Summary

Sumac tells PopCorn facts about Mesopotamia as their plane taxis for takeoff. She asks PopCorn about his relationship with his father, and PopCorn responds that his father is conservative and traditional. Sumac unnerves the flight attendant by telling her about her multiple parents and that she is learning Sumerian, the Mesopotamian language. Sumac and PopCorn practice a few phrases during the flight. PopCorn watches a comedy, but Sumac notices that he does not laugh.

After a nine-hour plane ride and five-hour rental car ride, PopCorn and Sumac spend the night at a bed-and-breakfast in PopCorn's father's town, Faro, which has a population of only four hundred. The next morning, they drive to PopCorn's childhood home. They enter the house and meet PopCorn's father, a tall, thin man with a gray beard. PopCorn introduces Sumac, and his father appears surprised because they look nothing alike...