Before Ally could ask more, Huda pried apart two lengths of rusty wire separating the nursery from the vacant lot next door.
“Slide through,” she said.
Ally eyed the prickly purple thistle, flowering chamomile, and scraps of rusty tin poking from the earth. Dust and dirt coated a mound of broken concrete. Bright yellow dandelions had sprouted in its patchwork of crevices.
“Hurry up,” said Huda. “Before someone sees us.”
Ally slid reluctantly between the wires. Huda picked her way toward a pile of dry branches.
“The nurseryman man must have covered it up.” Huda dragged a large palm frond to the side.
Ally bent down to help.
“Covered what up?” She grabbed another frond.
“Careful!”
Too late, its serrated edge sliced Ally’s palm.
Huda tutted and pulled the last of the brush away.
A weathered slab poked from the earth. Ally remembered it from her first visit to the nursery. She leaned closer. The slab was made of sandstone, with two lines of Arabic script carved across its face.
“Is this a headstone?” she said slowly.
“Can you read it?”
“The second line says 1952 to 1972, right?”
“What about the line above that?”
Ally brushed dirt from the words carved into its face. Huda laid her hand on Ally’s shoulder.
“It says ‘Yusra,’” said Huda. “‘Yusra Hussain.’”
Ally moaned, so quietly it could have been the wind.
“Yusra’s dead? She’s been dead since 1972?” Ally touched the scarred marker. “How did this happen? She was so young.”
Huda squinted at the humid shadows of the nursery. The old man had disappeared. No insects buzzed. No lizards scrambled through the thorny grass. Even the river was quiet, its deadly currents hidden beneath a surface so smooth it could have been glass.
“Yusra was executed,” whispered Huda. “For treason.”
“Executed?” The word rang in Ally’s ears, so shocking she almost believed it had come from someone else’s mouth.
“From what I was told, Yusra joined the youth wing of the Iraqi Communist Party. Her cousin was already a member, and he convinced her to come to their meetings. She was not a high-ranking member. She was not important at all. But the party fell out of favor. It was banned, and that was enough for the regime.”
Ally’s throat constricted.
“You were right, Yusra did live on Eighty-Second Street,” continued Huda. “But the regime demolished her family home. That’s part of the punishment for traitors.” She glanced at the mound of broken concrete. “Rubble is all that’s left. That, and her gravestone.”
Ally asked herself, Could it be any lonelier, this small, sad slab buried under palm fronds and dust?
“The regime doesn’t care who it harms,” said Huda. “An innocent young nurse means nothing to them. It will do the same to Khalid and Hanan, unless you help us.”
“Tom won’t agree to this.” Ally wrung her hands. “I’m sorry.”
“Did you know traitors are forbidden proper burials?” said Huda. “Yusra was lucky to have her name on that stone. Most people don’t get that. ” She paused and eyed the burial slab. “I know this, because my brothers were called traitors. They were executed too.”
“Your brothers? Executed?” Once again, Ally’s voice sounded like a stranger’s in her ears.
“No one wrapped my brothers in burial shrouds. No one got to say prayers as they were laid to rest.” Pain eddied in Huda’s eyes. “For months afterward, my mother couldn’t leave our house, because if she cried in public the regime would have had her whipped.”
Ally felt like a traveler gone astray, who’d crossed too many time zones, too fast and too often, who could no longer tell day from night, who didn’t know the right words to say, or how to comfort the woman beside her, rigid with grief.
“I’m so sorry.” She reached for Huda’s hand. “Why didn’t you tell me before?”
“Because secrets aren’t for telling.” Huda looked suddenly much older, her wrinkles deeper, her eyes weary as the hour before dawn. She brushed a patch of dirt from the gravestone. “Your mother didn’t understand about secrets either, Ally. That’s how Yusra ended up dead.”
CHAPTER 24
Many years ago, Huda saw a young woman from her village swept away in a flood. Now as she looked at Ally, struggling to comprehend all she’d been told, she remembered the moment the sandbar collapsed beneath the young woman’s feet, how her mouth opened as the water seized her, but no sound escaped, not even a scream. She waited for Ally to say something, anything, but eventually Huda had to continue on alone.
