67 pages • 2 hours read
We Are Called to Rise
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Chapters 7-10Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 7 Summary: “Roberta”
Roberta has lived in Las Vegas her whole life and knows the ins and outs of the desert city. She especially knows where homeless teens escape to find whatever comfort they can. Roberta is a volunteer Court Appointed Special Advocate involved in the Las Vegas Homeless Youth project. Some mornings, she parks in a certain lot and waits for teens to climb down from a particular roof in town, greeting them with McDonald’s. She recalls a particular boy, Dawan. She met Dawan one afternoon while walking her dog with her husband, Marty. She noticed subtle indications of a person living in the bushes near the path. Concerned for the person’s well-being, she called out but didn’t hear any response. She persisted, but no one emerged. She was so blinded by her concern that she told her husband to keep walking and that she’d catch up to him.
Finally, a “skinny, scratched, sunburned adolescent” who resembled “a scrawny savage” (67) crawled out with a knife, and she offered him water. The boy looked afraid, but she wanted to help, so she called her husband back to offer the boy a sandwich. Roberta would later realize that this boy had evaded the juvenile system many times and that this was a rare opportunity to help him. That’s how it started: her four years of involvement in trying to help Dawan. Whenever she would later see him, she would get excited, until the day she received a phone call from Child Protective Services informing her of his death.
Chapter 8 Summary: “Avis”
Avis is struggling to get past her separation with Jim and still feels attached to him. She reminisces about attending a wedding in Oregon for Jim’s old college roommate. She didn’t feel comfortable around his college friends but recalls the memory fondly. Back then, her baby daughter Emily was still alive, and the thought of this makes her joyful. Meanwhile, Avis and Jim are in the middle of figuring out their divorce. Avis invites him over to talk about their next steps, but when he arrives, she thinks about Emily learning how to walk in that very house. Still, Avis seems headstrong and doesn’t allow herself to think much about those days, saying, “I knew these kinds of thoughts would come up. I’ve steeled myself for them” (73).
Jim gets straight to business and suggests homes he can help Avis buy so she can comfortably live by herself. She is shocked at his directness but is open to starting her life over. She begins to question the meaning of life and becomes pessimistic about her future, while Jim shows no emotion. Avis gets angry at him for being so cold, and he apologizes, but she appreciates his forward-thinking and knows he is trying to help. She recalls her friend Cheryl trying to help her find meaning in life again after Avis announced her failed marriage. Avis battles dark thoughts about how insignificant everything in the universe is.
She returns to the present when she hears an ice cream truck coming down the road. She and Jim laugh at memories of Nate, who would clumsily run out to grab ice cream when the truck came. Avis then sadly attempts to suggest marriage counseling, but Jim kindly shuts her down, though he’s mostly silent. Avis remembers the gun upstairs, and the idea of suicide enters her stream of thought as an option. Jim finally interrupts the silence by saying he has made promises to Darcy he can’t go back on, to which Avis calls him a “fucking asshole” and aggressively tells him to “get out of this house” (78). She doesn’t want to seem like her deadbeat mom, Sharlene—a pessimistic woman who couldn’t keep any men in her life—but Avis is confident that this is the appropriate response to the situation. She returns to the idea of meaninglessness, and how her suffering doesn’t matter in the scope of the world’s many tragedies.
Chapter 9 Summary: “Bashkim”
Bashkim must interview a parent for a school project. He chooses Nene since he knows how difficult Baba can be. He thinks about how Baba is mean and yells at the children who order ice cream from the truck if they take too long to decide. Nene, on the other hand, is gentle and much better at making sales, which Bashkim thinks makes Baba insecure. Baba also doesn’t want any involvement with Bashkim’s school after the incident with Luis’s letter.
While interviewing Nene, Bashkim asks Nene where was born and where she grew up. Nene responds very thoughtfully, providing extensive details about her life in Albania, but Bashkim simplifies and neutralizes her words. When asked why she came to Las Vegas, Nene answers honestly, outlining Baba’s problems with the Albanian government and how difficult it was to immigrate to America. Bashkim simply writes that his grandfather liked the US and that’s why his family decided to leave Albania. Nene’s answers reveal that she clearly misses living in her native country with her family, even if the politics were more complicated because of Baba’s history. When the interview ends, Nene asks if she can read it, but Bashkim says he will show her when it’s finished—which he knows is untrue. He thinks he is doing the right thing and tells himself that “Nene won’t understand that my answers are good for her” (85).
Back at school, Bashkim feels uneasy because of the disastrous parent conference. Both his teacher and his principal have offered him support. He can tell that Mrs. Monaghan doesn’t want to bring up the letters with the soldiers to the class anymore, and Bashkim worries his classmates might think it’s because of him. The chapter ends with Bashkim comparing Baba and Specialist Rodriguez-Reyes. He feels bad for them both since each has been negatively affected by war and political turmoil.
Chapter 10 Summary: “Luis”
Luis admits that he shot himself in the head with a .22 pistol—a failed suicide attempt that led to his hospitalization. He is in Washington, DC, and is working towards rehabilitation. He tells his doctor that his occupational goal is to re-join the military, but he quickly reveals that he lied about this because the Army doesn’t care about “grunts” like him. He continues to think about his dead friend Sam and also begins interacting more with Dr. Ghosh, who asks him about the “kid” he keeps mentioning in his sleep. Luis lies, saying he doesn’t know, but internally he confesses that he just doesn’t want to share any details. They move to the next topic: Luis’s family. Luis’s mother was a drug addict, and his father was a gang member who died before Luis was born. Though raised in seemingly harsh conditions, Luis insists that his grandmother—his abuela—took him in and cared for him like any other “pampered kid.”
