- Lin chain-smokes on the beach and thinks about love.
- Johnny Cigar comes up and talks about his theory that humans come from the sea, and so we are made of it—our tears, our amniotic fluid, our blood, our sweat.
- Jeetendra is the next to interrupt the reverie, asking for help with his wife, Radha, who is very sick.
- Prabaker, too, finds out that his girlfriend, Parvati, is very sick.
- It is a cholera outbreak that affects a hundred slum dwellers.
- Lin argues with the health official who comes to assess the situation, but they make nice and the official promises to get the slum a delivery of salts to rehydrate the cholera victims. Jeetendra's wife, Radha, dies.
- Every healthy person gets to work getting rid of the water and sterilizing food and kitchenware.
- Karla shows up, too, to help Lin.
- They work through the night, administering to the sick, and finally head back to the hut to sleep. On their way, though, the nightly migration of thousands of rats overtake them, and they have to stay very still to keep from being gnawed on by the horrible creatures (ew, ew, ew).
- When they finally get back to the hut, Karla tells Lin her life story and the backstories on their exiled friends.
- They fall asleep.