Welcome to Laila's Land (ATSS 3)

The setting of the story has abruptly changed to a house down the street form Mariam and Rasheed, and the main character of this story is a nine-year-old girl, Laila. Laila lives with her mother and father, and has two brothers, but they are currently off at war fighting the Soviet invaders. I believe Laila is a very fortunate daughter because she lives with fairly liberal parent who allow her, a girl, to attend school. In fact her father believes education should be the most important pillar in her life. With education and the changes happening during the war between the communists and capitalists, Babi believes that Laila is destined for great things. He even confides to her “.., it’s a good time to be a woman in Afghanistan. And you can take advantage of that (121).” Not only does Babi believe Laila will lead a successful life, but so do her friends. They claim “By the time we’re twenty, Giti and I, we’ll have pushed out four, five kids each. But you, Laila, you’ll make us two dummies proud. You’re going to be somebody. I know one day I’ll pick up a newspaper and find your picture on the front page (149)."
Along with Laila’s ambitions and education, Tariq is another important part of her life. Tariq is two years older than Laila, and they have played together for as long as either of them can remember. As Tariq and Laila grow up they begin to have feelings for each other, romantic feelings. At first it’s just a just a flirtatious look here and there, but then the relationship grows to be more. The two are about to proclaim their love for one another when Tariq announces that his family is moving to Pakistan. Thinking it will be the last time they ever see each other, the two do the dirty deed right then and there on the living room carpet. Although Tariq moves to Pakistan, Laila soon realizes that in nine months she will have here own part of Tariq to savor forever.

A new paragraph starts at "Along" after the quote from page 149, but the indent does not seem to work.