Before all the people in the building figure out what it was that he did not take, you hear Ida yelling.

The kids are asleep. I sit by Amir. His tea is getting cold, and he is not eating nuts anymore.

“I don’t know what happened to Hosseini. All of a sudden he had to go home and told me to make up an excuse when the boss asked about his whereabouts.”

He gets quiet.

“Shall I warm up your tea?”

He says, “Why did he go?”

I shake him gently, “Never mind. Tell me something good, something about love.”

“Where is love? It’s all dirty stuff. When our Canadian visas are approved, we will get rid of all this.”

Chapter 6

6

Amir is in love with Canada. Everybody knows about his passion. Anybody who hears something new about life in Canada passes the news on to him. Sometimes he talks about Canada, as if he has lived there for years. He sighs and says, “I’ll go to Canada and be rid of this place.”

When he hits a dead end, he says, “Canada is totally free from bad luck and problems.”

Years ago, Amir was able to go from Baku to Turkey and from there to the Greek border. He has talked about that foolish risk he took at least a thousand times. He got off at a train station to get a cup of tea, only a cup of tea. But before taking a sip, he experienced one of the most important moments of his life; he felt the humid air, the store window full of colorful drinks, the green bench where he was sitting, and then a heavy hand landed on his shoulder, and the harsh voice of a Turkish policeman asked for his passport.

Years had to pass for the barbwire at the Turkish-Greek border to prick him but not hurt. “Oh, I would die for those barbwires now. If I get there ever again, I would be gone forever. I wouldn’t even look back.”

Shahin sighs like Amir, looking at the ceiling and gesturing like him! “I wouldn’t look back either, if I went.”

We both look at him.

“Because I don’t have anything here, no bicycle, no skates, no computer, no nothing!”

Amir says, “A bicycle is not what you need. You should study; education is what you need to make a living these days. You need a skill.”

Shahin wants to have a bicycle.

“I don’t want you to run around in the streets. I want you to grow up.”

Shahin says, “I don’t want to grow up. I want a bicycle.”

“You need to get a job and buy the bicycle with your own money.”

Shahin does not want to work. He wants to ride a bicycle.