Cutting for Stone

Genet and Rosina come back, and Genet grew into a woman while she was gone. Marion is embarrassed in front of her. He tells her about his encounter with the probationer, saying they didn’t have sex because he wants his first time to be with Genet. Rosina interrupts them before Genet can respond.

Marion listens to the American rock station every night now, and most nights, Shiva joins him. That night, the whole family is listening when a Chuck Berry song plays, and Marion dances in front of everyone. Shiva and Genet join in, and then Hema and Ghosh. The next day, Marion finds out at the record store that the song is 10 years old and feels stupid.

The night before school starts, Marion and Shiva go with Hema and Ghosh to a party. They see many expatriates there, and Marion realizes that just like the Chuck Berry song, they are not as up-to-date and sophisticated as he had thought.

Marion and Shiva are 16 now and play cricket. Coming home one night, Marion sees Tsige, who now owns the bar she used to work in. He introduces Shiva, and she invites them into her home. They decline, and on the way home, Shiva mentions that Marion could have had sex with her. This makes Marion angry. When he speaks to the probationer again, he realizes that she thinks she had sex with him the previous night, which means that she slept with Shiva. When Marion confronts him, Shiva says that he has been visiting brothels all this time and has slept with 22 women, including the probationer. Marion is still saving himself for Genet.

Genet begins dating Rudy, a rich boy at their school who has a car. Marion tells Genet he dreams of marrying her, sharing all the details he has thought of. Although she likes it, she does not want to wait until she is married to have sex. He tells her that Shiva has had sex, and she wonders why they are still waiting. Marion gets angry and accuses her of being superficial. Rosina finds them together and is angry, but Marion tells Rosina he wants to marry Genet. Later, he notices that Shiva was watching the whole time.

Marion is in his last year at school and wants to work at the new teaching hospital nearby. Genet and Shiva join him when he studies, although he does not think Genet is serious about becoming a doctor. Genet asks Shiva about sex, and he is matter-of-fact as he describes his first time. Marion gets upset because he is trying to study, and now he is aroused, as is Genet. When he leaves, he finds Rosina eavesdropping from the kitchen.

Marion leaves to get some fresh air, and when he returns, Rosina attacks him, accusing him of having sex with Genet. He realizes that Shiva had sex with her. The next day, Genet stays with Rosina and Marion stays home from school while Shiva goes on a field trip with another doctor. Hema and Ghosh know something is going on because three relatives visit Rosina and Genet. Marion does not bother to defend himself because he is afraid no one will believe him. He decides to move into Ghosh’s former quarters, and for the first time, he and Shiva sleep apart.

The next day, Almaz takes Hema to Genet, who is feverish. The people who visited Rosina and Genet the previous day performed female genital mutilation on Genet, and the wound is infected. When Genet wakes up, she tells Marion she regrets rushing into sex with Shiva. Rosina does not believe that it was Shiva, even though Genet told her. Genet agreed to the procedure in exchange for her mother’s silence, and this makes Marion feel somehow responsible.

More than a week later, Genet begins to recover. Marion is furious with Shiva, but Genet tells him that she made Shiva have sex with her, and Marion agrees to never tell Hema the truth. When Genet leaves the hospital, she moves into Marion and Shiva’s former bedroom. When Marion goes to Rosina’s house to get Genet’s clothes, he finds that Rosina has died by suicide.

Genet goes to a boarding school and does not come back to Missing. She and Marion enter medical school together in 1974, and she is a quiet but lazy student, leaving Marion to do most of the work. He knows that it is not laziness but something else. Ghosh is a professor at the new medical school.

Marion develops his own methods of diagnosis, and one morning, he realizes something is wrong with Ghosh. He follows Ghosh to Matron’s office and confronts him. Instead of telling Marion what is wrong, Ghosh asks for his diagnosis. Marion correctly diagnoses him with preleukemia. He tells Marion that he has known for two years and has many years left but is suffering from anemia. He asks Marion not to tell Hema or Shiva because he does not want things to change.

Marion educates himself about the disease, myeloid metaplasia, and spends as much time with Ghosh as possible, learning from Ghosh’s attitude toward his condition. Shiva, meanwhile, convinces Hema to operate on fistulas. The procedure is one that Marion’s namesake, Dr. J. Marion Sims, first accomplished. Their program is a success, and Hema congratulates Shiva for understanding her patients’ needs better than she did. They are getting funding for this, which makes Shiva happy, but Marion still feels their rift.

Marion is preoccupied with Ghosh’s illness and stops paying attention to Genet. She is failing classes, and when he goes to check on her, an Eritrean activist is visiting her. The man leaves when he sees Marion. Marion confronts her about the man and her grades, and she withdraws.

During Marion’s final year of medical school, Ghosh throws up blood, and Hema finds out about his illness. She feels bad, as Marion did, for not seeing it. Marion goes to Shiva’s workshop and tells him about Ghosh. Shiva withdraws, and Marion is upset because he needs him. Shiva is so upset that he begins sleeping on the floor outside Hema and Ghosh’s bedroom. Marion moves back into the house and convinces Shiva in their bedroom. It is awkward, but they reconnect.

As Ghosh’s condition deteriorates, he tells Marion to not feel obligated to take care of anyone and pursue his medical career. He wants Marion to go to America, to follow his own dream. He then tells Marion about Thomas Stone, changing the perspective that Marion has always had about Thomas from Hema. Ghosh wants Thomas to know that he always considered him a friend but could not write because Hema made him promise not to. He tells Marion not to hate Thomas and to contact him. Then he tells Marion to forgive Shiva.

A week later, Ghosh dies, and Marion understands loss and grief in a new way.

Two years later, Marion leaves Ethiopia. Four Eritrean fighters, one of whom is Genet, hijacked an Ethiopian airplane, and the government thinks Marion is a coconspirator. The Emperor’s forces are determined to squash the rebels and are violently following all leads, so Marion must get out of the country as soon as possible. When he arrives in Missing, Hema has already packed food, clothes, and documents for him. Before he leaves, he visits Sister’s and Ghosh’s graves. Hema, Matron, Almaz, and Gebrew see him off, and Shiva gives him two books. Marion is still angry and cannot forgive Shiva, blaming him for everything that has happened since he had sex with Genet.

Marion escapes to Eritrea and waits in a safe house. In his luggage, he finds Sister’s St. Teresa print, which Ghosh had framed. He also discovers that Shiva gave him a copy of Thomas Stone’s book. It has a picture of their father in the back, and he can see the resemblance. Inside is a bookmark with a note from Sister to Thomas. He wonders how long Shiva had the book and begins to study it, wondering what happened to the letter his mother’s note mentions.

On a moonless night, he and his guide leave the safe house. They meet up with a group of Eritrean fighters, one of whom Marion remembers seeing in Genet’s room. Marion’s fantasy about Genet is over, and he never wants to see her again. He sees a man he knows from medical school, who puts Marion to work healing the wounded. Two days later, Marion crosses into Sudan, then flies to Kenya, where Eli Harris has arranged a job and a room for him. He works in Eli’s small outpatient clinic in Nairobi and studies to train in America.