Ahmad and Hadi exchanged looks again before Ahmad asked him what the shabnamah said.
Omar had seen the look again and was feeling hurt and flustered. Didn’t his friends believe him? His eyes darted around, scanning the dark interior of Ahmad’s shop and then back to the two men. He needed to find something solid and mundane to focus on so he didn’t make any more stupid mistakes. He wished he’d never crossed the square to talk with them. He wished he’d taken less of his draught after lunch. Apart from just walking away, he had no option but to answer. ‘It said my friend had to stop.’
‘What friend?’ they asked in unison.
If only they’d get up off their stools, Omar thought, feeling uncomfortable standing over them, but his days of squatting for a conversation with some old friends were long gone. ‘That’s the problem,’ he said, wiping the sweat off his brow. ‘I don’t know.’
‘Stop what?’ asked Hadi.
‘I don’t know this either.’ He could feel his breath shallow in his chest and knew this was not good for him. He took a deep breath. ‘I think this person might be cheating his customers.’
Ahmad looked at Hadi, who Omar thought had visibly paled. He and Ahmad were now both looking at Hadi, waiting for him to respond.
‘But what if this man needs the money to feed his family?’ Hadi asked.
Omar was starting to feel calmer again as he considered these words. It was a valid point. ‘I agree that would be a problem, but what does it matter that his family goes a little hungry compared to the possibility of losing his life?’ The blood drained from Hadi’s face again. Maybe he’d gone too far with the ‘losing his life’ comment. Omar was beginning to feel sorry for his friend, and also a bit bad about maybe exaggerating a little and causing so much pain, so he offered the possibility that it might be a friend of Behnaz. He thought this a good option to cover all possibilities but saw immediately it had been a mistake.
Hadi was frowning. ‘Why would it be a friend of Behnaz if it was on your door?’
Omar could feel the panic rising again. He needed to stick to the script. No more embellishing. ‘I don’t know, but it might be … or it might be a friend of Chief Wasim or Dr Sofia. It might be a friend of anybody. We have to think of all possibilities so we can warn them.’
‘No,’ said Ahmad, ‘there’s only one person in the square it can’t be for and that’s you, Omar.’
Omar was very glad to hear that Ahmad thought it wasn’t about him but he needed to know why.
‘Because it said “your friend”, didn’t it? So if it was on your door then you’re the only one it can’t be about.’
Omar could feel his heart lighten with this news, wondering why he’d never thought of that himself. In his happiness he also thanked Allah the Merciful that neither Hadi nor Ahmad had thought to ask how he had come to the conclusion that the message was about someone cheating. Trying to describe the trains that came and left the station in his head would have proved a little tricky, as would the truth of the matter. Now he had delivered the message he was also feeling a great deal of sympathy for Hadi.
‘Well, my friends, I’ll leave it to you, but if you have any ideas, please let me know.’ Shuffling back across the square, Omar was feeling satisfied with how things had worked out. It had been a good plan and he had executed it to near perfection, apart for those mistakes about Behnaz and the gate and calling it a shabnamah. And, of course, as Ahmad had pointed out, the threat could not be about him.
As he was locking up his shop for the day, he noticed Hadi had already locked up and gone home, but Ahmad was crossing the square to talk with Babur and his cook. Soon they would talk with their customers who would talk to their friends. The message was being spread. All his careful planning had saved his friend from real danger, and if he was wrong and it wasn’t about Hadi then whomever it was about would soon be warned.
While making his way up the stairs to his beautifully soft bed, Omar realised he had perhaps been a little too hasty in his decision to throw his Viagra away if it definitely wasn’t about him. He also wondered who had sent the night letter, because the more he thought about it the more he realised it wasn’t anything like a Taliban shabnamah. Tomorrow he would think about correcting that misunderstanding in the square, but right now he needed to sleep.
* * *
AFTER AHMAD TOLD Babur and his cook about Omar’s shabnamah, the three men moved inside the chaikhana to discuss this worrisome news further. Taking the seats that gave them the greatest privacy from Babur’s other customers, they relaxed back on the cushions to enjoy the tea the cook had prepared for them. After engaging in an initial conversation about how the Taliban and all the invaders had ruined their country, Ahmad and the cook began considering who this ‘friend’ of Omar’s might be.
The cook pointed out that if it could be a friend of Behnaz then it could also be a friend of Chief Wasim or Dr Sofia. He also pointed out that everyone in the square was a friend of Omar, Behnaz, Chief Wasim and Dr Sofia, which, as far as Ahmad was concerned, was not a particularly instructive comment. What Ahmad really wanted to know was whether they had guessed the shabnamah might actually be about him not going to mosque in the morning. When he noticed that Babur was uncharacteristically quiet, he asked him who he thought the friend might be.
Babur looked at Ahmad a little aggrieved. ‘Why do you
