And the Mountains Echoed

to meet this way almost daily. They played ball, chased each other through the orchards’ parallel rows of trees. They chatted about sports and movies, and when they had nothing to say they looked out on the town of Shadbagh-e-Nau, the soft hillsides in the distance and the hazy chain of mountains farther yet, and that was all right too.
    Every day now Adel woke up eager for the sight of Gholam sneaking up the dirt path, the sound of his loud, confident voice. He was often distracted during his morning lessons, his concentration lapsing as he thought of the games they would play later, the stories they would tell each other. He worried he would lose Gholam. He worried Gholam’s father, Iqbal, wouldn’t find steady work in town, or a place to live, and Gholam would move to another town, another part of the country, and Adel had tried to prepare for this possibility, steel himself against the farewell that would then follow.
    One day, as they sat on the tree stump, Gholam said, “Have you ever been with a girl, Adel?”
    â€œYou mean—”
    â€œYeah, I mean.”
    Adel felt a rush of heat around his ears. He briefly contemplated lying, but he knew Gholam would see right through him. He mumbled, “You have?”
    Gholam lit a cigarette and offered one to Adel. This time Adel took it, after glancing over his shoulder to make sure the guard wasn’t peeking around the corner or that Kabir hadn’t decided to step out. He took a drag and launched immediately into a protracted coughing fit that had Gholam smirking and pounding him on the back.
    â€œSo, have you or not?” Adel wheezed, eyes tearing.
    â€œFriend of mine back at the camp,” Gholam said in a conspiratorial tone, “he was older, he took me to a whorehouse in Peshawar.”
    He told the story. The small, filthy room. The orange curtains, the cracked walls, the single lightbulb hanging from the ceiling, the rat he had seen dart across the floor. The sound of rickshaws outside, sputtering up and down the street, cars rumbling. The young girl on the mattress, finishing a plate of
biryani
, chewing and looking at him without any expression. How he could tell, even in the dim light, that she had a pretty face and that she was hardly any older than he. How she had scooped up the last grains of rice with a folded piece of
naan
, pushed away the plate, lain down, and wiped her fingers on her trousers as she’d pulled them down.
    Adel listened, fascinated, enraptured. He had never had a friend like this. Gholam knew more about the world than even Adel’s half brothers who were several years older than him. And Adel’s friends back in Kabul? They were all the sons of technocrats and officials and ministers. They all lived variations of Adel’s own life. The glimpses Gholam had allowed Adel into his life suggested an existence rife with trouble, unpredictability, hardship, but also adventure, a life worlds removed from Adel’s own, though it unfolded practically within spitting distance of him. Listening toGholam’s stories, Adel’s own life sometimes struck him as hopelessly dull.
    â€œSo did you do it, then?” Adel said. “Did you, you know, stick it in her?”
    â€œNo. We had a cup of
chai
and discussed Rumi. What do you
think
?”
    Adel blushed. “What was it like?”
    But Gholam had already moved on. This was often the pattern of their conversations, Gholam choosing what they would talk about, launching into a story with gusto, roping Adel in, only to lose interest and leave both the story and Adel dangling.
    Now, instead of finishing up the story he had started, Gholam said, “My grandmother says her husband, my grandfather Saboor, told her a story about this tree once. Well, that was long before he cut it down, of course. My grandfather told it to her when they were both kids. The story was that if you had a wish, you had to kneel before the tree and whisper it. And if the tree agreed to grant it, it would shed exactly ten leaves on your head.”
    â€œI never heard that,” Adel says.
    â€œWell, you wouldn’t have, would you?”
    It was then that Adel caught on to what Gholam had really said. “Wait. Your grandfather cut down our tree?”
    Gholam turned his eyes to him. “Your tree? It’s not your tree.”
    Adel blinked. “What does that mean?”
    Gholam bore his gaze even deeper into Adel’s face. For the