Return to the Little Coffee Shop of Kabul

by Deborah Rodriguez

  Yes, she thought as she stopped herself from instinctively tossing the false cigarette to the ground to crush it out under her shoe, all in all life was pretty good. She still worried about the future of her country, and what it might bring to the lives of her family, but not too deep inside she felt the stirrings of hope. For she knew that in Afghanistan, though nothing was easy, nothing was impossible either.

  11

  There were days when Sunny thought that the spectacular view she had seen through the living room windows that first day on the island had been a mirage. Joe had told her to be patient, although, of course, his advice was delivered via an Italian proverb and an endless explanation that followed. It was true that sometimes, if you sat still long enough and were lucky enough to be at the window at exactly the right moment, you might catch a quick peek of the snow-capped mountain across the water before it would disappear again behind the fog. But that was about it.

  Patience. Sometimes Sunny thought she’d skipped straight from chaos to inertia, without ever stopping for the patience phase. There were days when she felt as though her entire self was being tested by the situation with Rick. He wasn’t budging, sticking firmly to his notion that the place should be held onto in honor of Jack and his dream. Yet he still refused to accept Sunny’s offer for her half of the property, even though she’d caved a little and dropped her asking price by a tad as an incentive.

  She leaned back into the couch and dug deep into a carton of mint chocolate chip ice cream. Bear lifted his head and eyed the spoonful with longing. This dog must eat better than I do, it occurred to her, remembering the little plastic bags of roasted chicken and rice Joe had left with her when he’d dropped Bear off for the day, claiming he had something he needed to do, although she couldn’t imagine what. There wasn’t anything to do in this damn place. Even Sangiovese, the cat, looked bored, his tongue scraping rhythmically across its paws in an endless, needless bathing ritual.

  She didn’t even want to think about how long she’d let herself stay on the island. The days just seemed to pass, and she’d wake each morning still there. Doing nothing. Nothing to do. She had tried, one Tuesday when it hadn’t looked too damp out, to take a walk, hoping it might help clear her head a little. She’d stood frozen at the bottom of the driveway, her eyes turning left, right, left, then back again, each direction reflecting a mirror image of the other, with nothing but a flat, dark corridor of thick pines stretching out as far as she could see. She finally chose a left, for no particular reason, and began to walk.

  At first it had been okay, and she started to think that perhaps this walking business might be something she’d try every morning; that is, until she settled things with Rick and left the island for good. But after about ten minutes of not seeing anyone else out there walking, or biking, or jogging, or driving for that matter, she started getting a little spooked. A couple of times she found herself spinning around to see who was following her, only to realize that the footsteps she heard had been her own. And the wildlife she’d hoped to spot during this attempt to become one with nature? All dead. Smashed squirrels and squished snakes and crushed slugs and flattened worms. Roadkill all around. At one point the sound of a plane overhead seemed to offer a welcome sign of life, but when she looked up it literally disappeared into thin air as the grey sky swallowed it whole. A ghost plane. After what seemed like an eternity of silence, she began to wonder if something had happened, if some terrible disaster, some apocalyptic event, had occurred, leaving her unaware and alone and left out there to die. She grabbed the phone from inside her pocket. No service, of course. Then she turned around and hurried back to the house, doubling her pace.

  What was with her, scared of her own shadow? Where was the Sunny who, much to Bashir Hadi’s, and Jack’s, dismay, would leap at any chance to throw on a head scarf and hit the unpredictable streets of Kabul on her own, so anxious to breathe in the smell of fresh naan coming from the bakeries and soak up the sights of the bearded vendors on Chicken Street as they haggled over the price of an “antique” sword or a lambskin hat? And when did she become such a lump? she wondered as she scraped at the bottom of the carton with the spoon. She never used to be like this. Hard work was something she’d always been drawn to, reveling in the challenge of a tough task and picturing the rewards she knew would follow. The coffeehouse was proof enough of that. She was proud of her accomplishment. And that feeling she used to get just from standing back and listening to the hodgepodge of languages, from seeing men and women from around the world, all so far away from everything familiar yet feeling so at home in her, Sunny’s, place? Nothing could beat that.

