American Spartan by Ann Scott Tyson

Author:Ann Scott Tyson
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3, mobi
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2013-03-10T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 20

ONE WARM SPRING EVENING under a sky brimming with stars, Noor Afzhal rose from a wooden cot in the courtyard of his Mangwel qalat. The village was quiet except for the soft chorus of neighbors’ voices and a donkey braying in the distance. He stepped through a doorway and walked past the front gate to the hujira, or guest room. There he slipped off his plastic sandals and sat cross-legged on a carpet. Reclining slightly against a large cloth pillow, he was content to be surrounded by his sons and grandsons.

Jim sat in his usual spot, by Noor Afzhal’s left side.

Raza Gul, Noor Afzhal’s youngest and most cheerful son, rolled out a rectangular plastic mat on the floor. Then a ten-year-old grandson came through the door carrying a basin and a long-spouted water pitcher, or loota. He placed the basin in front of each man in turn and carefully poured water over their outstretched hands, then offered them a towel. Raza Gul returned with a stack of warm, homemade wheat bread and placed one of the flat rounds in front of each man. Boys followed with large metal platters of fragrant rice and smaller plates of stewed chicken. They hunched over and began eating, breaking off pieces of bread and dipping it in the chicken stew, and scooping up rice with their right hands and pushing it into their mouths with their thumbs in the Afghan manner.

Noor Afzhal ate heartily. His health had revived since Jim brought a heart surgeon to the village to examine him and prescribe medicine for his heart and high blood sugar. Jim watched the elder’s intake of sweets, constantly checking to make sure he was drinking his tea without sugar. Noor Afzhal was visibly stronger and more robust than when Jim had met him in Jalalabad a year earlier, in the summer of 2010. He walked farther and sometimes sportily rode on the back of Azmat’s motorcycle.

Jim tore off a piece of chicken meat and turned to Noor Afzhal.

“You are getting younger and I am getting older, wailay, why?” Jim asked him.

“It’s because you have taken the responsibility,” said Noor Afzhal with a smile.

After they finished eating, Raza Gul took away the food and folded up the plastic mat with the leftover bread. A short while later, another grandson arrived with a pot of green tea and a tray of glasses. Then Jim’s favorite of the grandsons, an active boy with a mischievous grin whom he nicknamed “Little Malik,” came in, and Jim called him over to play.

“God made a mistake,” Jim told Noor Afzhal, taking a sip of tea. “I should have been born in Afghanistan.”

“God does not make mistakes,” Noor Afzhal replied, not missing a beat. “You were born in America so you could come here and help us.”

The longer Jim stayed in Mangwel, the more he emerged as Noor Afzhal’s de facto eldest son and his biggest protector and ally, even within his immediate family. Noor Afzhal set aside a room inside his qalat for Jim.

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