The next day, Luis tells Dr. Ghosh more about his grandmother. He wants to honor what she has done for him and feels guilty for not having given her the credit she deserves for raising him “like a prince” (91). However, when asked about his Mexican American heritage, he uncomfortably avoids the topic. Dr. Ghosh notices his discomfort, so they continue to talk about his abuela, whom Luis clearly admires. The next day, the doctor arrives late, and Luis is mad. He doesn’t speak and closes his eyes, so the doctor leaves.
When Luis wakes up, he begins to finally think about what happened to him and Sam in war. In his recollection, they leave base without permission to explore the village, knowing the risks and consequences. Luis is on alert since he and Sam have no backup, but Sam is having fun. When a villager appears “on fire” near a boy carrying a bag, Luis panics and thinks the boy is carrying a bomb. Luis shouts and aims his rifle. The villagers scatter in fear. Though Dr. Ghosh still can’t get Luis to tell him what has happened, Luis continues thinking about the event to himself and reveals that the boy wasn’t carrying a bomb, but he still fired his weapon, killing the boy. Luis, in retrospect, admits he was scared and made a mistake, but in his memory, he was certain he was acting out of self-defense.
During their next appointment, Dr. Ghosh tries a different tactic and begins talking to Luis about the other “boy” who wrote him a letter, but Luis doesn’t remember. Dr. Ghosh informs him about Bashkim and says that shortly after responding to the letter, Luis shot himself in the head. This is news to Luis, who tries to figure out what happened, worrying that he wrote a suicide letter to the boy. He feels horribly guilty and begins to physically panic until Dr. Ghosh calms him down, assuring him everything is fine.
Chapters 7-10 Analysis
In these early chapters, each character experiences a personal rising conflict. Roberta is struggling to save at-risk young people in Las Vegas, at times failing despite her sincerest efforts. Avis is dealing with her failed marriage and broken family life—including Nate’s abusive tendencies towards Lauren. Bashkim’s parents are constantly fighting, and the safety he feels at school is destroyed when Luis’s vulgar letter creates conflict between Baba and school administration. For Luis, coming to terms with his actions—such as killing a boy in Iraq, writing an inappropriate letter to Bashkim, and attempting suicide—begin to strangle his sense of pride and manhood.
Each narrator has a clear conflict present in their life, and their resolve will be determined by how they respond. We slowly begin to understand each person’s attributes and how they fit in with the themes of war, trauma, toxic masculinity, and family disorder. In Roberta’s case, we learn she is a relentlessly compassionate woman, even putting herself in danger to help another person in need. For example, when Dawan emerges from the bushes with a knife, her first thought is, “I should have been scared, but mostly I was shocked. He needed water, he needed a doctor” (67). This statement establishes Robert as a character who will sacrifice her own well-being in order to assist others in need, alluding to the role she will play in this story.
Avis, on the other hand, is struggling to find hope and meaning in her life after her husband’s affair. She has worked hard to create a safe life for herself but now has nothing. She questions the value of morality and human compassion:
For weeks now, I’ve been dwelling on these questions that I somehow missed when everyone else was asking them. […] You know: the meaning-of-life questions, the why-be-moral questions, the questions about scale. Our eighty years is a fraction of a second in geologic time, and our planet less than an atom against the universe, and our individual lives puny against the seven billion people living right at the same moment we are. How could any of us think that our lives have meaning? (73).
Avis’s thoughts in many ways serve as the guiding question of the novel: Why should anyone care about helping others or being good if everything can suddenly disappear? She struggles to admit she is angry at Jim, but this denial appears to be a defense mechanism against pain—something she developed from years of living with Sharlene’s neglect.
Bashkim’s scenario reveals troubles regarding cultural and generational miscommunications, sub-conflicts that emerge beneath the story’s overall narrative. Bashkim’s inability to successfully bridge his parents’ unhappiness with his world of joyful potential at school leaves him feeling powerless. Though he enjoys learning and strives to do his best in class—forgetting about his family’s problems and poverty—his innocence cannot keep out the world’s negativity. Bashkim’s bubble of security at school, which he has worked hard to create (most evident in the way he translates his mother’s interview, omitting her responses because of her cultural and generational differences), has been ruptured by Luis’s letter. This change symbolizes war’s violent effects on all members of society, even children.
Luis is largely responsible for committing these horrific acts, both writing the letter to Bashkim and killing a boy in Iraq. Luis is the only protagonist who has directly played a role in his own fate, having literally pulled the trigger to his own outcome. Therefore, his suffering is more intense, and he struggles to cope. Luckily for him, he has the support of Dr. Ghosh, whose gentle and caring attitude contrasts with Luis’s aggressive anger. Ironically, it is Dr. Ghosh’s tenderness—and not Luis’s tough soldier mentality—that helps Luis begin his road to recovery:
And then Dr. Ghosh is standing next to me, and he’s holding my hand, and he says, ‘Luis, it’s okay. It’s okay, Luis. We’re not going to talk about this right now. I am going to sit here, and you can rest’ [...] And so I close my eyes (99).
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