Nadia Hashimi - A House Without Windows

He leaned in.

“Then why not make it simple? Why not plead guilty to the crime? Just one visit with the qazi and you’ll save us all a lot of trouble.”

His tone was not antagonizing or patronizing, nor did he look ready to walk away. He was curious.

Zeba met his stare. He was asking the question Zeba asked herself a thousand times over. Why not take the final step and declare herself guilty before the qazi did? Why prolong this misery?

“Well?”

Zeba looked at Yusuf, his bright eyes and thick hair. She saw decency in him. She saw an earnestness that she’d never seen in anyone before and didn’t understand. That was what felt so foreign about him, along with his thin framed lenses.

She couldn’t answer that question. Was it because confessing to this crime felt wrong? Was it because she didn’t want her children to hear the words? Maybe it was because she secretly hoped Yusuf would find a way to help her. The questions were too much. She turned away.

“You’re not ready to give up,” Yusuf concluded, nodding his head. He was digging his heels into this case when every attorney at the office was telling him not to waste his time. “I don’t know the reason. Maybe it’s a simple one. Or maybe it’s complicated. But you don’t want to say you’re guilty. And that’s all I need right now. I can work with this.”

Yusuf’s mind raced. He would have to be creative. His foot pressed against the floor as if it were an accelerator.

Zeba closed her eyes. What was she doing to this boy? Was it wrong to pull him into this mess? He was so young, too young to share in this bloody mess. It would surely ruin him, and she would be the one to blame.

GULNAZ KNEW HE’D SEEN HER COMING UP THE HILL. HIS CHAIR was positioned under the shade of the chinar tree, a position that put him right in the way of visitors to the shrine. The ziyarat, tall and majestic, loomed over his humble desk, a slab of wood on a crate. When she got close enough that he could be sure his eyes were not deceiving him, he put his teacup down, interested. He’d expected her to walk past his open-air studio without a pause in her step.

Jawad watched her careful steps, her generous head scarf hiding her hair and delicate shoulders. The rest of the world could decay and crumble, and much of it had, but time dared not touch Gulnaz.

Gulnaz was still a beautiful woman, even with her fifty-some years. Jawad’s chest tightened to think of her milk white complexion and bewitching green eyes. He shook his head and, for the thousandth time in his life, regretted that he lacked the power to make his own wishes come true.

Jawad pulled three tiny squares of paper from his leather pouch. Just like the others, Gulnaz was seeking something.

“ Salaam-ulaikum, ” she said, trying not to sound as breathless as she was. Her back was straight and confident, but her kohl-rimmed eyes darted behind her occasionally. No doubt, her son had no idea where she was.

“ Wa-alaikum al-salaam, ” he replied. Gulnaz hadn’t called on his services in years. Jawad was curious what dilemma might have brought in the town’s most beguiling widow. The breeze teased wisps of jet black hair out from beneath her head scarf.

It was midmorning, a time between prayers. A few people wandered through the arched porticoes and coiled pilasters. No one noticed Gulnaz, daughter of their beloved spiritual leader. Jawad knew the murshid well and was one of the few people in town not utterly devoted to him. He smiled to think what the great Safatullah would say to see his daughter calling on him.

“What can I do for you, Khanum?”

The turquoise tiles of the mosque glimmered in the sunlight. Gulnaz shielded her eyes from the glare. She pretended not to notice the way Jawad looked at her.

“I have come to ask for something.”

“Of course. Tell this simple man how he can be of help to you.”

Gulnaz tried to sound formal, as if this were their first conversation.

“I am in need of a taweez, ” she said carefully. She didn’t want to stray from the script she’d rehearsed on her way up the hill.

“And what kind of taweez do you need exactly?” Jawad was the town’s most notable talisman maker. He had crafted a talisman for nearly every villager at some point or another, not to mention the visitors who came to pray at the ziyarat . The hope that a taweez offered was hard to resist, and his were known well beyond the town’s borders for their potency. That was why, after so many years, Gulnaz was again standing before him, in a place so holy people said every seventh pigeon carried a spirit and that gray pigeons would turn white within forty days of joining the flock.

“Protection.”

Jawad paused.

“Protection,” he repeated. Jawad was intrigued. He squinted up at Gulnaz, his wrinkled face tanned from years of hilltop sun. He was somewhere between sixty and sixty-five years old but had not a single gray hair. He’d been writing taweez for as long as he could remember and had clashed with Safatullah on more than one occasion.

Safatullah Kazimi was the most renowned murshid of their province. Safatullah had, from a young age, garnered attention for his mystic devotion to Allah, for his ability to lift the prayers of those around him to Allah’s ears. By the age of twenty-five, his hair had turned completely white, which everyone took as a testament to his divinity and wisdom.

Safatullah’s family lived a kilometer away from the edge of the ziyarat, the tomb of a beloved mystic. Maybe it was the hallowed ground or maybe it was the flocks of devout travelers — but something made Safatullah into a figure larger than life. His reputation grew as he saved children from fatal illnesses, restored sight to the blind, and gave barren families precious babies. He took no money for his work though people brought him whatever gifts they could. Even when wishes weren’t granted, people left with solace and understanding. He steadied their spirits and affirmed their beliefs.

The work Jawad did was similar. For a fee, he offered people recourse when prayers weren’t enough. His skills weren’t mentioned in the Qur’an, and though nearly everyone sought him out, no one talked about their taweez . It was something private, between the seeker and Jawad, who would carefully etch the letters and numbers on the tiny squares of paper.

On more than one occasion, Safatullah had advised his followers against using Jawad’s services. There was nothing that a talisman could say better than a devoted heart. He didn’t like that Jawad charged a fee for his service and felt Jawad wasn’t pious enough to be writing amulets. Jawad had said, loudly enough for his words to reach Safatullah’s ears, that charging a small fee was more honest than expecting a lamb from the poorest family.

Jawad had also accused Safatullah of following in his father’s footsteps and serving as a spy for the British. The previous murshid, Safatullah’s father, was rumored to have helped overthrow King Amanullah, the monarch who sought to free Afghanistan from Britain’s reins. Though Safatullah was still in diapers when King Amanullah had been forced to abdicate, it was a suspicion that stuck with him like the smell of garlic on fingers.

Then again, Safatullah, as the son of a grand murshid, was part of the light, part of the righteous, and Jawad was outside of Islam, a purveyor of the secrets and tricks people used when their faith became sullied with desperation.

“Protection, Jawad- jan . No family is above misfortune. As you said, our family is very much respected. There are eyes of every color upon us, and I have to look after the ones I love. I need to protect them.”