After forty days in this desert
of a country without seeing a single woman, let alone physical contact, Carl
hungered for the sight of a woman.
Any woman would do. The closest
thing that one got to that in this country were the blue ghosts that
walked the streets in little herds. They were completely covered in the
traditional blue Afghan burqa or chador. Each of them looked exactly alike, no
identify, no personality. He often wondered how they could tell each other
apart. Did an Afghan child ever go home with the wrong mother? Did an Afghan
man ever go home with the wrong wife?
Carl had come to Afghanistan to
join his wife, Lauren. She was offered a job working as a women's rights
advocate for the US agency for international development. It had been a dream
of hers since their first trip abroad and he had encouraged her to take the
position.
Lauren's position was not an
accompanied post. Because of security concerns, family was not allowed to come.
But, there was no way Carl was going to let his wife go to Afghanistan alone,
even if she was with the US government. So, he found a position with a small
development organization that worked with the Afghan ministry of
education. That way they could be together.
Lauren's supervisors hadn't been
amused when the heard that Carl had gone around their restrictions and had
gotten a position with a different organization in the same town where she
worked.
They refused to let him stay with
Lauren at the agency guest house and they also required Lauren to check in each
night at the official compound. Apparently, there could be no exceptions made
to the security protocols. Or at least they didn't want to make any exceptions.
So for the last six months that
had been trying to make it work with day time visits. It reminded him of the
worst parts of high school. He could go to her place. She could go to his. But
they had a ten o'clock curfew. Once they had still been in bed five minutes
before ten, when a sharp rapping on the door startled them.
The night security had come,
Charles the mission leader had told them explicitly to make sure that no guests
were on the compound after ten o'clock. Since there were no guests besides Carl
it was clear who was meant. Since then, if possible Lauren came to his place.
But then she had to be back by ten, which meant that she had to leave even
earlier.
The last several weeks though
even that hadn't been possible. Lauren
has been in Kabul, twelve hours away, and she's been traveling around the
country visiting various women's projects.
He had prepared a special meal
for her, with ingredients he had saved for a special occasion. If this wasn't a
special occasion though, he didn't know what was. It was their first evening
together in more than a month.
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