“Parents decide which of their children they can afford to feed on which days.

No one will take this girl,” Sonja says.

“Then I will keep working.”
“Does she speak?” Sonja looks to the girl. “What’s your name?”
“Havaa,” Akhmed answers.
Six months earlier Sonja’s sister, Natasha, was repatriated from Italy. When
TEXT
Sonja 1 the knock and opened the door, she couldn’t believe how healthy her
heard
sister looked. She hugged her sister, joked Chechnya
about the padding on her hips. Whatever
horrors Natasha had experienced in the Anthony
West, Marra
she’d put fat around her waist.
“I am home,” Natasha said, holding the hug longer than Sonja thought
necessary. AFTER
They HER SISTER,
ate dinner Natasha,
before the sun died, Sonja
went down,began sleeping
potatoes in the
boiled hospital.
over the
She returned
furnace. The army home hadto wash
cut the herelectric
clothes lines
a few four
days years
a month, but those
earlier. They days became
had never
fewer
been and fewer.
repaired. Sonja Noshowed
reason her to return,
sister to nothe
need to wash
spare roomher by clothes.
candlelight,She gestured
only wears
to hospital
the bed.scrubs
“This isanyway.
the place you sleep, Natasha.”
Shespent
They wakes theon a cot
week in in the trauma
a state unit. She
of heightened sleeps
civility. there intentionally,
No prying questions. All in
anticipation
talk was small.ofWhat the Sonja
next noticed,
critical patient.
she did not Some days, on.
comment roused by the
A bottle shuffle of
of Ribavirin
footsteps,
antiviral pillsthe
oncries of family members,
the bathroom she stands
sink. Cigarette burnsand a body takes
on Natasha’s her place
shoulders. on the
Sonja
cot and
worked onshe works on
surgeries, resuscitation,
and Natasha worked knowing on she is awake
sleeping. Sonjabecause
brought she food
couldhome
dream
nothing
from like this. and Natasha ate it. Sonja started the fire in the morning, and
the hospital,
Natasha “A slept.
manThere
is waiting
werehere mornings,
to see you,”
and athere
nurseweresays.nights.
Sonja, Thisstill on
is the
life,cot,
Sonja
rubs
the weariness from her eyes.
thought.
Akhmed
“About is what?”
true to his word. Five minutes after Sonja accepts the girl, he is
washed and The nursein
suited scrubs. Sonja
hesitates. takesout
“He’s right himhere.”
on a tour of the hospital. All but two
wings areAclosedminute later in the hallway the manthe
for lack of staff. She shows him cardiology,himself.
introduces internal“My medicine,
name is
and endocrinology wards. A layer of dust covers the
Akhmed.” He speaks Russian without an accent, but by now Sonja feels floors, their footprints leaving
more
a trail. Sonja thinks
comfortable of the in
conversing moon landing,
Chechen. A how
shortshe saw descends
beard the footage for the
from first time
Akhmed’s face.
when
For she arrivedshe
a moment in London.
thinks he’s a religious man, then remembers that most men have
grown“Where is everything?”
their beards out. FewAkhmed asks. Beds,
have shaving cream,sheets,
fewer hypodermics,
have mirrors. disposable
The war has
gowns,
made surgical tape, cheeks
the country’s film dressing,
and chins thermometers,
devout. IV bags, forceps—any item of
practical medical
He gestures use to is agone.
smallEmpty
girl, nocabinets,
older than open drawers,
eight, standinglocked rooms,
beside him.closed
“My wife
blinds,
and I taped-over
cannot carewindowpanes,
for her,” Akhmed the stale
says.air remain.
“You must take her.”
“The
“Thistrauma
isn’t an and maternity wards. And we’re struggling to keep them both
orphanage.”
open.” “There are no orphanages.”
AkhmedThe runs
request hisisfingers through his
not uncommon. Thebeard. “Trauma,
hospital receives that’s obvious. You
humanitarian aid,have
has
to food
keepand
trauma open. But maternity?”
clean water. Most important, it tends to the injured regardless of ethnicity
or Sonja’s
militarylaugh rings down
affiliation, making the the
empty hall. “Ione
hospital know. It’s funny,
of the few largerisn’t buildings
it? Everyone left
is untargeted
either givingbybirth or dying.”
either side in the war. Newly injured arrive each day, too many to
“No.”
care for. Akhmed
Sonja shakes shakes herhis head,
head. Too andmanySonja wonders
dying; if he’sbe
she cannot offended
expected bytoher.
care
“They are coming into
for the living as well. the world, and they are leaving the world and it’s happening
here.” Sonja“Her nods,
father wonders
was taken if Akhmed is religious
by the rebels after all.On Sunday the army came
on Saturday.
and took her mother.”
TEXT 2Sonja looks at the wall calendar, as if a date could make sense of the times.
“Today is Monday,” she says.
“I wasAdaptation
a medical studentfrom before
The Journey to thesays,
the war,” Akhmed River Sea to
switching
Chechen. “In my final year. I will work here until a home is found for the girl.”
Akhmed glowers. Sonja often By EvaseesIbbotson
defiance from rebels and occasionally
from soldiers, but rarely from civilians.
“I can’t,”
Maia is an sheorphan.
says, but Herheronly
voiceguardian
falters, heris justification
a lawyer, named failing. Mr. Murray,
Sonjaresponsibility
whose only surveys the corridor: a handful
is to help her of patients,
with no doctors.
the small amountThoseofwith
money her
parents have left her when they died. Then, Maia learned that her done
money, with advanced degrees and the foresight to flee the country, have so. the
relatives,
Carters would be willing to take care of her. When a note written by the Carter
twins, Gwendolyn and Beatrice, arrives, Maia makes up her mind to go live with
the Carters in their house on the Amazon. She travels there with Miss Minton, her
new tutor. On the boat from England, she meets Clovis King, a struggling child
actor. The two quickly became friends. Maia is very excited to live with the Carters.
She imagines that she and the twins will become the best of friends and they will
have a wonderful time together.

However, the only reason the Carters took Maia in was her money. In
reality, Gwendolyn and Beatrice are selfish. They hate Maia before they even know
her. Maia feels like being with the Carters is like a being in prison. Soon, however,
she meets Finn, who is running away from private detectives known as “the crows.”
They are trying to force Finn to return to England and claim his inheritance.