Take What You Can Carry by Gian Sardar (superbooks4u .TXT) 📕

If she could just call her father. If he could fly here, just so she could sit next to him, him and his comforting scent of woodsmoke and cigars and sweaters on rainy afternoons. He would know what to do. He would remind her it will be okay, and she would believe him. For a moment, she thinks of actually calling him, but to admit that any of the events of their trip had occurred would send him into a frenzy. No. She needs to be calm. To take the cues from those who know, who’ve been through this before.

Soran leaves as soon as morning curfew lifts, planning on talking to anyone he can, to try to get a message to Aras that Delan has been taken. She watches the window, waiting for his return, for news, and when he’s finally there, he doesn’t say much, only tells her that the person he went to find, Kak Zuhdi, was home and will do what he can. “Give me an hour,” he tells her. “I have others to go to.”

The day catches a sudden heat, as if it’s spun too close to a fire. Only the second day Delan has been gone, but already the world is inflamed and angry. Does he feel this same swelter? Or is it simply that without him here, the ordinary has turned unsparing?

Delan’s parents are kind to her, feeding her breakfast, patting her shoulder, making sure she’s comfortable. She wants to tell them it’s not right, that she should be the one doing this for them, because it’s their child who’s been taken and she knows that that trumps everything. But then she sees Gaziza’s preparation of the food, the way she hands the plate to Olivia and watches, that this is what they need. Routine. Kindness. To do anything else would be to admit a great wrong, and now everyone needs to believe that he is okay. It was just yesterday he was taken, after all. Getting out of jail often takes longer than this in the States—though of course this is not jail or the United States, and it’s these thoughts that sit like rocks within her.

Then Soran is leaving again. “Please watch Lailan,” he says. “Miriam must work. And I must see if Kak Zuhdi is home, to tell him what happened. He will be key.”

“But he was home. Earlier. You spoke to him.”

A pause at the door. “Yes, you are right. Of course. I’m tired. There are others is what I meant. You can watch Lailan?”

A welcome distraction. Olivia throws herself into caring for the girl, playing with her and going on a walk, collecting bits and pieces for her art. Seedpods and sticks and pebbles. When they wander too far, Olivia turns them around, thinking Delan may be back, convincing herself with every step that he is. She pictures him in the living room, watching through the window. Even Lailan seems to catch sight of the vision, skipping and then stopping, turning with a grin and parroting phrases she’s learned from Olivia. Yes? You think so? I think so! When they reach their block, they hold hands, silent. She feels him there. It’s palpable. So palpable, she’s waiting for the door to swing open. For him to step before them. The belief is so strong that when the door stays shut, when they step into a silent living room, it’s as if he’s been taken again. Beside her, Lailan holds her hand tighter.

Soran appears, heading upstairs. “I need to close my eyes. She could use a nap. If you can try, I would appreciate it, and then I can give you a break. Naps are her enemy, though, be warned.”

Quietly Olivia leads Lailan up to her room, where she tells the girl stories in a whispered hush, hoping to ease her toward a nap. Lailan, however, has other plans and listens and kicks the blankets, fidgeting just enough to keep awake. “More,” she says whenever Olivia stops talking, and Olivia searches her childhood for stories.

“Maybe you should tell me a story,” Olivia finally says.

As if she’d just been waiting to be asked, Lailan jumps up, standing tall on the end of the bed. Eyes closed, she conjures her story with raised arms and then launches into an epic tale. There is what sounds like a frog who flies. A dress made of gold. A girl in a forest of faces. Though at times Olivia is lost from the roadblocks of language, one thing is certain: the girl is a born actor. Yet another thing to tell Delan when he’s back.

“Wait,” Olivia says. Something’s occurred to her. “Faces?” She gets up to turn on the fan, remembering what they’d said on the hike about spirits in heaven speaking to humans through the trees. Maybe that wasn’t appropriate to say in front of a child. She’s not sure. She’s never had to think this way before.

When Olivia lies back on the bed, Lailan is nodding, touching the wall. “Faces. Girl’s mother father.”

“The girl’s mother and father. Her parents live in a tree?” She’s hoping they’re fairies, elves, or some Kurdish equivalent.

“Yes. Her parents in a tree. Her parents dead.” The word drawn out and solemn.

A beat while Olivia absorbs this. What had Soran said about Lailan’s parents? Just that it was a subject he’d revisit later, which was ominous in itself. “When I was little,” Olivia says, “my mom died.”

Lailan nods, as if she knew, then turns to face the wall, tracing a slender crack with her finger.

“But here’s what was wonderful: my dad told me a secret he’d learned. That people we lose become stars. I don’t know who he heard it from, I forget, but his sister, my aunt, she’d also passed away and there were two stars, right next to each other. That was them.” Seen from a rocky shore on a clear night. Olivia’s hands stained with blackberries. Toes dug into cold sand. It