“Your mother knew about Yusra’s political activities, and one day she let it slip to a mutual friend. That friend was . . .” Huda battled to keep her voice level. “That friend was an informant for the mukhabarat.”
“The mukhabarat?” Ally spat out the word with such disgust, it made Huda cringe. “You’re saying my mother told the secret police about Yusra? Why would she do that, for God’s sake?”
“Not the secret police,” muttered Huda. “An informant. They’re not the same.”
Ally clutched her temples.
“I can’t believe this.”
“I imagine your mother trusted the person she confided in. Maybe they really were friends.”
“Friends?” Ally’s mouth twisted. “Her and the informant?”
Huda stared at the pitiful headstone.
“Not all informants are willing. Most of them want a peaceful life, but then the mukhabarat come calling, demanding otherwise. This friend of your mother’s, this informant, maybe she had to do it to save her family.” She prayed Ally wouldn’t see the blood rising in her cheeks. “It’s complicated.”
“My mother and the informant,” said Ally slowly, “they’re to blame for Yusra’s death?”
“In Iraq, every friendship is a risk.” A tremor surfaced in Huda’s voice. She forced it back down, but it remained just under the surface, threatening to give way at any moment, like a sandbar dissolving beneath her feet. “You never know who might turn you in for something as small as a joke, or an offhand comment. Perhaps it will be your best friend who gets your tongue cut out. Perhaps it will be a colleague at work. Perhaps they don’t want to betray you, but the mukhabarat will harm their children otherwise.”
“I thought my mom was some sort of brave explorer. Now I find out she was a fool.” Ally crushed her hands to her eyes. “A dangerous fool.”
“Don’t condemn her,” said Huda gently. “We’re all in danger here. Even you.”
“Me?” The girl looked up. “What are you talking about?”
Huda glanced over her shoulder.
“I know you’re a journalist. And someone told Rania that you’re American.”
Horror mushroomed in Ally’s eyes.
“Who said that?”
“It doesn’t matter,” said Huda. “But it’s enough to land you in Abu Ghraib, or even on the executioner’s block. And if the mukhabarat find out, they’ll want to know why Rania and I didn’t tell them first. They’ll say we’re not patriots.” She glanced at the lonely headstone. “Maybe they’ll call us traitors.”
Ally turned a seasick green.
“I never wanted to cause trouble,” she said. “I’m such a fool, just like my mom.”
Tears began to slip from the corners of Ally’s eyes, reminding Huda of that river breaking its banks. Mustafa had been there too, when the sandbar gave way, and instantly he leaped in the water to save the young woman. But she panicked and clawed her way up his back, locked her arms around his neck, until the river dragged both of them down. The tips of the waves looked like teeth, swallowing them up. Eventually, Mustafa thrashed to the surface. Alone. He’d had to wrench the girl from his shoulders and release her to the river’s arms.
Guilt pushed the oxygen from Huda’s lungs. She wished that the
Tigris would rise up and swallow her, take her down to its silent, silty depths, where there was no right or wrong, no lies or betrayal, no manipulation. She winced as Ally bent over the sandstone marker and tried to wipe the dirt from Yusra’s name.
“It’s my fault.” The words leaped from Huda’s mouth before there was time to think, like Mustafa plunging into that stream.
Ally straightened up. There was a peculiar look on her face, like she already knew what Huda was going to say.
“What do you mean?”
Huda eyed Yusra’s lonely grave, a traitor’s grave like her brothers’. She took a breath and forged on, praying it would wash the stain from her heart.
“You’re not to blame. And neither was your mom.” She took Ally’s hand in hers. “The informant would have drawn her close. Just like I did to you.”
CHAPTER 25
Ally stomped along the river road, back toward Huda’s car, gravel crunching beneath her heels. Below her, the pontoon tugged at its moorings. Rania had left, and their table had been cleared. Ally lurched to a halt. Like tiny spiders, suspicions hatched in her mind.