  Her last Skype session with Yazmina, from the vegan café down in town, had been a little tough. Seeing the jerky image of the Kabul coffeehouse in the laptop screen had made her feel as though it were a set of a movie, like it wasn’t, and had never been, real. The place looked good, with a few slight changes that had been made here and there—some new curtains, cushions, tablecloths—but it did seem a bit quiet for a Thursday evening. Yazmina had spoken quickly and breathlessly in her improving English, her face seeming to glow as she shared with Sunny her wonder at little Najama’s cleverness, her pride at her husband Ahmet’s involvement with others determined to help build a better Afghanistan, and her worries about what trouble that might bring. But she was clearly busy, and before Sunny had a chance to inquire after Halajan and Rashif, or Bashir Hadi, or to ask about how Yazmina’s sister Layla was doing in Minnesota, Yazmina had to go. Sunny had signed off with a feeling of envy she wasn’t proud of.

  Bear stood and stretched, then padded over to the couch where Sunny remained seated and rested his chin on her thigh with a sigh. “You said it, boy.” She stroked the brown fur on his head and stared out into the grey. There was no question about it. It was time to get out of Twimbly. It was time to settle with Rick. It was time to get a plan—a vision that was hers, and hers alone. And if it involved going back to Kabul, so be it. So long as she came up with a plan. It was time to get off her sweet ass and put it in gear.

  But this place didn’t seem to be helping much with that. She’d felt muddled and soft ever since she had stepped off that ferry. It was as though the island had cast an evil spell on her, one that made her lazy, and hungry, all the time.

  Yes, decisions needed to be made. But maybe not right this moment. Candace was coming to town. And she was bringing a surprise.

  12

  The blue dome capping the faded walls of the Shah-e-Do Shamshaira mosque loomed before her, the edifice nearly blending in to the dusty hills beyond and clear sky above, save for its stacked white columns and high, arched windows. Halajan rushed past, through the gaggle of old men stooping to feed the pigeons, her eyes straight ahead, defying anyone who might wonder at a woman traveling alone in the center of the city.

  The streets were jammed with traffic, horns blaring and tailpipes spitting out enough fumes to choke an elephant. She covered her nose and mouth with the bottom of her scarf and turned left onto the narrow bridge that spanned the Kabul River, its once verdant banks and flowing waters now a mud-caked trench littered with garbage and filth. Once safely on the other side, she paused for a moment to catch her breath, then continued left toward the Mondai-e bazaar, past the vendors on the streets surrounding the market, many crouched next to the blankets spread at their feet, others leaning on their wheeled carts as they sipped their chai, waiting for a taker for the fabrics and undergarments and sugarcane juice they offered. These were the ones, she knew, who were not allowed to be selling, who had not paid for the right to have their space. But that didn’t seem to stop anyone from buying. As Halajan was about to make the right turn into the passageway that would lead her to her destination, she heard a small voice at her side. “Rabbits, maadar kalaan? Do you need some rabbits today, grandmother?”

  She turned to see a grinning boy no older than ten, his clothes in tatters and his face smeared with dirt, offering a birdcage heaped with a squirming p
ile of brown fur. But as she bent closer for a better look, the boy’s smile suddenly collapsed, his eyes widening with fear. Out of the corner of her own eye she spied a blue-shirted policeman waving a stick. The boy lifted his arms to cover his face before the first blow fell. Halajan heard his cry and quickly stepped in front of him, raising her head to look the menacing man squarely in his steely eyes. This time the stick stopped in midair. Halajan’s look narrowed into a squinting dare as she remained frozen in place, waiting for the rage to leave the man’s face. Then she turned and began to slowly walk away, one eye remaining behind to make sure it was understood that there was no sale underway, and no reason to harass. The boy smiled and waved. Halajan quickened her step. Najama didn’t want a rabbit anyway. No, it was a peacock Halajan was after. And today, she was in the mood for a deal.

