Jem, a young girl, watches her neighbor walk his dog around the street. There's a police van in front of his house who await his return. Jem thinks about her family, how her father had cancer and now only has one lung, but still smokes. Her mother left him and remarried a man who now fights in the war in Yugoslavia, but not before they had a son named Sava. Slowly, she reveals pieces of what happened. The man who lived down the street had a girlfriend, and she gave birth very recently. She brought the baby over, but they partied that night and left the baby outside by their dog's kennel. The dog attacked the baby as it cried, and the couple didn't seem to care. The dog was being walked one last time before being put down, and the man was taken in by the police. Jem's mom comes home from her morning shift at the mortuary to prepare for her night shift that evening. Jem wonders if her mom has just handled the baby's body. Her mom asks Jem to watch her baby brother while she goes upstairs. Jem considers slipping outside again once she's sure her brother has fallen asleep for a nap, but decides against it and reads until her grandmother comes to take over. Jem goes on a walk down her street, and thinks about the events of the day and her estranged father, while her grandmother cooks dinner. As she passes a dog on the street, Jem suddenly feels the desire to head home. Once there, she grabs the dinner her mom had packed for the night shift but had forgotten on the counter and says that she's going to drop it off for her. Her grandmother thinks that this is a lovely idea. Jem arrives at the hospital where her mother works. It takes some time to navigate the hospital, especially as Jem's mind swims with the possibilities of what her mom might be doing at that moment. When she finally reaches the mortuary, she stands outside the door and hopes that her mom will come out and see her.