Free A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini

of black hairs on the lobe
     of his left ear. His eyes had a mischievous, reckless light in them. He raised his hand. “ Salaam, Khala jan.”
    “Noor is ten. I have an older boy too, Ahmad.”
    “He’s thirteen,” Noor said.
    “Thirteen going on forty.” The woman Fariba laughed. “My husband’s name is Hakim,” she said. “He’s a teacher here in Deh-Mazang.
     You should come by sometime, we’ll have a cup—”
    And then suddenly, as if emboldened, the other women pushed past Fariba and swarmed Mariam, forming a circle around her with
     alarming speed.
    “So you’re Rasheed jan’s young bride—”
    “How do you like Kabul?”
    “I’ve been to Herat. I have a cousin there.”
    “Do you want a boy or a girl first?”
    “The minarets! Oh, what beauty! What a gorgeous city!”
    “Boy is better, Mariam jan, they carry the family name—”
    “Bah! Boys get married and run off. Girls stay behind and take care of you when you’re old.”
    “We heard you were coming.”
    “Have twins. One of each! Then everyone’s happy.”
    Mariam backed away. She was hyperventilating. Her ears buzzed, her pulse fluttered, her eyes darted from one face to another.
     She backed away again, but there was nowhere to go to—she was in the center of a circle. She spotted Fariba, who was frowning,
     who saw that she was in distress.
    “Let her be!” Fariba was saying. “Move aside, let her be! You’re frightening her!”
    Mariam clutched the dough close to her chest and pushed through the crowd around her.
    “Where are you going, hamshira ?”
    She pushed until somehow she was in the clear and then she ran up the street. It wasn’t until she’d reached the intersection
     that she realized she’d run the wrong way. She turned around and ran back in the other direction, head down, tripping once
     and scraping her knee badly, then up again and running, bolting past the women.
    “What’s the matter with you?”
    “You’re bleeding, hamshira !”
    Mariam turned one corner, then the other. She found the correct street but suddenly could not remember which was Rasheed’s
     house. She ran up then down the street, panting, near tears now, began trying doors blindly. Some were locked, others opened
     only to reveal unfamiliar yards, barking dogs, and startled chickens. She pictured Rasheed coming home to find her still searching
     this way, her knee bleeding, lost on her own street. Now she did start crying. She pushed on doors, muttering panicked prayers,
     her face moist with tears, until one opened, and she saw, with relief, the outhouse, the well, the toolshed. She slammed the
     door behind her and turned the bolt. Then she was on all fours, next to the wall, retching. When she was done, she crawled
     away, sat against the wall, with her legs splayed before her. She had never in her life felt so alone.
    WHEN RASHEED CAME HOME that night, he brought with him a brown paper bag. Mariam was disappointed that he did not notice the
     clean windows, the swept floors, the missing cobwebs. But he did look pleased that she had already set his dinner plate, on
     a clean sofrah spread on the living-room floor.
    “I made daal ,” Mariam said.
    “Good. I’m starving.”
    She poured water for him from the aftawa to wash his hands with. As he dried with a towel, she put before him a steaming bowl of daal and a plate of fluffy white rice. This was the first meal she had cooked for him, and Mariam wished she had been in a better
     state when she made it. She’d still been shaken from the incident at the tandoor as she’d cooked, and all day she had fretted
     about the daal ’s consistency, its color, worried that he would think she’d stirred in too much ginger or not enough turmeric.
    He dipped his spoon into the gold-colored daal.
    Mariam swayed a bit. What if he was disappointed or angry? What if he pushed his plate away in displeasure?
    “Careful,” she managed to say. “It’s hot.”
    Rasheed pursed his lips and blew,