The Kite Runner: Chapter 23 Summary & Analysis

The narrative continues with a blur of Amir’s memories. Time seems out of order, and he sees a nurse named Aisha leaning over him, and a man with a moustache, and a familiar man in a pakol. Amir imagines Baba wrestling the black bear, but when Amir looks into his eyes he sees it isn’t Baba, but Amir himself that is wrestling the bear.

Amir wakes up and learns that he is in a hospital in Peshawar, and the man with the moustache is named Dr. Faruqi, though Amir thinks of him as “Armand.” Amir tries to speak, but discovers his mouth is wired shut. The doctor tells him he has a ruptured spleen, seven broken ribs, a fractured eye socket, and a split upper lip. He will have to eat only liquids for a few weeks. Amir thinks about the damage, but the thing that sticks with him is the lip injury – it is split down the middle like Hassan’s cleft lip.

Farid and Sohrab visit Amir the next day, and Amir thanks them and properly introduces himself to Sohrab, who barely speaks. Amir asks about Rahim Khan, and Farid says he disappeared the day after they did, but left Amir a note. When Farid leaves, Amir asks if Sohrab will stay. Sohrab sits with Amir, but he does not speak and only looks at his hands.

That night Amir reads Rahim Khan’s note. Rahim Khan says that he knew what happened with Amir and Hassan, and though what Amir did was wrong, he was too hard on himself afterward. He hopes Amir will find some peace on his trip to Afghanistan.

Rahim Khan then says that he knows Baba was hard on Amir, but part of the reason for this was Baba’s own guilt. He could not love Hassan openly as a son, and Amir represented his privileged half, so when Baba was being hard on Amir he was also being hard on himself. All of Baba’s good works, including the orphanage and his many works of charity, were a way of redeeming himself for his sin. Rahim Khan says he hopes Amir can forgive both Baba and himself.

With the letter, Rahim Khan leaves Amir a key to his safe-deposit box, where there is money to cover Amir’s expenses in Peshawar. He asks that Amir not come looking for him, as he has little time left to live. Amir weeps as he reads the letter, and thinks about his similarities with Baba – how they were both “tortured souls,” who had betrayed their truest friend. Amir compares himself with Baba’s many good works, and wonders if he has done anything to redeem himself.

The next morning Amir looks at himself in the mirror, and sees all the damage to his face. Farid and Sohrab arrive, and Farid says they should leave Peshawar soon, as the Taliban have friends there. Amir gives Farid the names of the American couple that Rahim Khan told him ran the Peshawar orphanage, and he leaves to find them.

Amir spends the rest of the day playing a card game, panjpar, with Sohrab, who still rarely speaks. Amir asks what Hassan had said about him, and Sohrab says that Hassan told him Amir was the best friend he ever had. When Amir tries to touch him, Sohrab flinches.

For the next two days, Sohrab and Amir play panjpar in silence. The next day Amir decides that he must leave, and he discharges himself from the hospital early. Then Farid arrives and says that there never was a Thomas and Betty Caldwell in Peshawar. Amir and Farid are worried about what they will do now, but they get Rahim Khan’s money from the bank and decide to take Sohrab to Islamabad, the capital of Pakistan. On the drive there Amir sleeps, and he dreams of Rahim Khan’s words: “a way to be good again.”