“Is Rania working for them too?” She whirled toward Huda. “Is Rania an informant as well?”
“Please, keep your voice down.” Huda glanced over her shoulder. “And, no, she’s not. She’s a victim in this, like her daughter. And Khalid.”
Ally hurried on, muttering curses, and trying desperately not to panic.
“Ally, please, calm down.”
Huda reached for her arm, but Ally shied away. She needed space and time to think. The last thing she wanted was Huda’s false sympathy clouding her judgment.
“Tell me,” she said. “Exactly what have you been reporting to the mukhabarat?”
“Nothing.”
“Oh, come on. You’re an informant. By the very definition, that means you’re giving them information.”
Huda’s big eyes shone with tears. Ally wondered, Was that a trick she practiced in the mirror? Did the mukhabarat give her lessons on how to fake a smile, how to make a hug feel warm even if her heart was unmoved?
“I only told them little things,” Huda stammered, “here and there.”
“Exactly what were these ‘little things’?”
“Really, it was nothing.”
“Stop it,” she hissed. “If you want me to help you, you better start telling the truth.”
Fear flickered across Huda’s face, barely visible, like a fish among the reeds.
“One time, I mentioned Barbara and Inez.”
“Barbara and Inez? What do they have to do with this?”
“Nothing, like I told you,” said Huda. “I simply reported that you did aerobics at the UN with two oil-for-food inspectors called Barbara and Inez.”
“We do jumping jacks.” Ally slapped her hand against her forehead. “We’re not trading state secrets.”
“Like I said, mostly I have nothing to report. I just provide a few details about your daily activities. It’s not like you were doing anything suspicious, until, well . . .” Huda paused. She glanced at the Tigris, like she might find an answer in its tides. “I didn’t tell them about either of your visits to Eighty-Second Street.”
“You know that I went back?” Ally felt sick. “Have you been following me?”
“No, I never, I swear. The nurseryman told me. He said he hid in the tool shed when you came.” Huda eyed her. “No Iraqi likes to talk about the dead. They’re not coming back, no matter how much we pray. It’s the living we need to think of. We need to think of Khalid and Hanan.”
Ally squinted at the perfect blue sky with its perfect fluffy clouds, and prayed this wasn’t really happening. But even as the wish formed, she knew there’d be no miracle. God wasn’t going to save her, just like he never saved Yusra. Or Huda’s brothers. What about Khalid and Hanan? Would he turn a blind eye to them too?
“Let’s be honest.” Huda leveled her gaze. “You’ve done plenty of lying too.”
“I haven’t lived in the US since I was five years old, not since my mother died. And I haven’t done a scrap of reporting in Iraq.” Ally tugged on the passenger door.
“Wait,” said Huda. “If there’s anything more you want to ask me, do it now.”
Ally scowled.
“You don’t get to set a timetable for this.”
“You don’t understand.” Huda glanced over her shoulder. “There might be a microphone in my car.”
“A microphone?” Ally felt as if she was still on the swaying pontoon, with the Tigris pulsing beneath her feet. “In your car?”
“I can’t say for sure. But the mukhabarat know I don’t want to be an informant. They may be listening in on me . . . and you.” She stared at her kitten-heeled pumps. “So if you want to ask me anything, do it before we get inside.”
Ally searched the sky again, but it was too big and too bright.
“Are you telling the truth about Yusra and my mom?”
Huda nodded. “It’s the truth. I’m sorry.”
Ally couldn’t be sure if she saw concern or calculation in Huda’s eyes. The Iraqi woman unlocked the car. Ally raised her hand.
“Wait.”
Back at the nursery, she’d drilled Huda about her lies: exactly when she started informing on her, Abdul Amir’s role, the names of the men she reported to and what they looked like. But all the while, she avoided the most important question, kept her back to it, even though they could both sense it circling like a shark, its fin slicing the surface every now and then, a small, dark hint of the animal below.
“Were we ever really friends?” Ally didn’t want to ask this question, not because Huda might lie, but because she might not want to hear the truth. “Or was it all part of the act?”
