Authors: Elliot Ackerman
Just to the east, the border traced the summits of the mountains. Soon the sun would rise there. Already its snow-covered ridges throbbed deep blue like a first sky. These peaks were the only ones that stood tall enough to still have snow. Just beneath them, the pines bit their roots into the rocky soil. Somewhere among those peaks or beyond them were Gazan’s men. Looking toward the border, I felt my wish for badal mix with my wish for redemption, for what I did to Tawas.
I opened Mumtaz’s front gate and craned my neck into the dirt lane outside. I wished to see Gomal again, but not as I had before, not as a soldier. Mud-walled homes ran along the lane for a few hundred yards and emptied into a bazaar that was nothing more than a gathering of wood stalls and steel-shuttered mud huts. One by one, columns of smoke rose from the thatched rooftops as cooking fires were lit.
I heard a hacking cough behind me and a tired shuffling of feet. Mumtaz stepped through the courtyard and landed on his knees by the pots and pans. He pulled down the band of his trousers and pissed into the ditch that ran out the back wall. The kitchen was also the toilet. Iskander trotted from the chicken coop and licked Mumtaz behind the ears. He reached back, patted the dog on the head, and groaned. Then he stood heavily, planting one leg after the other as if he were summiting a mountain.
Good morning, I trust you slept well? he asked.
Very well, thank you, I said.
He poured a pitcher into a steel dish, rinsing it, and then he tossed the dirty water into the ditch so it guttered beneath the back wall with his piss.
Come, he said. I’ll fix us some breakfast.
He offered a smile that was impossible not to return. I carried an armful of wood from the chicken coop to the stove and restarted the fire. This and the rising sun heated the room quickly. Mumtaz came through the doorway with a bag of rice, an onion, and a steel pot of water. We boiled the rice, cut the onion, and waited for our breakfast to cook. Each time Mumtaz opened the lid and stirred, he inhaled the steamy smells of our meal, making a great show of his preparations.
Food has been very tough to come by since the checkpoints, he said. But you’re my meelma. Let no man say that Mumtaz doesn’t understand hospitality.
You’ve been very gracious, I said, and thanked him.
You’ll need your strength if you’re going to find work here, he answered, laughing.
I said nothing to this, but asked: Will I be able to buy a phone in the bazaar?
Oh, yes, he said, there are several vendors there who can help you.
I could sense Mumtaz’s curiosity, but manners would keep him from asking whom I’d be calling, so I answered his curiosity with a lie. Good, I said, my family will be glad to know I’ve arrived and am looking for work.
Mumtaz returned an unsatisfied nod.
As we waited for our meal to cook, we sat silently. I thought about the phone, and as I did I recited Commander Sabir’s number in my head:
09973285676, 09973285676,
09973285676.
It had become like a prayer, uttered often, tethering me to my purpose.
Mumtaz heaped two spoons’ worth of rice into my steel bowl. I took large mouthfuls and ate quickly. I wanted to finish before he did and leave for the bazaar, alone. If I traveled with him, the people in the village would be more likely to approach me. I wondered if my story would unravel against their questions. The thought of it reminded me
of the nervousness I once felt when repeating my multiplication tables to Ali. I hoped to avoid that pressure. In the bazaar I’d figure a way to get a phone, but more important, I’d figure a way to get to Atal.
I finished breakfast and took my dish out to the kitchen as I left. Iskander saw me pass through the gate and into the dirt lane. With me gone, he ran inside to be with Mumtaz as the meal was finished.
The streets came to life with a slow pulse. A few men walked toward the bazaar, pushing wheelbarrows or carrying items of little value—wood, scrap metal, some old electronics. Others did nothing at all. They crouched in their doorways and watched the day pass as if its possibility were a rumor. Behind them, through the open gates of their compounds, women cleaned. They washed linens in water basins and dried their many-colored wraps of green, red, and blue on the cracked mud walls. At times, the wind caught these colors and the inside walls billowed into a bright festival while the color of the outside walls seemed lost to the earth. Many of the women stared at me from their homes as I passed. Their faces were uncovered and drawn to my unknown face by instinct. And despite all, Gomal endured, it stirred with a determination to exist, despite Commander Sabir’s siege, despite Gazan’s mortar attacks, and despite Atal’s stubbornness.
