For the Love of a Son: One Afghan Woman's Quest for Her Stolen Child

She told me to
take my mother and she would take our daughters.’
    My father looked at me and gave a sad sigh.
‘I told her to go, if that is what she wanted.
    ‘Your grandmother heard the ruckus and came
out of her room. When she learned that the fight was about her, she
said, ‘Do not let your wife go, my son. I have lived my life. From
this day on I will be in my room and I will never come between you
and your wife.’
    I felt sick to my stomach, hatred sparking
for my mother’s actions. Her shameful conduct had created misery
for the sweetest woman I have ever known.
    My father walked away, his shoulders sagging
along with his spirit.
    Soon my father was ill again. On that
occasion Mother did not travel with him. After losing my
grandmother, and knowing my father was gravely ill, my fear caused
me to cling to my mother. I began experiencing panic attacks when
my mother was away. When she left home on an errand, I would stand
on the balcony watching and waiting, silently praying she would not
be run down by a speeding car or become ill while she was out. When
I finally discerned her outline in the distance, I would run to
welcome her back as though she had been away for weeks.
    To increase my anxiety, my mother developed a
thoughtless habit of greeting me with predictions of doom. ‘Your
father is going to die, Maryam. He is going to die. When he dies,
his brother Shair will come and take you and Nadia to his galah.
Shair will marry you to one of his sons if you are lucky and to an
old man if you are not. Prepare yourself, Maryam. You will be
married off to a cruel man. You will never be allowed to see your
mother again.’
    I became hysterical at the image Mother
planted in my mind. In Afghanistan, the brother of a dead man has
full authority over his sibling’s wife and children from the moment
of passing. Who knows if Shair Khan would have sent his men to
Kabul to collect my father’s wife and two daughters to do with them
as he pleased, but his cruel ways and past behavior prepared us for
the worse.
    Mother’s fear of losing her daughters was
festering in her heart, and she failed to hold those fears inside
her. Her thoughtless conjectures so alarmed her youngest daughter
that I spent much of my nights sending passionate prayers to God.
‘Please Allah send Father home! Please God heal his cancer. Please
Allah do not let Shair Khan get me. I am just a child, God, too
young to be a wife.’
    My mother grew so paranoid she began to
believe that Nadia and I would be kidnapped by our uncle even
before our father’s death. She warned Nadia and me, ‘If I am unable
to come to school and pick you up, never get in the car with anyone
but our driver or your father. Never . Even if your father’s
relatives try to give you a ride, do not get in the car.
Young girls are kidnapped daily in this country. You will be taken
away and married to an old man, or sold to a tea house to become a
dancing girl.’
    We were properly frightened.
    One day Nadia and I left classes expecting to
see Mother in her usual place waiting to take us home. Mother was
nowhere to be seen. Soon we spotted Askar sitting in a taxi. He
motioned for us to come to him, calling out, ‘Your mother is
preparing tonight’s meal. She sent me to bring you home.’
    Although Askar had been with our family for
as long as we could remember, the change in routine made us uneasy.
Never before had Askar arrived in a taxi asking us to join him.
Nadia and I exchanged cautious glances, our thoughts in union. Had
Askar been bribed by Shair Khan? Was our faithful servant no longer
faithful? Was he there to kidnap us and deliver us to the galah?
Was this the kidnapping our mother had warned us about?
    We shuffled from one foot to another,
anything to avoid getting in that taxi with potential
kidnappers.
    Askar was impatient, calling out, ‘Get in the
taxi, now! You are wasting time!’
    Not knowing what else to do, Nadia and I
warily climbed into the back seat of the taxi. Our worse fears came
true when the taxi driver drove in the opposite direction of our
home.
    Askar turned to explain. ‘Your mother asked
me to purchase some fruit from the market.’
    Nadia knew the fruit market was in the old
part of Kabul, well away from our neighborhood. She began weeping.
I felt severe pangs of pain rippling up from my stomach. Our
mother’s terror had taken root in our heads. We were being
kidnapped!
    Our screams merged as one. Askar and the taxi
driver looked at