The Blood of Flowers Read Free

I couldn't imagine leaving him.
    My mother threw dried dung in the stove to boil water for tea. "Here's a surprise," she said, bringing us a plate of fresh chickpea cookies. They were fragrant with the essence of roses.
    "May your hands never ache!" my father said.
    They were my favorite sweets, and I ate far too many of them. Before long, I became tired and spread out my bedroll near the door, as I always did. I fell asleep to the sound of my parents talking, which reminded me of the cooing of doves, and I think I even saw my father take my mother in his arms and kiss her.
    THE NEXT AFTERNOON, I stood in our doorway and watched for my Baba as the other men streamed back from the fields. I always liked to pour his tea for him before he walked in the door. My mother was crouched over the stove, baking bread for our evening meal.
    When he didn't arrive, I went back into the house, cracked some walnuts and put them in a small bowl, and placed the irises I had gathered in a vessel with water. Then I went out to look again, for I was eager to begin our walk. Where was he? Many of the other men had returned from the fields and were probably washing off the day's dust in their courtyards.
    "We need some water," my mother said, so I grabbed a clay jug and walked toward the well. On my way, I ran into Ibrahim the dye maker, who gave me a peculiar look.
    "Go home," he said to me. "Your mother needs you."
    I was surprised. "But she just told me to fetch water," I said.
    "No matter," he replied. "Tell her I told you to go back."
    I walked home as quickly as I could, the vessel banging against my knees. As I approached our house, I spotted four men bearing a limp bundle between them. Perhaps there had been an accident in the fields. From time to time, my father brought back stories about how a man got injured by a threshing tool, suffered a kick from a mule, or returned bloodied from a fight. I knew he'd tell us what had happened over tea.
    The men moved awkwardly because of their burden. The man's face was hidden, cradled on one of their shoulders. I said a prayer for his quick recovery, for it was hard on a family when a man was too ill to work. As the group approached, I noticed that the victim's turban was wrapped much like my father's. But that didn't mean anything, I told myself quickly. Many men wrapped their turbans in a similar way.
    The front bearers got out of step for a moment, and they almost lost hold of the man. His head lolled as though it were barely attached to his body, and his limbs had no life in them. I dropped the clay vessel, which shattered around my feet.
    "Bibi," I whimpered. "Help!"
    My mother came outside, brushing flour from her clothes. When she saw my father, she uttered a piercing wail. Women who lived nearby streamed out of their houses and surrounded her like a net while she tore the air with her sorrow. As she writhed and jumped, they caught her gently, holding her and stroking the hair away from her face.
    The men brought my father inside and laid him on a bedroll. His skin was a sickly yellow color, and a line of saliva slid out of the corner of his mouth. My mother put her fingers near his nostrils.
    "Praise be to God, he's still breathing!" she said.
    Naghee, who worked with my father in the fields, didn't know where to look as he told us what had happened. "He seemed tired, but he was fine until this afternoon," he said. "Suddenly he grabbed his head and fell to the ground, gasping for air. After that, he didn't stir."
    "May God spare your husband!" said a man I didn't recognize. When they had done all they could to make him comfortable, they left, murmuring prayers for good health.
    My mother's brow was furrowed as she removed my father's cotton shoes, straightened his tunic, and arranged the pillow under his head. She felt his hands and forehead and declared his temperature normal, but told me to fetch a blanket and cover him to keep him warm.
    The news about my father spread quickly, and our