I walked through the village carefully. I met no one’s stare, but neither did I look away. If I were seen, perhaps it would come to the attention of Atal and he’d find me, but if I were noticed, my purpose might be questioned. All things were balance in this new game.
When I arrived at the bazaar, most of the stalls had just opened. A man with a clean white shalwar kameez and a neat gray vest raised the rolled steel shutter of his shop front. Inside was a well-kept display of electronics.
Can I help you? he asked, his voice flat and unwelcoming.
I’m looking for a mobile, I said.
The man fastened a lock that held the steel shutter open and its weight sagged against the mud wall to which it was bolted. He disappeared behind a wooden counter, returning with a phone in fresh plastic packaging, the kind that comes from that outside world, the one I’ve always imagined to be clean and clear. The shopkeeper held out the phone, but didn’t give it to me.
You came all the way here to buy this? he asked.
I came here for work, I said, and stuck out my hand, demanding the phone in exchange for my answer.
He handed it over.
What job could be had here? he replied. His response was part statement and part question. Perhaps there was a business opportunity he’d overlooked.
I was in the Special Lashkar, I said, but left only recently because of an accident.
An accident? he asked.
An unfortunate one, I said. I’ve been to this village before, when I was a soldier. I need work and this seemed like a good place to start looking.
The strength of my story was that it was almost the whole truth. There was no reason to hide that I used to be a soldier, in fact this would make the news of my presence spread quickly, and hopefully to Atal.
With my story planted, I paid for my phone and left the store. On my way out from the bazaar, I stopped by one of the open-air stalls and bought a heavy blanket and a foam mattress. As I turned to leave, a woman in a pale blue burka edged next to me. I tensed my body, struggling not to stare at her. Slowly she looked over the blankets, pillows, pots and pans that were on display. She was covered and her head never turned in my direction, but from behind the mesh face screen of the burka, I felt her eyes hang on me. And I knew it was Fareeda.
She said nothing, she couldn’t, but she stood next to me and lazily ran her good hand on the soft blankets. I wanted to pour myself out to her and take her all the way back through everything—Tawas, my brother, Commander Sabir, her uncle, badal
.
I wanted her to understand. But she couldn’t and she couldn’t speak with me, a stranger and a man, in public. Still she stood there. In the quiet and the standing was a sympathy. And as she turned to leave, the back of her hand touched mine and I felt I’d soon see Atal.
–
When I returned, Iskander was napping in the middle of the dirt courtyard. His belly was upturned to the sun and his paws were extended and bent at the wrist. I walked into the house where I found Mumtaz in a similar position next to the stove. He writhed on the floor, scratching his back against it, and I looked out the door and to the courtyard, where Iskander now did the same. Tucked in the corner of the room was Mumtaz’s bedding. I placed my new blanket and pillow next to his. We had no wood. I’d burned it all. And the thought of spending the night in this room with Mumtaz was enough for me, I didn’t want to spend the day with him too, so I took to the hills in search of firewood and a place where I could send a message to Commander Sabir unnoticed.
By late morning the streets were nearly empty. Packs of dirt-faced children kicked up dust, roughhousing and chasing the feral dogs who roamed in competing packs, but aside from this, the men had taken to whatever work they had and the women toiled inside their compounds. I could’ve left the village in any direction, but the eastern border loomed, drawing me to its snowcapped mountains and slopes covered with stubborn pines. I traveled a narrow path out of the village that weaved through an easy rise of foothills before it ran in switchbacks to the altitudes.
I hiked among the trees, stacking felled branches into small piles along the path, climbing ever higher. Soon I stood amid an outcropping of gray rocks that broke through the thick forest. This was where Commander Sabir wanted to build the outpost. I understood why. The ground commanded the valley below. Among the rocks there was a large boulder held in place by several bent trunk pines that had grown, and now strained, at its base. This dangerous balance had likely existed longer than the village. From such a height, the mud-walled compounds and dirt lanes appeared like undiscovered mites in the flank of the mountain, protected only by their insignificance. I crouched between the boulder and the face and shielded myself from the gaze of anyone below. I took out my phone and punched in the numbers that tethered me to my other life,
09973285676.
