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She starts to cry, “Then they started having sexual intercourse with me in front of my brothers and my parents. When they finished they took metal and introduced it into my vagina, so the metal tore my vagina.”

“How long ago did that happen?”

“June 2004.”

“How long have you been at Panzi?”

“Those two years. I live far away, so I’ve had no communication with my family, only nurses and doctor take care of me. I want to see my family, but I’m scared to be taken again by those negative forces.”

“You say ‘negative forces.’ Who raped you?”

“Hutu.”

“Interahamwe?” I ask.

“Ndiyo.” Yes.

“When you think of the future, what do you hope for?”

“Only that I will recover. About the future, I’m waiting for God’s plan.”

She looks out the window, tears wetting her face, “Up until now, my mind hasn’t recovered. I’m still in a very unstable situation.”

The door opens and someone comes in to get Marie’s toy frog.

The young woman continues crying, wiping her eyes with her scarf. “I am living, but I do not consider myself a human being. When I think about what happened to me, I feel as if my mind is far away. I think of the five men who had sex with me and I feel as if I was killed. Please think of me when you go back to America, because I don’t expect to get out of this situation. I feel as if the Panzi Hospital will be my home forever. I have many difficulties . . . many wounds inside my vagina.”

How do I gently wrap this up? I follow the nurse’s lead by asking, “Would you sing a song for us?”

She sings in a sweet, intimate voice: “When I remember the suffering I’ve had, I really weep. When I cry, I think about how I was suffering, because it was suffering in a true way.”

AS I’M PACKING up my things, I notice a wiry braid and a party skirt peaking through a crack in the doorway. A little hand rests on the latch. Marie inches her head in for a moment and rubs the wall. She smiles and retreats behind the door, leaving only her hand to linger.

I call out to her, in a singsong voice. “Helloooo, Ma-rie . . .”

Her fingers creep back and rest on the crack in the doorway.

“Ma-rie-eee, where are you?”

I pull out the camera and find her hiding behind the door in the hallway. I flip the camera monitor toward her so she can see it. She squeals, delighted and intrigued. She follows the camera, watching herself as I record her. Maybe I’m playing with her, maybe I’m doing it for the sake of my own memory, but this is footage I swear I will never show anyone.

CHAPTER TEN

The Peanut Girl

WE STOP AT the market to buy peanuts and bread. I’m in the backseat, buried in my notes, waiting for Serge to return. When I look up, a girl, perhaps eleven, stands by my window staring. She doesn’t hold up her hand, but she still appears to be a beggar. I drop my gaze back to my paperwork. As I look down at the paper, the image of her face registers. Hollow cheeks, closely shaved head. Thin. I look back up and survey her boney shoulders and arms. She is Ethiopia thin. Holocaust thin.

I ask Maurice to buy two extra pounds of peanuts. He hands me the bursting, soccer-ball-size plastic bag. The girl has abandoned her mission and retreated a few feet, so I turn to her and we lock stares. I invite her with a slight nod. Her eyes bulge for a second when she sees the nuts.

I unroll my window and slip the peanuts into her hands. As she grabs the bundle of protein and calories, Maurice almost squeals, giggling with delight. We pull away into the crowded Bukavu street and we are approaching the traffic circle when I think, She’s starving, and what do I give her? Peanuts.

Let them eat peanuts. . . .

A moment later, we swing around to head back to Orchid and I see her again. She stands on the traffic median, grasping the bag of peanuts like it’s a precious baby doll, digging her hand in and stuffing the nuts in her mouth by the fistful.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Militias in the Mist

I’M CARSICK AS I step out of the SUV following the thirty-mile drive on the bumpy, dusty, pothole-ridden,