Page 2 of The Wishless Ones
“And then what happened, Mama?” Rohan asked. He was still full of wonder, still rife with the awe that only a younger child could keep alive.
“The two halves remain divided, and for whoever gathers both pieces and joins them together once more, a great reward awaits. Do you see, Jafar?” Mama asked, slicing an eggplant into neat circles.
“What?” Jafar asked, only to indulge her. He gathered the slices in a bowl before pulling out her basket of spices.
Mama smiled. “My little helper. They are two halves of a whole—”
“Like me and Jafar!” Rohan exclaimed.
Mama laughed. “Indeed. Good catch, my daffodil. Together, you are both as powerful as the golden scarab. You can do anything and stand up to anyone, remain strong against adversity.”
“And summon a genie?” Rohan asked. “I already know what I’d wish for.” He was looking at the small pile of sweets on the counter.
Mama’s laugh grew. “Yes, even summon a genie who will grant wishes beyond your wildest dreams.”
Jafar wished he could dream. Jafar wished he could control the world around him. He wished he had clung to his mother’s stories more. Appreciated the distractions for what they were: little morsels of escape from the reality of life in this village. He wished he had better shown her how much he loved her.
Because it wasn’t even three days later when her body was cold and the sands were smoothed over her grave.
It had been eleven years since Rohan had learned of the genie in a lamp, and he was still enamored with the tale. Perhaps because its telling was soon punctuated by a pivotal time in his life. Or because it seemed almost implausible, which made him wish for it even more.
When Mama had told Jafar and him the story, Rohan had known exactly what he would wish for: money that didn’t need to be returned, food that didn’t need to be stolen, a house that wasn’t crumbling at every turn.
He also remembered distinctly what Jafar had wanted even if he had never voiced it aloud. Rohan had seen it in the way Jafar’s gaze had darkened and strayed to Baba’s room at the back of the hall. Rohan shuddered at the memory now, barely moving out of the way when a maid hurried past.
He hadn’t needed a genie after all.
Now, they had coins in abundance, food stocked by servants, a house that was several times the size of their old hovel, clothes no longer stiff with patches. Rohan regarded it all with a deep, troubled sense of guilt. He remembered wanting that lamp so deeply, so desperately, that when his wishes came true after Mama’s death, it almost felt as though he’d traded her for them.
And now, their house was so large that the emptiness was almost tangible—even if it was masked by the servants bustling down the halls, scribes rushing out the door, and a parrot’s squawk rising above the hubbub. No piece of Mama remained, not her few treasured necklaces, not her old shawl that always hung on the back of the chair, not even her books.
If Rohandidhave a genie, he would use one wish to bring his mother back, one to make his father a better man, and the last to eradicate the shadow in his brother’s eyes.
When Mama had told them the story of the golden scarab, she had really been telling Rohan to watch over Jafar, to keep the family together. Which was why, though Rohan was aware there would be no wishes left for him, he would be content—because he’d bedoingthe wishing, and that made him feel, in a way, almost as powerful as Baba.
He crossed the hall to the dining room, where the low table was laden with food: pots of labne surrounded by colorful platters of roasted vegetables, like beets and carrots and eggplants beside more eggplants, all seasoned to perfection and bright with garnishes from crunchy nuts to tangy sumac. At the table’s center was a roasted leg of lamb, glistening and fragrant, while steam rose from a fresh stack of blistered flatbread.
Jafar was already there. He was a wisp of shadow, towering above the food with clothes as dark as his hair. His jaw was sharp enough to cut, his nose long and slender. Jafar had always looked effortlessly handsome, striking and commanding, a contrast to Rohan, who could look in the mirror and still be confused by what stared back.
When Rohan’s greeting went unanswered, he followed Jafar’s gaze to the four different dishes of eggplant, and he knew his brother was no longer here in this room, waiting for their father to sit before a feast fit for a noble. No, in his mind, he was back in their decrepit kitchen from a decade before, gathering eggplant in a bowl, helping Mama season it, tracking everything they didn’t have and everything he wanted to give them.
Against the backdrop of their father’s approaching footfalls, the two of them sat down, Rohan on his knees, Jafar with his legs crossed. The rug beneath them was a vibrant crimson, with a multitude of colors woven to tell a story of beauty.
“Relax,” Jafar said softly.
Rohan’s brow furrowed. “I am.”
“You’re sitting like you might have to flee,” Jafar said, quickly matching Rohan’s silence as Baba sat on a cushion across from them. The gold edging on their father’s ebony-dark cloak caught the sunlight slanting through the window. His attar was heavy with black musk and saffron, his lips pressed thin. He leaned into the light, and shadows crowded in the fine lines of his brow and around his mouth.
“Did I not tell the cook I was tired of lamb?” Baba asked.
Rohan tensed. Only their father could look at something so lusciously alluring and complain. Rohan slid a glance at Jafar, always worried that the latest words out of their father’s mouth would make him finally snap. His father wasn’t like them; he didn’t remember how difficult it had once been, how scarce food used to be. And Rohan couldn’t blame him for choosing to block out reminders of the loss of his wife.
“Barkatisgetting older,” Jafar said about the cook, and Rohan exhaled in relief at both his brother’s choice of words and his calm tone. “He either didn’t hear or forgot.”
Baba grunted in reply, tearing into the lamb with a piece of flatbread. It wasn’t clear whetherBabahadn’t heard or had forgotten how to be civil, but Rohan was too famished to care. He snatched up his own flatbread, warm and still dusted in gritty grains, and dug in.
“Either way, his cooking is as delicious as ever,” Rohan remarked as flavor burst across his tongue. He loved sumac; the tang and the texture. He’d add it to everything if he could.
