Summary

This section begins with Amina’s family arriving at the mosque after the attack. Amina notices all of the police cars lining the streets leading up to the mosque. When they arrive, they encounter Amina’s father on the phone, and they all enter a long, emotional embrace. Amina’s father tells the children to wait in the car, so Mustafa and Amina obey him. However, after some restless silence inside the car, Mustafa cannot resist returning to see the damage in the mosque, so Amina follows him. Amina compares the damage to that which could be done by a “tornado” (155).

When Amina’s father finds his children in the mosque, he takes them outside to wait for the Imam. When Imam Malik arrives, he is wearing a leather jacket over his pajamas. Amina remarks that she would laugh at this with Mustafa...