Some people live with so much violence and death around them that it has become their normal. Such is life for Taliban supporter Atiq Shaukat, who works as a jailer at Kabul prison. His wife is sick and dying. He thinks of her as a burden and resents the time he has to spend taking care of her. All he can focus on is the fact that she has made him late for work. He has looked forward to work on this day because he is charged with the responsibility of taking a prostitute to the town square to be publicly executed. It seems alien to those of us in the western world, but there is a crowd gathering already. Public executions are popular entertainment in Kabul.
Mohsen Ramat does not like public executions. He doesn't like anything that the Taliban have instituted, their "new normal" in Kabul. Despite this, there is something in him that makes him want to join in when he sees a prostitute being stoned to death at the marketplace. It is a free-for-all, and he quickly picks up a rock and hurls it in her direction. He is a good shot and he cracks her head open.
Despite his earlier support of the Taliban, Atiq begins to question his feelings towards them. He was one of the few men from his village to join them, and he is pretty much alone amongst his group of friends in his belief in their mission and their methods. Take his childhood friend Mirza Shah, for example Like most men he joined the Taliban army, but he deserted his unit, one of the first to do so, which was an act of great courage because it put his life in danger; always, a danger of retribution hung over those who did not publicly show their support. He joined the Mujahideen and has turned to selling cocaine to make money. There is an endless supply of cocaine in Afghanistan. Mirza and Atiq are still close, and Atiq confides in him a great deal. He admits to being concerned about his wife, his frustration with her, and resentment of her, hiding his fear about her illness and impending death. Mirza feels only contempt for women and says that God decreed that men could do what they want with women because they don't feel pain like men do. He tells Atiq to divorce her and make her leave his home. Atiq disagrees. He feels responsible for his wife and, because she once saved his life, he feels obliged to try to do the same for her.
Life for women in Kabul is hardly life at all. Unlike Mirza, Mohsen Ramat loves his wife, but her life is still far from rewarding. She is a school teacher, which is a profession frowned upon by the Taliban who don't believe in education. The more educated their people are the less likely they are to support their tyrannical government. Despite her good job, the couple have barely any money. Their house has no glass in the windows and therefore no drapes, but they live instead with a blanket over the holes in the wall where the windows should be. After all, they cannot risk offending a man passing by who might catch a glimpse of Zenaira, Mohsen's wife, through an un-covered window. Mohsen is troubled by what he saw at the market, and more troubled still by his participation. He confides in his wife about it. She is filled with horror and sadness because of his actions.
The Taliban rule seems to be bringing nothing but hatred and anger out of people who before might have also consisted of peace, respect and love. This seems to be withering out of their souls. Atiq realizes that he is angry about all of the poor people and the elderly people around him. One night he is told to patrol a sanctuary where he "arrests" men if they do not join the assembly of Taliban supporters outside. He stays for evening prayers (Maghreb) and afterwards, tries to prolong his duties so that he doesn't have to go home to his sick wife. Atiq is not a man blessed with the milk of human kindness in his heart. He eavesdrops on a conversation between old war veterans. One is telling a story about staying alive after an ambush by lying amongst the dead and pretending to be dead himself. The corpses began to smell and the stench was overwhelming. He thinks the corpses must have been the enemy, the Shuravi Army, because the bodies of the Mujahideen don't smell. Instead of arresting them for anti-Taliban thought, Atiq goes home. He finds Musarrat, his wife, out of bed, and tending to their home. She has cooked dinner for him, and cleaned up a bit. He is far from grateful and they end up in a fight, Atiq leaving and going outside. This mirrors life in the Ramat house; Mohsen's wife is furious with his behavior at the stoning and is not talking to him. He finds himself kicked out of the house for the evening as well.
