He ignored her.
“She lives there.”
He pointed toward their gate.
“She only came outside for one minute.”
The morality official looked at him.
“Then she can go back.”
Laila stepped away.
At that exact moment, Mishi darted from beneath the car.
She ran between the two men.
Across the lane.
Onto a low wall.
Then jumped into the courtyard of a neighbouring house.
Nobody stopped her.
Nobody asked where she was going.
Nobody asked who accompanied her.
The cat disappeared into the sunlight.
Laila stared after her.
Farid whispered:
“I’ll get her later.”
They went home.
It should have been a minor incident.
A warning.
Nothing more.
But after that morning, Soraya became frightened.
For three days she did not allow Laila or Mina near the front gate.
“If they recognise the house, they may come again.”
“They don’t care about us,” Laila said.
“You don’t know that.”
“I did nothing.”
“That doesn’t matter.”
Laila looked at her mother.
“Then what does?”
Soraya did not answer.
She simply closed the curtain.
Before August 2021, Soraya had worked in an accounting office.
Not an important job.
She had not been powerful.
She had spent most days entering figures into spreadsheets and complaining about a printer that jammed whenever someone tried to print more than twenty pages.
She used to leave home each morning carrying a handbag and a plastic container of rice.
Laila remembered watching her apply lipstick in the hallway mirror.
Not because lipstick was important.
Because leaving the house had once been ordinary.
Now Soraya rarely spoke about that job.
She embroidered children’s clothes at home and occasionally helped a neighbour keep handwritten accounts for a small food business.
The money was irregular.
Farid increasingly became the person who did things outside.
He bought vegetables.
Collected medicines.
Paid bills.
Carried documents.
Asked questions at offices.
Laila wrote lists for him.
That was how February became March.
Then April.
Then May.
Mishi continued escaping whenever somebody forgot to watch the door.
Nobody punished her.
She slept wherever she wanted.
On the roof.
Under a neighbour’s car.
Beside a pile of firewood.
Sometimes she disappeared for half a day.
Laila began noticing it.
Not because she resented the animal.
Because the comparison became impossible not to see.
One afternoon, Mina stood beside the courtyard wall listening to children returning from school.
She was twelve.
Her last year of formal education was ending.
She held an exercise book against her chest.
“What happens next year?”
Laila knew exactly what she meant.
“Nothing.”
Mina frowned.
“What do you mean?”
“You’ll study here.”
“With you?”
“Yes.”
“That isn’t school.”
“No.”
“Will they open again?”
Laila looked away.
“I don’t know.”
Mina became angry.
Not emotional.
Angry.
“Farid says they’ll open.”
“Farid doesn’t know.”
“Papa said the same thing.”
“Papa doesn’t know either.”
Their father, Hamid, heard them from the next room.
He worked repairing mobile phones in a small shop.
He came into the courtyard.
“Why are you frightening her?”
Laila turned.
“I’m not frightening her.”
“You told her school isn’t opening.”
“I said I don’t know.”
“She doesn’t need to think about these things every day.”
“She thinks about them because she’s the one who can’t go.”
