The Taliban Shuffle_ Strange Days in Afghanistan and Pakistan - Kim Barker [98]
My nose felt brand new, and it was time to leave. After the long break, I knew that I wanted to keep my job, wanted to stay overseas. Four years into this gig, my whole identity was wrapped up in it. If I wasn’t a foreign correspondent, then who was I? But after almost two weeks in Chicago, hearing the various plans to save the newspaper, I had become a pessimist. Something had to give. With few ads, dropping subscriptions, and no other business model, the newspaper seemed like it was imploding. I worried that I would have to move back to Chicago, find a new job, or make Dave get an actual job, if we could even make us work. Nothing else seemed likely. I calculated the odds. Chicago or Dave getting a job seemed like the most realistic bets. I talked to Dave. He really didn’t want to get an actual job yet.
“But I’m pretty sure they’re going to get rid of the foreign staff,” I said. “We can’t both freelance. So I may have to move back to Chicago. We may have to move.”
“I really hope that doesn’t happen,” he said. “I’d miss you.”
“Wouldn’t you come with me? You can work there.”
“I don’t want to live in Chicago. I don’t want to run into all your ex-boyfriends all the time.”
“All my ex-boyfriends? There’s maybe one.”
“I don’t want to just be a trophy on your arm there, Kim.”
“A trophy? You’re hardly a trophy.”
I thought about what he was saying.
“What about a compromise, D.C. or New York?”
“I don’t want to live in the U.S. I have no interest.”
All my doubts clicked into place. Freedom Fries and all, this was still my country. I didn’t want to move back to the States yet, but I didn’t want to rule out the possibility of ever living here again. I had reverted to my fantasy of normalcy, children, the things I was supposed to want, rather than facing the fact that this relationship was doomed. The fights had just gotten worse; objects had been thrown. I would much rather be alone than ever yell again, even if it meant being alone in Pakistan.
I walked into the Tribune Tower to say goodbye to my bosses and churn through some paperwork before flying home to Islamabad. Within three months, most of the glass offices would be filled with different people. Most of the top editors would quit, including the man who had written my name on an envelope, the editor in chief, and the editor who wouldn’t let me talk to Sam. The motto of the Tribune would change from the hopeful “World’s Greatest Newspaper” to the realistic “The Midwest’s largest reporting team.” That evening, I stepped off the elevator and walked past the inexplicable six-legged statue on my way out the door. I glanced at the nearby quote from Flannery O’Connor. It seemed apt: “The truth does not change according to our ability to stomach it.” My limbo was becoming my life.
CHAPTER 20
WHY CAN’T WE BE FRIENDS?
I flew back to Pakistan to pick up the pieces. As I trudged out of the Islamabad airport into the summer swelter, Samad spotted me and grabbed my purple suitcase, big enough for him to fit inside. “Hello, boss,” he said, looking down at the pavement. This was a test run, to see if he could handle working for me again. He had disappeared for more than a month after I left for the States, unavailable whenever my office manager called. But he had finally surfaced to explain why he had been acting so strange. He was not an ISI spy. He had been seeing a girl—his fiancée.
Although he was engaged, Samad was not supposed to talk to his fiancée. This was an arranged marriage. Samad and his fiancée would not be allowed to marry for years, not until his older brother had married, and not until Samad and the girl were considered old enough. This decision had the force