I don’t know how long I had been there, when I saw ugly Lubna Aziz, dressed in one of her mother’s ugly, show-off rozas, walking up the hill in her sideways falling way. Lubna walked slowly, like a wounded dog, and then stopped for a moment in front of a glorious purple rosebush. In a movement as smooth as bread in olive oil, she pulled her hands from her pockets, and cut a rose from the bush. In a blink it vanished into the pocket of her roza and she continued walking up the steep road in the direction of her house.

The smoothness of her act struck me as incredible. I was still not really rested as I got up from my spot and walked up the hill behind Lubna, who then pulled the flower out of her roza and was sniffing it. It looked as though she were eating a sandwich.

The wind brought me her song:

Everyone else drives around in cars

While my grandfather rides a mule ...

Crazy girl with a crazy song. Why is she awake and wandering around at this hour? Surely she doesn’t have a European doctor who is prescribing walks for her.

I couldn’t catch up with her, so I called out to her, “As-salaamu alaykum.”

She turned and looked at me and then stopped, waiting for me to reach her.

“Hello, Lubna. I got very tired. That hill gets steeper every day.”

She looked at me with blank eyes. “God keep you strong,” she said and looked at her feet.

“Lubna, what are you doing out here so early?” She wasn’t wearing socks or even a sweater under her dress. “It’s much too cold for you to be out here without socks. Go inside and keep warm.”

She was silent for a moment, still staring at her feet, maybe so I wouldn’t have to look at her ugly face, and then in a tiny, slow voice she said, “My mother told me to come out.”

“I’m sure she’d rather you were inside where it was warm.”

“But I can’t go back until I see the man leave.”

“What man?”

“The man who makes my mother giggle.”

“What man?”

“The man,” she said, looking up, her eyes fighting to focus on something. “The man who fixes things.”

I felt a wave of pity as I stared at this gnarled little creature, her body shivering naked underneath her dress. “Why don’t you come back down with me?”

“I can’t,” she said and turned toward her house.

Poor ugly retarded girl. I watched her walk home and then I turned and walked up to the top of the hill and sat underneath the mulberry tree, just above Lubna’s house and overlooking all of Nawara. Poor ugly retarded girl. What man makes your mother giggle? Crazy girl. Crazy stories. And I am feeling so sleepy.