We’re out of the crowds now and almost back at the shop. It’s taken a while because you keep bumping into things when you’re running and crying at the same time.
‘Will they be OK?’ sobs Bibi.
She’s been asking me the whole way, but I don’t blame her. I’ve been asking myself the same thing.
‘They’ll be fine,’ I say to her. ‘Dad rescued Mum. You saw him.’
I don’t say anything about government roadblocks and helicopters with telescopic sights. I just glance at the sky and feel sick with worry.
We arrive back at the shop.
Mum and Dad aren’t there.
Bibi howls. I hug her and hug myself at the same time. ‘This is good,’ I say to us both. ‘If they got back first and found we weren’t here, they’d be really worried.’
I wish it felt good.
‘But why aren’t they here?’ wails Bibi.
‘Dad probably wants to make sure he’s not being followed,’ I say, desperately hoping I’m right. ‘He’s probably whizzing down one-way streets the wrong way, you know, like he’s told us city taxi drivers do.’
I decide to pack our bags to be ready for a quick getaway when Mum and Dad do arrive. I go into the shop, then remember I packed everything before we went to the stadium. Everything except my ball, which I pack into my rucksack now.
And Mum’s candlestick, which we left with a candle burning in it. The candle is still burning. I’m not going to pack that. Not yet.
‘Jamal.’
It’s Bibi, screaming.
I rush outside. A vehicle is speeding off the road in a blur of red and green. It ploughs across the open land and stops in a whirl of dust between the tape trees and the shop.
Now I’m screaming too, we’re both screaming their names as we run towards the taxi.
Mum and Dad get out.
We cling onto each other, all four of us, so hard it feels like my arms will snap. Then Dad pulls away. ‘We’ve got to move fast,’ he says, going to the boot of the taxi.
I’m not ready to move fast, but Mum pulls away too.
‘I thought they were going to kill you,’ sobs Bibi, clinging to Mum’s dress.
‘No’, says Mum softly, stroking Bibi’s head.
Then Mum stares at Bibi as she realises we were in the stadium. She looks at me. I nod. No point in hiding it.
‘Were they going to kill you because you’re a teacher?’ says Bibi.
Mum looks away. She nods. Her face is pale and dazed. Suddenly I can see she thought they were going to kill her too, and that makes me cry again.
Mum turns and moves towards the shop. She stops. She stares at the candle burning in her candlestick. She turns back and puts her arms round me and Bibi again.
‘Thank you,’ she whispers.
‘Mum,’ says Bibi in a tiny voice. ‘What will happen to those other women?’
Mum doesn’t say anything for a long time. I look up and see the anguish on her face. My own chest hurts with the sadness of it.
‘We couldn’t do anything,’ I say softly to Bibi. ‘We’re just a family.’
Mum takes a deep breath. ‘And we’re going to stay a family,’ she says, keeping her arms round us. ‘No matter where we go.’
She’s never held me so tight.
‘Are we going on a trip?’ asks Bibi.
Mum nods.
‘Where?’ asks Bibi.
‘A long way away,’ says Mum.
‘Like a holiday?’ asks Bibi.
Mum hesitates. Then she gives me and Bibi a brave smile.
‘Sort of,’ she says.
‘When are we going?’ asks Bibi.
‘Very soon,’ says Dad from over by the taxi.
I turn and see he’s crouching by the driver’s door with a can of paint. He’s already painted half the green door red. He takes a lump of chewing gum out of his mouth and pushes it into a bullet hole and paints over it.
‘Come on Bibi,’ says Mum. ‘Let’s get the things in the car.’ She goes into the shop. She’s incredible. An hour ago she was nearly shot and now she’s organising Bibi.
While Dad paints, I kneel next to him and catch the drips off the bottom of the door with my sleeve. The government will be on our trail soon and we don’t want to leave tracks.
‘Clever thinking, Jamal,’ murmurs Dad.
That makes me feel good.
‘Dad,’ I say. ‘What you did was so brave, driving into that stadium and rescuing Mum. But I wish you’d taken us. We could have helped you throw the smoke cans.’
Dad stops painting and stares at me. I remember he doesn’t know I was in the stadium. I swallow. He puts a paint-spattered hand on my shoulder.
‘Jamal,’ he says quietly. ‘You are a part of my heart and a part of my soul. I’m proud that you’re my son.’
I put my arms round him so he can feel how I’m glowing inside.
‘I’m proud that you’re my dad,’ I say.
We look at each other. And suddenly I know that if Dad can be a desert warrior in a soccer stadium, so can I.
Then I remember we have to move fast.
‘Shall I scratch the boot?’ I ask. ‘And put some dents in the back doors? To disguise it more?’
Dad blinks. He gives a flicker of a smile and shakes his head.
‘This’ll be enough,’ he says. ‘It’s just to get us to the other side of the city. Then I’m going to sell the taxi to get money for our trip.’
I look at Dad in amazement.
Sell the taxi?
That must be really sad for him. He’s had that taxi for years. Longer than he’s had me and Bibi. We must be fleeing to somewhere too far away to go in the taxi. Somewhere up some really steep hills. The taxi was never that good at hills.
While Dad finishes the painting, I catch the drips and keep an eye out for government trucks and try not to think about the other women in the stadium.
Mum sticks her head out of the shop.
‘If you want to go to the toilet,’ says Mum, ‘go now.’
None of us do.
I’m too busy having thoughts about my new plan.
‘If a person goes somewhere else and becomes a huge soccer star,’ I say to Yusuf’s grandfather in my imagination, ‘and so does his sister, and they play regularly on TV, and then they come back to Afghanistan with their parents, do you think they’d be popular enough to help form a new government? A kind and fair government that wouldn’t murder anyone?’
‘Yes,’ says Yusuf’s grandfather.
He’s pretty old and wise, Yusuf’s grandfather, even in my imagination, and he knows about these things.
‘OK,’ I say to him, ‘I’ll do it.’