A House Without Windows Read Free Page B

who had immigrated to the United States with her family at a very young age from Peru. She had chocolate brown hair and her cheeks dimpled when she smiled, which she did often. She was a friend of a colleague and stopped when she spotted them drinking beers at a sidewalk café. She was making her way home from her job at an accounting firm, wearing a white peplum top and smartly creased, navy blue pencil pants.
    She was sweet and smart and, importantly, did not flinch when Yusuf told her his family had come from Afghanistan. On their first date, they went to see a free Peruvian music concert in Central Park. On their second date, they ate artisanal ice cream in the East Village. Yusuf couldn’t resist slipping his arms around Elena’s waist and pulling her close when he was with her. She was five inches shorter than him, and when they embraced, Yusuf breathed in the sweet, tropical scent of her shampoo. She clung to him just enough that he felt adored and not so much that he felt trapped. She could talk about the implications of a trade agreement and the latest One Direction song in the same breath. Yusuf’s friends raised their eyebrows and beer mugs in approval. Elena was a catch.
    When Yusuf met her, he’d already made plans to move to Washington, D.C., to work with a nonprofit that focused on crimes against humanity. He convinced himself they both understood things would come to an end once he left. Elena didn’t fit into his plans. And yet, Yusuf found immense happiness in a hundred quiet things: the way her nose crinkled when she laughed, the way she slipped a playful finger into his collar, the urge he felt to call or text her a moment after they’d kissed good night.
    The fact that they had so little in common seemed to draw them to each other. Language, religion, professional fields—they studied each other with almost academic interest.
    Elena listened to Yusuf talk about the headlines that pulled his attention: the unearthing of thousands of Muslim corpses, men and boys who’d been executed in the Bosnian genocide, the flogging of a dissident journalist in Saudi Arabia, the disappearance of a Malaysian passenger plane. Elbows propped on the table and eyes focused, she filled in with details she’d read in online news reports. She made Yusuf question his plan. Maybe he shouldn’t limit himself to women from his own background. Maybe a common culture and language wasn’t everything.
    Maybe Elena was everything.
    They were on their way to the subway station after a dinner with friends when Elena and Yusuf paused at a crosswalk. He turned to her and adjusted the paisley scarf knotted around her neck. It was fall and the evenings were brisk.
    My niece’s baptism is this weekend. You’ll come with me, right?
    The red hand turned into a white stick figure, prompting them to move forward. Yusuf didn’t immediately obey. Elena had to tug at his elbow.
    Maybe, he had said . Let me see how much I get done with work this week.
    They’d settled into two empty seats on the 7 train, New York’s version of the Silk Road. Elena would get off soon after they entered Queens, before the neighborhoods turned distinctly Asian. Yusuf had another nine stops to go before he got to Flushing.
    You know, I already miss you, baby, Elena had said to him as the torque of the subway car nudged them closer together. I’m going to want to visit you every weekend in D.C.
    Yusuf had kissed her squarely on the lips, long enough that Elena interpreted it to mean he would miss her equally. But something in Yusuf was rattled by the expectation that he would go to something as alien as a baptism, and, as their lips parted, Yusuf withdrew. When the conductor announced her stop, Elena smiled at him and walked off the train. He was already sorry for what he would have to do, but it could be no other way. Yusuf no longer saw all that Elena was—he only saw what she was not.
    A REMORSEFUL