This is the story of an unusual and lifelong friendship between two Afghan women, spanning from the idyllic mid 1950s to post-September 11 Kabul. Bound by tragedy and fate, by political circumstance and custom, the two women live through the Soviet war, the harrowing days of the Afghan civil war and the rule of the Taliban. Yet even as their world unravels around them and innocence is shattered, they find that there, amidst the ruins, is the possibility for hope, meaning and unexpected grace.