A Constellation of Vital Phenomena

At the hospital, Sonja waits for Akhmed but he never arrives. Near the ice machine, Sonja finds the note Akhmed had once sewn into his pants leg with his address. Sonja follows the address and drives to Akhmed’s house in Eldár. The house is dirty and filled with broken furniture. Sonja finds a dead woman in the bedroom and sees the syringe of heroin next to her body. Sonja tidies the house and cleans and dresses the woman. Under the woman’s body, Sonja finds the letters for Havaa and the manila envelope bearing Khassan’s address. One of the letters to Havaa describes how a woman at the hospital named Natasha delivered Havaa. Sonja drives to Khassan’s address and gives Khassan the envelope addressed to him. Sonja tells Khassan that Akhmed has been taken, and Khassan asks about Akhmed’s wife, telling Sonja that her name was Ula. Sonja explains that Ula’s body is still at the house, but she is dead. Back in her car, Sonja notices that two of her letters of safe passage are missing. Sonja puts Havaa’s letters with the remaining ones so she can give the letters to Havaa at the hospital.

At 12:15 in the morning, Khassan hears the Feds break into Akhmed’s house and take him. Later that morning Khassan goes into Ramzan’s room and watches him sleep. While Ramzan sleeps, Khassan tells him a story about the village from Khassan’s childhood. In the village, the cobbler’s son had found a way to make liquor, and his drinking caused him to destroy many people’s property. The cobbler offered to mend the shoes of anyone his son had wronged, but he was unable to keep up with the number of people his son had affected. One day the son disappeared. A month later the village elders visited the cobbler and welcomed him back because he had put the good of the society above his own. Khassan explained that the story always ended there, and nobody talked about how the cobbler spent the rest of his life drinking, “alone but for the ghost of his son, whom he pleaded with in unbearable calls that I could hear from the far side of the village” (362).

As Khassan watches Ramzan sleep, he is interrupted by a knock at the door. The woman, whom we understand is Sonja, introduces herself as a friend of Akhmed’s, explains that Akhmed is gone, and gives Khassan the manila envelope addressed to him. After the woman leaves, Khassan goes to Akhmed’s house. Khassan sees that it is cleaned, with Ula’s body dressed and laying on the bed. Back at home, Khassan packs his clothes and takes Ramzan’s pickup truck. The manila envelope from Akhmed contains two letters of safe passage. Khassan isn’t sure where he will go, but he is determined to leave. As Khassan starts to drive, he sees the feral dogs in the rearview mirror. Khassan unlatches the pickup’s tailgate and allows the dogs to jump inside before driving out of the village.