missing. My sister did her best to keep my spirits up.

He will come soon enough, Fereiba-jan. He’s always been a clever boy. He is his father’s son.

Yes, he is.

We live in a small apartment now with a single bedroom and a small kitchen. It is modest and glorious all at once. While they consider our pleas, we have been granted identification cards and a few pounds per week for food. More than anything, I am grateful that they have evaluated Aziz. The dear doctor from Turkey was right. Aziz had a hole in his heart and needed surgery urgently, the doctors here told me. They would treat him while we waited for our case to be reviewed. With or without an interpreter, there was no way to express how grateful I was to hear that.

If only I could share this news with Saleem. I look for him everywhere we go. I see boys of his height or with his hair color and pray that one of them will come running toward me. I hear his voice in crowds and turn frequently and abruptly, wondering if I’m walking past him without knowing it. What if he is here but cannot find us? Samira knows and is unsurprised by my behaviors. She does the same. Harder than anything is not knowing where he is.

I dare to imagine a perfect world. I dare to dream that the woman writing my story on those many pages will stop and remember that a boy by the name of Saleem Waziri is here and in search of his family. I dream that I will tell him his brother is well. I dream that we receive a letter declaring that we will not be sent away and that we will be allowed to work and go to school and stay in this country where the air is clear and life is more like metal than dust.

And while I’m thinking of these things, a woman in a green hospital uniform walks toward me. Her hair is covered in a blue puff, the same grating blue as the walls. She removes her mask as she approaches. I stare at her face, anxious to see what news she will bring of my son. I can tell nothing from her eyes. I dare not stand up because she may very well knock me down with what she is about to say. I have no choice but to wait and listen.