  Through the tight alleyways she wound, first left then right then left again. She knew her way well, from the times she had been here as a girl, with her father. The lane grew smaller as she continued—another left, then a right—until the sounds of the street were completely drowned out by the twitters and trills and caws bouncing off the crumbling mud walls. The Alley of Straw Sellers, where men had gathered for many generations with birds for sale, lay straight ahead.

  Halajan squeezed her arms close to her body as she entered the heart of the market, where in some places it was not even wide enough for two people to pass without touching. Seeds and husks sailed through the close air, stirred up by the flapping of hundreds of wings.

  It did not seem all that long ago to her that the birds of Kabul had been silenced by the Taliban. In a place where even the poorest of homes followed the old royal tradition of keeping songbirds, the bird sellers at the Market Kaa Forushi had been thriving. But to the fundamentalists, there was only one song that mattered—the song of the Koran—and everything else was deemed a distraction. They swarmed through the bird markets and into people’s homes, opening cages and forcing the birds out into a hostile world, one the birds were not prepared for, where many met their fates in the mouths of hungry cats and dogs.

  Now there were plenty of people keeping birds again. For even on the darkest of days, in a home with little money to spare, the song of a bird is an invitation to dream. And besides, how much trouble could a bird be anyway? thought Halajan. As Sunny used to say about Yazmina, they ate like birds.

  Today in the market there seemed to be more socializing than selling going on; the men and boys crouched close to their stalls, sharing a laugh or a smoke or a cup of chai. But as Halajan walked past their chatter suddenly seemed to come to a halt, silenced by the sight of a woman trespassing through their male world.

  That made Halajan itch for a bargain even more. Was her money not good enough? And what was the problem? she thought as she stopped for a moment to scan the alleyway behind her. She could not see even one other customer interested in purchasing their wares. Halajan took a deep breath, inhaling the cloud of cigarette smoke around her, and continued deeper into the dark maze.

  She passed the dog kennels empty of dogs but crowded with chickens and roosters and ducks, and circled around to the place where men kept their prized kowks and little budanas in airy wicker cages, to be let out only for show. Here the birds were treated like kings, coddled and fussed over from Saturday to Thursday, with hopes that Friday morning would bring riches from the men placing bets on their fighting prowess. Though from what Halajan remembered being told, even then the birds were scooped up and shielded from clawing talons before any true battle could occur. They were far too valuable to let any real harm come to them.

  Deeper and deeper she went, through the jumble of cages filled with canaries and finches belting out their birdsong in the dark alleyway. Some looked a little worn, others seemed scrappy. Halajan thought how confused they must all be from the darkness. You would hardly know what time of day it was, if it weren’t for the slivers of sunlight breaking through the narrow slats of the tin roofs above. But it was the caged doves that made her the saddest, with their hopeless dreams of flight stirred daily by the coos of their luckier brothers and sisters soaring through the late afternoon Kabul skies.

  Finally she came upon the peacocks. Halajan planted herself firmly in front of a toothless vendor who sat on his heels, sipping his tea. The man barely raised his eyes.

  “How much?” she asked without bothering to stop for the usual formalities.

  “Twelve thousand.”

  Halajan laughed. “The cost of half a year’s rice just for one little bird?”

  “That is my price.” The man stood and turned away from her, busying himself with a leaky bag of seed.

  “You must be a very rich man, to turn away at the smell of money.”

  The man shrugged his shoulders and continued with his task.

  “Twelve thousand afghanis for a bird that does not even sing. And that one over there, the one missing the feathers on his wing. How much is he?”

  The man turned toward the bird and hesitated. “Ten thousand,” he grunted.

  “For a scraggly old bird? You should be paying me to take him off your hands.”

  “He still has a beautiful tail. One with colors that will fetch a hefty sum.”

  “Okay. So then what about the white one? Who would want a peacock with no color?”

  “The albino peacock is very rare. Very prized. That will cost you thirteen thousand.”