“I’m your friend, of course.” Huda bent her head. “I couldn’t sleep last night trying to think of how I could prove this to you. But honestly, what can I do or say? You need to look into your heart. Do you really believe our friendship was a trick?”
“Why would I trust my heart?” Ally’s eyes stung. “I obviously can’t tell friend from enemy, just like my mom. And she got Yusra killed.”
“We can’t fix your mother’s mistakes, or mine.” Huda eyed the muddy river. “But perhaps we can beat the mukhabarat. If we stay loyal to each other, if we trust each other, then maybe we can change the patterns of the past.”
CHAPTER 26
The aroma of roasting chicken filled Huda’s kitchen. The phone jingled. She laid her knife next to a mound of sliced eggplant, wiped her hands on the kitchen towel, and grabbed the handset from its cradle.
“Hello?” Ally’s voice reverberated down the line. “Huda?”
Huda gripped the phone tight. It had only been a few hours since she dropped Ally at home.
“My dear, I can’t talk right now.” She prayed the girl wouldn’t say anything dangerous on the line, and that the mukhabarat weren’t taking notes. “I will stop by your house tonight when I go to the market. We’ll talk then. Now is not good.”
“Listen, I—”
“Really, it’s better if we talk later. I am frying eggplant. It’s—”
“Please, listen.” The girl’s words surfed in and out of a buzzy fog of static. “I’m going to Jordan for a short holiday. I want to leave tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow?” Huda pressed her hand to her chest. “That’s too soon. It’s impossible.”
“The day after, then. No later.”
“But I need to organize a car.”
“I can’t put this off.” Ally’s pitch began to climb. “Really, I can’t delay.”
“Okay, be calm. I will get everything ready for you to travel. Thank you, Ally. Thank you.”
As Huda hung up, tears gathered in her eyes. She hurried to Khalid’s room and stuffed three changes of clothes, a toothbrush, hat, and sneakers into his backpack. Tomorrow, she told herself, she’d add water, sesame bars, dates, and flatbread, and then sew the $540 she’d stashed in the tea canister in
to the lining of his bag.
Huda turned a circle, eyes like lighthouse lamps. Khalid’s Chewbacca doll lay beside his pillow. Should she pack it as well? She picked up the toy and hugged it to her chest. She pictured Khalid, six hundred miles away, all alone. Can I really do this? she asked. Can I send my baby away?
Huda wiped her eyes, then she grabbed the flashlight Khalid used for late-night sessions with Harry Potter and slid it into the backpack. The Corolla rattled into the street. Huda’s heart pounded. She shoved the backpack into the closet and slammed the door shut.
Out in the kitchen, the eggplant’s pale flesh was turning brown. Huda poured bread crumbs onto a plate and cracked two eggs into a bowl. She shot an anxious glance over her shoulder, and a string of egg white dribbled onto the counter. The front gate groaned.
Huda picked up a plank of eggplant and dipped it in egg wash. Abdul Amir’s key jangled in the front door. Boots crunched over tile. Huda took a deep breath and pressed the dripping eggplant into the breadcrumbs.
“Sister, we’ve come at a bad time,” muttered Abu Issa.
Huda wheeled around in shock, crumb-coated hands raised in the air.
“I didn’t intend to interrupt your dinner preparations.” Abu Issa stepped into the kitchen and sniffed. “Is that chicken with cardamom I smell?”
Huda’s heart hammered so hard she feared it might tear a hole in her ribs.
“What are you doing here? How did—”
The front door slammed. More boots. Abdul Amir barreled into the kitchen.
“What’s going on?” cried Huda.
Abdul Amir ignored her. Something in his eyes reminded her of Khalid by the lake at Martyr’s Monument, when he said her brothers would be ashamed of her. Abdul Amir went straight to the fridge, pulled out a six-pack of beer, and then hurried out to the garden.
“Abu Issa, would you mind waiting in the living room?” Huda grabbed a paper towel and wiped bread crumbs from her trembling hands. “I need to speak with my husband for a moment.”
“It’s better if you leave him alone.”
When the Apricots Bloom Page 25