Atiq is tired but doesn't want to sleep next to his wife. He goes instead to the jail to sleep, but is interrupted by a young man called Nazeesh who has seen a light on at the jail and assumed that the jailer is in need of some company. It's not clear why anyone would want to be in Atiq's company. When Nazeesh tells him that he is taking care of his sick father, but feels over burdened and is planning on running away, Atiq becomes angry and taunts him, telling him that he is all talk and no action. He has promised to run away many times before but never done it. Nazeesh is upset and leaves. Atiq's interpersonal skills are negligible. Everyone he comes into contact with leaves his company upset.
Eventually, Zunaira calms down. On thinking about it, she convinces herself that Mohsen got caught up in the moment and the need to be seen to support the Taliban, at least in public. She convinces herself he threw a rock at the prostitute in a moment of madness. Mohsen suggests a walk, but Zunaira doesn't like to go outside. Women are not seen as people, but as objects to be carted around by their men. She hates covering her face with the oppressive burqa and she must walk behind Mohsen, not next to him. However, she agrees to go with him on a walk because she can see by his face that he is sad to have upset her. The rules are as alien to him as they are to her because all he wants to do is take a romantic walk with his wife.
Atiq is noticing something new about himself; his default action is to be mean and unkind to people. He mutters away to himself about this predicament, causing his wife to tell him that he is going mad because he has started to talk to himself. He's upset by this and goes outside, barrelling into Zunaira and Mohsen so fast that he knocks them down. At first they are angry but then they laugh about his rudeness. Another guard comes over and hits Mohsen because he is laughing in public. This iis not aloud. Zunaira tells Mohsen that they should leave and go home, and the guard hits her harder for speaking in public. A second guard asks them where they are going and Mohsen tells them they are going to visit Zunaira's parents. The guard tells them that they will not be going there. Zunaira will wait with them and Mohsen will go to attend Mullah Bashir's sermon.
Mullah Bashir is a Taliban preacher who tells of the evils of the Western world. This is not a sermon that Mohsen is open to hearing. Zunaira is forced to sit outside for two hours, waiting for him, all the while growing more and more frustrated about what has happened to her country, and mulling over what her life is like as a woman under Taliban rule. She misses the old days and as they walk home after the hate-filled sermon, she begins to cry for her old life and its freedoms.
It's hard to stay on speaking terms when you are constantly afraid and resentful of your current situation. Mohsen and Zunaira are fighting again. She tells him to leave, that she never wants to see him again, but he begs her to give him another chance because she is his reason for living. He orders her to take off her veil and she defends herself when he tries to remove it by force. He slaps her hard. It's impossible to find a man in Kabul who does not put his hands on his wife. He stops short and realizes what he has done. Violence has overtaken him again. His apologies are rejected and as he turns to leave he trips and falls, breaking his neck on the wall when he his head. Zunaira is jailed for killing her husband. Her path crosses Atiq's again as he is her jailer. She is scheduled to be executed on Friday.
She removes her burqa in Atiq's presence. He is struck by her beauty. He doesn't want her to die and pleads her case but Qassim says she is tricking him. Besides, even if she is innocent, she's only a woman, and so her execution is irrelevant anyway. Atiq unlocks the door of the jail and tells Zunaira to escape but she refuses. She has nowhere to go and under Taliban rule she is dead inside anyway. Atiq is distraught. He has fallen in love with Zunaira but she refuses to let him save her life. His wife sees that he loves Zunaira and tells him that she will put on a burqa and pretend to be Zunaira. Zunaira can pretend to be her. She makes the switch and when Quassim comes to take his prisoner he tells Atiq to bring his wife to the rally. Mussarat, posing as Zunaira, is shot. After the rally, Atiq cannot find Zunaira, searching high and low. When that doesn't work he goes up to every woman in the crowd and demands that they remove their burqa so that he can see what they look like. Many of the men in the crowd don't like him putting his hands on their wives and someone hits him, cracking his skull. Still he keeps moving, until everything around him goes black. He never finds Zunaira but dies searching for her.
