BAGHDAD: Ghaswan still sees Haider crying that November morning. The boy doesn't like saying goodbye to Ghaswan, who drives to Jordan regularly to import household goods. When Ghaswan is at home, Haider insists on sleeping in his parents' bedroom. When Ghaswan is away, he waits for him on the balcony.
Like her husband, Sawsan, 33, dotes on Haider. The precocious boy is speaking his first words: "Mommy," "Daddy" and "food." He imitates those around him, pretending to drive the family car. Sometimes he plays with tools, posing as a mechanic. Haider is named after Sawsan's brother, a 23-year-old university student who was accidentally killed by US forces at an east Baghdad checkpoint on April 8, 2004. Sawsan gave birth to her son two days later.
On this morning, Ghaswan is to meet Khadim, his closest friend since childhood, to talk about an upcoming business trip. Although Ghaswan and Sawsan try to convince Haider that Ghaswan will be back shortly, the boy is inconsolable. He wants to go with his father.
"OK, take him," says Sawsan, "but don't be late."
After Ghaswan leaves with Haider, Sawsan begins cooking. She is still in the kitchen when the phone rings an hour later. It's Ghaswan . She has trouble understanding what he says.
All she hears is "Haider is dead."
AT the restaurant, the men are waiting for their food when the explosion blows out the windows and bits of the wall, overturning tables and chairs, covering the floor with blood.
When Ghaswan regains his senses, he is walking in a daze outside. He finds Haider and clutches him in his arms, refusing to believe the boy is dead. Ambulances arrive but there are not enough to transport all the dead and wounded. Ghaswan finds a taxi. At Kindi Hospital, doctors bandage Ghaswan before turning to work on many other wounded. Chaos reigns. Ambulances and taxis bring more casualties. Relatives scream in grief. Outside, a man throws up. In the morgue, another man gently folds a flowery bedspread tightly around a body, as if tucking a child into bed.
Inside a makeshift emergency room, Ghaswan is sitting on a bed without sheets, staring at the wall. Tears mix with blood in his eyes.
Alone in the house, Sawsan is screaming. Her cries give way to an unanswerable prayer: "Dear God, don't let him die," she says of her son, as she drives to the hospital. At first she doesn't recognize her husband when she sees him, bandaged and bloody.
"Where is Haider?" she asks before her legs collapse.
At least 33 people die in this explosion — seven of them police officers. Among them are Ghaswan's friend Khadim, 33, and their business partner, Qussay, 25.
Sawsan staggers to the morgue. Under the blanket, Haider is covered with blood. His head is smashed. One of his eyes is still open. She starts shaking him. "Wake up, Haider," she calls. "Wake up, dear."
Sawsan holds Haider in her lap as they drive to the Khark cemetery the following day. The boy is swaddled in white cloth, like he was right after he was born. Sawsan wants the road to go on, so she can keep holding him. At the grave, she imagines her relatives are giants as they take away her child for burial.
After a few days, Haider's maternal grandmother returns from a pilgrimage to Makkah, bringing presents for Haider. Ghaswan and Sawsan can't bring themselves to tell her about his death. Instead, Sawsan's sister breaks the news.
Weeks later, Ghaswan goes to buy diapers, momentarily forgetting that his son is dead.
Haider used to sleep between them in their bed. With the child gone, the distance between Ghaswan and Sawsan grows. Usually, they would spend their evenings playing with Haider. Now their evenings are empty. They worry that their happy eight-year marriage may crumble, that death will undo love.
They turn against each other. They argue. On a couple of occasions, Sawsan tells Ghaswan in anger, "You're the reason that my son died."
He relives the explosion every day. He has trouble sleeping at night, and cries when he does sleep. Getting up in the morning is difficult. His mind is hazy with grief. All he wants is sleep. Sitting next to Sawsan, he'll call her name but then say nothing, his mind gone elsewhere. After a couple of months, they move into a new house. The memories move with them.
Sawsan knows that her son is dead — she saw Haider's body at the morgue, she held him at the grave — but still she fantasizes that he'll come back.
Sawsan's mother cries herself to sleep, clutching pictures of the two dead Haiders, son and grandson.
"I want to see him," says Hanin, Haider's sister. Her parents have stopped sending her to kindergarten, fearing something might happen to her. They don't want to scare the 5-year-old, but they have told Hanin how her brother died. They want her to be cautious.
Vigilance, however, is making their life increasingly secluded as the violence worsens around them.
Sawsan thinks about others caught in the crossfire, losing loved ones. "It's not just us." At first, Sawsan doesn't notice. But in the new year, she realizes that she is pregnant. In August, she gives birth to a boy, Mustafa.
Ghaswan and Sawsan love the boy, and are grateful. But the newborn doesn't heal all the wounds. He reminds them of the baby they lost. Hanin calls her new brother Haider. Sometimes they correct her and she becomes petulant. "I want Haider, not Mustafa," she says.
Sawsan is preoccupied with the newborn and tries to concentrate on the future. But some days she breaks down. She tries to hide her tears from her husband.
Ghaswan no longer drives to Jordan. But he occasionally drives a taxi. Sometimes, his fares take him past the Qaduri restaurant on Abu Nuwas. The lights haven't come back on. He can't seem to let go of the past. But he knows he must shake off his apathy.
In their east Baghdad neighborhood, Shia death squads roam the streets, killing Sunnis. In the early fall, Ghaswan's 17-year-old Shia nephew is gunned down on his doorstep across town.
There's a civil war in his country, says Ghaswan, a Sunni, as he prepares to attend the one-year memorial feast for Khadim, his Shia friend killed in the explosion.
Ghaswan's family will not mark Haider's death. They have done that every moment of the last year.
A few days after the memorial, Ghaswan makes a decision. He has lost so much. But he needs to save what's left: his marriage, Hanin and Mustafa.
Together, Ghaswan and Sawsan pack their belongings and lock the house. Holding their children, they set out for a new beginning in Syria.
Their life in Iraq is over. —Dawn/Los Angeles Times News Service
