Breaking News

Work! The word gives her an electric shock. Suddenly she is sitting upright in bed, pulling her hair tightly back with one hand as she reaches to find an elastic band with the other. Oh, no, I’m late, she thinks. I’ve missed the office shuttle. Her husband turns to her and asks what’s happened.

‘I’m late. I won’t make it to work on time.’

Mohammad chuckles and says ‘Go back to sleep, it’s Friday.’ Maryam laughs. How could she forget it was the weekend?

Her husband tugs at her hand, asks to hold her, saying, come back and sleep. But she resists, she has a lot to do on Fridays – as she told him already a few days ago.

‘At least try to sleep on Fridays,’ Mohammad protests.

‘I’ve many things to do and one day off in the whole week,’ Maryam repeats, up and dressing now.‘I have to do the laundry, some shopping, and clean the house.’ Mohammad is frustrated he can’t go back to sleep with his arms around her. He pulls the blanket over his face and drifts off.

Maryam leaves the room. She takes the kettle from the heater, which it sits on all day to keep warm. She carries it to the stove and returns to the bedroom where Mohammad is now snoring.Without waking him, Maryam puts on her black hijab and headscarf, takes a few old banknotes from her handbag, and goes out.

The street is quiet. Apart from a man and woman going for a walk, water bottles in hand, there is no one. The couple’s conversation drifts back to Maryam, walking slowly in their wake.The man worries about the Taliban’s numerous daily announcements and how hard life has become for people in Afghanistan. The woman adds that life for women was already hard enough; the recent announcements of Sharia Law were needlessly cruel and could not possibly be justified. Maryam sharpens her ears, wondering if anything new has happened, but the couple move out of earshot until they disappear around a corner at the end of the street. Maryam forgets about them and goes over her list for the day.The rest of the way to the bakery, she counts her chores: she needs to prepare breakfast, then clean the rooms that have not been cleaned all week. Once this is finished, she can start a little sewing, and do some work for her artist’s soul. Lost in thought, she reaches the nearest bakery. There are several on the street, as there are on every street. Bread is essential. Everyone eats it with every meal. She can buy it fresh-baked three times a day from the baker’s assistant at a small, raised window. She goes up to the window but is distracted by the cry ‘Bismallah’. A pedestrian has picked up a piece of bread from the street and is holding it up. Bread is holy and she sees he is treating it with respect. He places it carefully where the birds can eat it. She returns her attention to the baker’s assistant.

‘Aunty, how many breads do you want?’ He rubs his eyes. ‘Two loaves please.’

‘With oil?’

‘Just two normal loaves of bread.’The man skilfully wraps them in newspaper, and she returns home.

The tea water is boiling now, so she fills the thermos and adds some tea leaves from the glass jar in the kitchen cupboard. From a smaller jar, she takes a few cardamom pods. Biting them open with her teeth, she adds them to the tea. She smiles.When I die, there won’t be tea at my grave for me. She wishes that after this complex life, she could have a thermos at her graveside every day. She laughs at the thought.

On the tray she places the glass cups her husband once bought her. She stops to admire the red flowers on the tray: she loves this tray because it ties her to childhood memories. It depicts a woman looking at the river from her balcony, and everywhere there are flowers.When Maryam was a child, she imagined herself as the woman on the tray. She felt the cool breeze from the river every time she looked at it. She had thought the picture was marvelously sophisticated and wondered how it had been composed so perfectly so as to give her this magical feeling.When she got married, she asked her mother for the tray to take to her new home, and it was included in the gifts from her parents to her new household. Now Maryam takes down the sugar and puts it on the tray with a bowl of walnuts and orange jam she made herself. She takes everything into the living room.

Mohammad is just waking. Maryam invites him to breakfast. He comes out of the bedroom rubbing his eyes.Then he returns to wash his face and freshen up. He emerges again and sits down, phone in hand. Maryam pours him a cup of tea and hands him the bowl of walnuts. She puts some homemade jam on a plate for him. While sipping his tea, Mohammad scrolls through social media on his phone.

‘When we finish breakfast, I have to do the laundry and clean the house, after washing the breakfast dishes,’ Maryam says. Mohammad looks up from his phone.

‘Go slow.’ He draws out the words.

Maryam laughs and shakes her head. She repeats herself again: ‘You don’t know! Today is Friday, my only opportunity. I’ll be at work the rest of the week and the house won’t be clean!’

A strange smile spreads across Mohammad’s face. He gestures with his hand – seeming to suggest she has lots of time.This attempt to bring calm irritates Maryam further. She stares at Mohammad as if to ask him what he finds amusing. But he goes back to his phone, the smile still on his face. Maryam recognises the look – he doesn’t want to say any more. But the smile remains.

She picks up her own phone, and, going to social media first, as usual, begins to scroll up and down for news. Once again, there are infuriating exchanges between men over a picture of a young woman.Then her eye is drawn to a post titled BREAKING NEWS. Underneath are many angry and sad emojis. It is a picture of a letter, but the print is too small to make out. She grabs her handbag, lying nearby, and fishes for her glasses. The picture is of an official document. It has the stamp of the Islamic Emirate of the Taliban and is signed by the finance minister. Maryam quickly scans the letter. It reads: ‘Women are banned from working in any part of government or in non-governmental organisations until further notice’. It cites as a reason that women are not complying with official rules about wearing the hijab. International organisations are warned that if they do not comply, their license to work in Afghanistan will be rescinded.

Maryam slowly places her phone down, her hands shaking. She reaches for her glass of tea, but she can’t drink it. She carefully puts it down. After a few moments in silence, her mind unfreezes. She realises what was in Mohammad’s laugh, in the character of his smile: her husband wasn’t happy that she worked out of the house and is pleased by the announcement.

Now Mohammad holds up his phone to Maryam.The same smile.‘Read what’s written here.’

She takes the phone and pretends to read. Mohammad is waiting for her reaction. Her face flushes but she bites her lip to stop herself from crying in front of him. She tries to calm a volcano of anger rising within, and an equal despondency. She says, off-hand: ‘Oh, I was waiting for this, I’m surprised they took so long to announce it. This is our situation: to be prisoners in our own homes and live purposeless lives.’

Mohammad tries to comfort her, but Maryam doesn’t want his comfort. He tries again with that wry smile. ‘Don’t worry too much, this situation is only temporary, soon everything will change.’

Maryam does not reply. Her heart is on fire from two sides – from the loss of her agency and from her husband’s horrible smile. She is more hurt by his smile than the news: the smile is the true sign of this oppressive code, passed from father to son without any official letter, book, or written law. Patriarchal thought sits deep in men’s egos and is transferred from generation to generation in this land, she thinks. All this disgusting tradition in which men see their strength and survival in trampling on women – each day a new trick. They want us in their shadow. She jerks away from Mohammad. Even if it costs her life, she has to leave the room. Mohammad does not know how to give up and calls after her: ‘Where are you going? Sit and drink your tea!’

‘I am going to turn on the washing machine, but I have many other things to do after that,’ Maryam says bravely. She opens the bathroom door. She walks mechanically towards the machine and puts the dirty laundry in.

If she could have done her chores as fervently as usual, that would have helped. But her hands are shaking, her body is lurching in pain. She fills a bucket with warm water and takes the washing powder down. She can’t do the next step. She tosses the box aside and sits on the floor. She holds her knees and starts to weep.A strange conflict persists between her mind and her heart. Her heart wants to die from of all this injustice. But her mind will not. She retrieves the washing powder and resumes her work.