When Broken Glass Floats

After the Khmer Rouge flee, Athy and her siblings travel along with many other people, looking for food. They are reunited with their aunts, their father’s youngest sisters, who ask them to travel to Phnom Penh with them. However, the aunts and their families decide to leave immediately, and Athy and her siblings are still trying to gather enough to eat.

When the siblings resume their travels, they cannot find their aunts. They rest in a small village, where they are awakened in the night by gunfire, probably the Khmer Rouge battling the Vietnamese. They stay in the village for three days gathering rice, and each night the sound of gunfire gets closer and closer. They travel to the next village, Chhnoel, and stay there for almost a week, gleaning rice from the fields. They camp next to Meng, a friend of Ra’s from the labor camps, and her family. The Khmer Rouge deliver a letter to the village, warning everyone to leave or they will be killed.

The people in the village don’t believe it; Athy and her family decide to stay as well. The next day, however, Athy and her sister Ra hear gunfire while searching for food and realize that Chhnoel is being bombed.