  Halajan turned to leave, feeling insulted by this greedy man who seemed to have no sense. She pulled her scarf tighter around her neck and began to walk away.

  “Fifteen hundred,” came a voice from behind her.

  She turned back toward him and planted her feet firmly on the ground. “Fifteen hundred for what?”

  He reached his hand into a cage that held three small birds, retrieving one that he separated from the rest without hesitation. “Fifteen hundred for this one.”

  Halajan looked down at the little brown bundle of feathers. “Ach. You call that a peacock?”

  The man nodded. “It is a she-hen.”

  “How can you tell?” she asked, eyeing the others in the cage with suspicion.

  “The feathers on the wings. They are darker brown. It is a girl.”

  “So you are trying to sell me a peacock with no tail?”

  “She is all you can afford. She is not as prized as the male birds.”

  “Of course not,” said Halajan with a scowl. Not even in the bird world do women have any value. The little bird remained silent and still in the man’s rough hands. She was no bigger than a teakettle.

  “You must take it or leave it. I don’t have all day, old woman.”

  Of course you don’t, thought Halajan, as she stood contemplating the helpless creature in front of her. What kind of surprise would this be for Najama? No matter how long the girl might wait, there would never be a beautiful tail appearing from the behind of this bird. How would she ever explain this choice that was destined to end in disappointment?

  The man bent down to return the bird to the cage.

  “Wait!” Halajan commanded. “Twelve hundred and you have a deal.”

  “Thirteen,” he said as he straightened back up.

  Thirty minutes later she was back across the river, a domed cage wedged up against her skinny legs, waiting for a bus to carry her home. Three buses had passed her by before she had been able to locate where the normal stop was. It wasn’t like it used to be. Even during the Russian times there were proper bus stops, where the buses would pull over for passengers to get safely off and on. Now it was a free-for-all, with no signs anywhere, and the decision to stop purely at the whim of the driver. Finally one of the little green buses came to a halt in the street in front of her, and Halajan hurried to keep up with the others rushing to board, the birdcage banging against her side. She handed the attendant her ten afghanis and managed to secure the last available seat in the women’s section—the one directly in front of the men’s, the seat most women avoided so as to not be
forced to deal with harassing touches from behind. But Halajan didn’t care. If anyone wanted to bother with this grandma, go ahead. Sometimes it was good to be old, she thought as she took note of the women around her, their gazes lowered to avoid the leering stares and unwanted pursuit that happened so often when a young woman traveled by bus. Unable to simply use a smile as a way of flirting with a girl, with the hope of a smile in return, a boy would instead choose to follow her, knowing her daily habits, and where she would be when.

  Halajan lifted the cage onto her lap as more people crowded the bus. So many stops! And so much traffic. At this rate she would never get home. The peahen seemed impatient as well, its peeps and squawks growing louder and more frequent with the driver’s every step on the brake.

  “Shush!” whispered Halajan as she bent forward to check on the bird. It did look a little out of sorts, with its feathers puffed up and its eyes drooping shut. Finally the bus broke free of the traffic and was able to pick up some speed. Halajan steadied the cage with one hand and held fast to her seat with the other as they bounced up and down over the ruts and potholes below, counting the minutes before she could get off of this damn thing. The bird’s peeps and squawks were turning into more of a screech, and now, just like the men were glaring at the women, the women were starting to glare at her. “Quiet!” she hissed to the peahen. But the screeching wouldn’t stop. The bird did not look well. Perhaps it is carsick, Halajan thought, just as a dribble of thick liquid escaped from its beak.

  Halajan turned her head toward the window to avoid the stares of the women being cast upon her like sharp stones. How she envied the men in their cars below, free to come and go in privacy as they pleased. She closed her eyes and tried to concentrate on the surprise ahead. Najama would be happy as a trout in a mountain stream when she saw her peacock. There would be no reason to tell her the truth about the peacock being a girl, at least not until the bird was grown. And by then, inshallah, the two would have formed a special bond, and all would be forgiven.