Then I sent a single word: ARRIVED.
As I admired the view, I heard a crash beneath me. I crouched and strained to see between the trunks. The crash came again. Low voices followed. I sat motionless and exposed. To move would’ve been most dangerous of all.
Three men with a lean and hard appearance, but nearly frail, crossed the steep mountain on the sides of their feet. A youthful whine came from the back of the column: We should sleep at the flat rock, even if we used it two nights ago.
The youth had a fresh face and wore a black shalwar kameez under a red sequined vest. The vest was gaudy like those worn by circus monkeys, but any amusement I felt at his appearance left me when I saw the steel mortar tube balanced on his shoulder.
Don’t get lazy, said the man in front.
His comments seemed at odds with his appearance as he stumbled forward, holding his rifle by the barrel, nearly dragging it on the ground. The fighters sifted between the trees. Their clothes fit loosely, and it was only where a shoulder strap pressed, or a belt of ammunition was slung,
that their hungry bodies could be seen. I imagined what was unseen. I thought these men were so starved that if I pressed their aching stomachs, my fingers might count out the bones on their spines. I wondered if they had any capacity to imagine another life. If they didn’t, this was their greatest suffering.
Their footsteps faded across the ridgeline, but I squatted and strained to hear the complete silence that would assure me they’d passed. Soon the quiet of the mountains returned. I stood, slowly, and descended, gathering the firewood I’d left along the path. By the time I’d made it halfway down, I strained to see over the heap in my arms and stumbled toward the village.
Suddenly a pair of hollow thuds rang out from the direction the three men had departed in. A thin finger of smoke rose through the trees and quickly blew to nothing. For a moment, all drew silent again. Then, just outside the village, the earth sprouted skyward in two places. Still it was silent, until rushing toward me came the
crump
of the impacts as their noise spilled over the mountains.
I froze. From above the woodpile in my arms, I looked down into the village. There was nothing I could do. I was in no danger. I knew where the mortar team was and was glad I wasn’t sitting with Mumtaz and Iskander below. The dust from the first two impacts cleared. The village offered little reaction, no people diving into their homes, no mothers running down the streets to protect their children. Everyone paused, looked up, and continued their business as though they’d noticed the first snowflakes on a day when the sky was already heavy and the air already cold.
Two more hollow thuds rang out. I awaited the second salvo with greater fear than I had the first. The crew would’ve adjusted their aim now and the impacts would be among the homes. The rounds hung in the air, but tore up the earth in the exact same place. No adjustments
had been made. It seemed the mortar crew missed on purpose. As the
crump
tumbled along the mountainside, the villagers below paid less attention to this salvo than to the first. Children still taunted dogs in the streets and men still lazed in the open air of the bazaar.
Suddenly my phone vibrated. I laid down my woodpile and checked it. Commander Sabir had left a text: UNDERSTOOD. I crouched against the hillside and fumbled through the pop-up menus until I managed to delete the message and the incoming phone number. With that finished, I rushed down the mountainside toward Mumtaz’s compound, confident that my armful of firewood would keep him happy and that gossip had already spread through the village—an old soldier from the Special Lashkar was looking for work.
I
spent most of my time with Mumtaz, leaving his compound only to gather firewood or, on occasion, to wander down to the bazaar in the hope that someone might mention to Atal that I’d been there. Mumtaz and I spent a great deal of time sipping tea, petting Iskander—who eventually allowed me to scratch him behind his clipped ears—and sharing stories.
Mumtaz’s enthusiasm for this last activity was unmatched. Each morning, as soon as I had loaded the stove with dry branches and stoked a good flame, I’d prop myself against my mattress and he’d begin. He told me of his family, stories that felt ancient, stories from before the war. He spoke of his father, who drove a truck, and how when he was a boy he’d accompanied him as far as Isfahan to the west, Lahore to the east, and Tashkent to the north. His father’s business had been prosperous and when Mumtaz was younger, he’d dreamt of building it into something larger than the work of a single man. Also he told me of his brother and how they would steal eggs from chicken coops like the one Iskander slept in and trade them for cigarettes in the bazaar.