‘What would we do in Paris?’
‘Shop, visit the Eiffel Tower, the Louvre, spend time with our son.’
Jabril looked at his wife in horror. ‘Tell me you don’t mean that.’
‘What? That I would like to spend time with my son?’
‘No, no, no, I’m sure you’d like to spend time with Jaweed just as much as I would, but then what?’
‘You’re right. We can’t live in Paris. How could I live without Chicken Street?’
‘This is not a laughing matter. There is no sense of family or obligation anymore with children,’ Jabril lamented. ‘We should never have taken them to America in the first place.’
‘And what should we have done? Brought them up in the middle of a war? How would you have got your degree in our country, Jabril, when it was chaos? No, we did what we had to do and now we’ll live with the consequences. We have no choice.’ Zahra moved from the lounge to kneel in front of her husband.
‘I know this hurts you,’ she said, taking his hands. ‘It hurts me too, but our children are living the lives they want to live. Didn’t we teach them to be independent? Didn’t we encourage them to have wings and fly? They’ve left us, Jabril, and that is as it should be. We need to let go of our dreams for our children: they were never their dreams.’
* * *
WHEN JABRIL’S PHONE rang he answered it immediately. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, before Daniel had time to speak. ‘It was remiss of me not to have rung and thanked you for helping find the boys. We couldn’t have done it without you.’
‘All I did was pass on information from my friend, but that’s not why I’m calling. Sofia told me about the article you’re planning to publish.’
‘Not you too?’ Jabril said, exhausted.
‘Pardon?’ When Jabril didn’t respond Daniel continued. ‘Are you sure you want to publish? It’ll be dangerous.’
‘I’m not worried about Massoud if that’s what you’re thinking, because once the article comes out he wouldn’t dare touch me.’ Jabril downed the last of the scotch in his glass and walked to the cabinet to pour himself another.
There was a long silence before Daniel spoke. ‘I think you’re wrong. You’ll have publicly crossed him and he can’t let that happen without exacting a high price. A price so high no one will ever consider doing the same thing to him again. That’s how the man operates. He has his reputation to protect, Jabril, above and beyond anything. His power comes from his reputation. You can only come off worse with this man.’
‘No, he’s a minister and this will ruin him.’ Jabril had returned to his chair and made himself comfortable by pulling up a pouf with his feet. ‘He won’t do anything to me because it would be linked directly back to him after the article came out.’
‘Do you honestly believe that? I’m not sure there’s much anyone can say about Massoud that hasn’t already been said, and I’ve never seen him held accountable for anything he’s ever done. Think about it. In the end he’ll just deny the paedophilia and none of us can prove it. I can’t even prove it. It’ll just be your word against his.’
The logic of what Daniel was saying sank in. In truth, Jabril had always known he’d be paying a high price, but what else could he do? No one understood that this was about more than Massoud and paedophilia now. Far more was at stake.
After he hung up, Jabril considered his options again. Was there another way? Definitely it would have been preferable to leave everything up to Daniel and the Human Rights Commission if they could do an investigation. He could also see that his own plan to bring down Massoud was probably naïve, but how else could he get Sofia’s visa reinstated before she had to leave unless he brought down the man who had cancelled it? Minister Massoud had to lose his power or Sofia had to go. It was as simple as that. There was no other way. Taking his empty glass out to the kitchen, Jabril got ready for bed.
In those lonely night hours, when fears are at their darkest, Jabril could feel himself sinking. The life he knew was slipping away. Was he going too far with the article? Was his life really in danger? Was Sofia’s life in danger?
As Jabril was going over his options he grew increasingly despondent until he discovered a new option, and while it was also dangerous it was definitely preferable to publishing. He was about to ring Ishmael and tell him to hold off on publishing until he realised it was already two o’clock. He would ring him in the morning.
* * *
RELIEVED TO SEE that the article hadn’t been published yet, Jabril was in such a good mood that when he came into the kitchen he was humming.
‘You sound cheery,’ Zahra said as she dried the last of her breakfast dishes.
‘Did you ask Chief Wasim to talk me out of publishing the article?’ Jabril asked, pouring himself a coffee.
Zahra was looking at him in as if he’d gone mad. ‘And why would I do that?’
‘Because he paid me a visit last night.’
‘Really?’ she said, turning around from the kitchen sink. ‘Chief Wasim would not be the first person I’d call to try to talk you out of publishing. So have you changed your mind because I see the article isn’t in the paper yet.’ She placed his breakfast dishes on the table in front of him.
‘Maybe.’
‘What does maybe mean?’
‘I’ve got a better plan.’
Zahra shook her head as she leaned back against the kitchen bench. ‘I’m glad to hear that, but does this better plan happen to involve Massoud?’
‘It does.’
‘Then I don’t want to hear about it.’ With that she walked out of the kitchen.
Jabril had decided that Daniel had been right about Massoud. He
