President Daoud’s family had been sequestered in the sunroom of Dilkhusha. When I heard someone call Rostam’s name across the lawn, I wondered if my friends had tried to slip away and pay me a visit. Hours later, there was still no sign of them. I huffed to think I had to wait for the storm to pass before I could rejoin Neelab and Rostam.
My mother gave me little room to wander, ordering me to stay close by. I felt like a prisoner in a place that had always been my playground. We were still across from the presidential library, so I could at least find an escape on those rich shelves.
My mother kept mainly to the bedroom with my brother. Faheem had been complaining of a stomachache since the night before. She’d been spooning warm fennel tea into his mouth while he tried to bury his face in his chest. I was seven years old when he was born. I remember curling myself around Madar’s growing belly and feeling my brother’s sharp kicks. Excited as I was to meet this new sibling, I also worried that he might siphon off all my parents’ attentions.
But once he was born, I was so smitten by his tiny fingers and powdery smell that I didn’t resent him one bit. And Madar’s lap somehow had room for both of us, the curious anatomy of a mother’s love.
I would press my head to her chest and hear the rhythmic thumping of her heart, as if a clock sat caged in her chest. I listened for it anytime I lay next to her, pushing away gnawing thoughts of hearts subject to the limits of time.
At noon, the hilltop cannon boomed as it always did. Though the morning had dragged, the hour had still snuck up on me. I was starting to feel hungry and wondered if I should help prepare something for Madar and Faheem. My father was tied up in discussions that didn’t seem to be going anywhere because he still hadn’t emerged with any good news.
I peeked into the bedroom and saw that my mother had fallen asleep curled around Faheem. Not wanting to wake them, I walked softly toward the kitchen. I stopped when I heard the familiar voices of the kitchen staff speaking in panicked whispers.
“You can’t be serious! Why would they do this?”
“I just saw it with my own eyes. Those tanks outside have just turned their guns on the palace. We are under siege!”
I walked into the kitchen.
“Why would the tanks point their guns at us?” I asked. “And what do you mean we’re under siege?”
The two men had their hands on the counter, their faces grim. They were unfazed that I’d overheard their conversation.
“Find your mother, little girl,” one man said, barely looking at me. “Stay with her. This is not a time for play.”
Startled by the edge in his voice, I left without asking for food. I wanted to report to my mother what I had just learned and gauge her reaction. I wanted even more to find my father. He would be able to fix whatever it was that had gone so terribly wrong. Though I couldn’t name it, I had a sense that something ominous was happening.
I shook my mother’s shoulder. Her eyes were still heavy with sleep, since she hadn’t gotten much the night before. But once I had unloaded the news on her, she blinked away the haze. She made me repeat what I’d said and promise that I had not misheard. She composed herself and reassured me, but I’d already seen the flash of panic on her face.
“Everything will be fine. I must find your father,” she said, blinking rapidly.
As if summoned, Boba appeared in the doorway. He was unshaven and sullen, his sleeves rolled up.
“Sulaiman—” my mother said.
My father squeezed my shoulder and walked across the room, sinking into the chair as if he were carrying his weight in stones.
“The winds have changed direction,” he said.
“Speak clearly,” my mother said, her voice trembling.
I sat by Faheem, whose stomach seemed to have settled just as the rest of the palace was beginning to retch. I had my arms around him and my chin on his head when I heard what sounded like coins rattling in a giant tin can.
“Get down!” my mother shrieked. In one swift move, she and my father grabbed us, covering our bodies with their own. We crouched on the floor, the four of us, paralyzed. Even Faheem seemed too stunned to cry. After a few moments, the gunfire ceased and we peeled away from one another. The room was untouched. We were unharmed, though I didn’t feel intact.
My father stood and went into the hallway.
“I see one of the guards,” he said, looking back at my mother. “Let me find out what’s happening.”
“But, Sulaiman!”
I saw hesitation in my father, and it made him almost unrecognizable. He cupped his hand around his forehead as if his thoughts might otherwise swirl out of his skull. He shook his head and knelt in front of us.
“We will find a peaceful end to this situation. We must.”
My mother groaned softly, for she knew what that meant. Any and all talks happened with my father’s mediation.
Not long after Father left our room, I heard a horrific sound. The sky threatened to split as jets flew low over the palace, spraying artillery on the grounds. I couldn’t hear my own shrieks through the explosions. We stayed put, too nervous to move. My father returned to us, whispering to my mother that a faction of the army had indeed turned on the president.
The conversations I’d overheard in the last two weeks echoed in my head. Grievances and doubts abounded, from the families of the political prisoners to the university students. Some thought President Daoud’s visit to the United States had turned him into a pawn of the Americans. Others demanded that he take an even stronger stand against Moscow. And away from the stoic first lady’s ears, women debated whether the president had too much pride to see the regime through the unrest.
Boba had spoken sharply with President Daoud.
You won’t fix this problem by culling dissidents, he had warned. The Americans hold our right hand, the Soviets our left. Mark my words, neither will let go of its grip even if they see us torn to shreds.
Kaka Daoud, Boba, and the circle of advisers stayed locked in a wood-paneled conference room. The kitchen was deserted, though I doubt anyone had much of an appetite anyway. Day stretched into night. Boba lumbered back to our room at a late hour, his eyes bloodshot. He smelled of tea, alcohol, and cigarette smoke.
“Boba, are they going to hurt us?” I asked, doing my best not to cry. I could not stop my chin from quivering.
“No, no, my darling girl,” Boba replied, his voice a low rasp. “They are our own people. Just as quickly as they turned left, they can turn right. All will be fine.”
My mother’s eyeliner smudged as she wiped away tears before they reached her cheeks. I caught her mouthing prayers, her knuckles blanched as she held my father’s hand. We remained knotted together in one small room. Terrified and exhausted, the dozens of people contained in the palace by mutinous soldiers drifted to sleep in tufted chairs, in four-poster beds, and with their backs up against embossed wallpaper.
I looked for small signs that we were not facing the end of the world, holding on tight to my freshly spun theory that if the sun and moon kept their rituals, my world would remain intact.
Perhaps it was a need to confirm the existence of the moon that woke me from my fitful slumber that night. It might have been my peculiar dream. I’d been back in the palace gardens watching my father play hide-and-seek with President Daoud, and Neelab was high-stepping into the fountain to toss Ai-Khanoum coins into the water.