Perhaps it was a need to confirm the existence of the moon that woke me from my fitful slumber that night. It might have been my peculiar dream. I’d been back in the palace gardens watching my father play hide-and-seek with President Daoud, and Neelab was high-stepping into the fountain to toss Ai-Khanoum coins into the water.

Whatever the cause, I woke abruptly. I tried to go back to sleep but couldn’t keep my eyes closed. I was thirsty too.

Faheem shifted next to me. I held my breath, not wanting to wake him. He made a short, tranquil hum before his breathing fell into a somnolent rhythm. I wanted to touch his face but when my fingers neared his cheek, the dark line of his eyelashes fluttered, and I pulled away.

My eyes adjusted to the dark, and I could make out the shapes of the furniture. I sat up. My mother was asleep in the bed just a few feet away. My father sat upright in the chair, snoring softly with his glasses in his hand. To see him resting brought me relief.

Boba often found me awake, reading, when I was meant to be asleep. Instead of becoming angry, he would tuck me in and sing a song by Ahmad Zahir, the wild-haired crooner enchanting the radio waves and house parties.

While I slumber, you are open-eyed

I am naïve but you are ever wise

I lie in rest, and yet you travail

Your glimmering love set to prevail.

When the clouds in the sky break away

Wink, my Star, and light the day

Boba had an important job to do, my mother would explain as she knelt at our bedside, rubbing Faheem’s back and stroking my hair. She’d looked weary too, and maybe that was because her job was no less vital than his.

Now my mother lay on her side, her hands tucked under her face. Her chest rose and fell like waves rippling across a lake. She looked beautiful even in her sleep—her perfectly straight nose, her round eyes, her hair in dark rivulets. The pendant she wore, the golden name of God, dangled in the hollow between her collarbones.

I put both feet on the floor and tiptoed to the door.

I stepped quietly into the hallway and came face to face with the French doors of the library. Moonlight fell through the window. I entered the room and walked over to the bookshelf to touch the spines of the president’s books, some linen, some glossy, until I pulled out The Book of Fixed Stars and turned to the page I had bookmarked. I walked with it to the window, trying to glean a story from the scattered stars.