In her courtyard, Lubov notices all the sounds coming from her neighbors: quarreling, babies, crying, and a family throwing cans into a tin bathtub. One night, she hears a terrible metallic clanging. After a few months, she walks to her window to see where the noise is coming from. She sees her neighbor, a fat woman who had a baby a few months ago, holding a saber above her head. The woman brings the saber down onto the concrete, and the sound rings out. She strikes it violently, multiple times in a row, until she seems satisfied. Many nights, Lubov would hear the woman quarreling with her husband, then her baby would cry, and she would escape to her balcony with her saber. These intense outbursts continued for many months. One day, Lubov realizes that the woman was once again pregnant and can't imagine how another baby's cries will anger her more. One night, as the fat woman begins her powerful ritual, and Lubov watches on, her baby crawls out onto the balcony. The woman stops, picks up her baby, and steps up onto her wall to watch the cars on the road below.