The bus is running and the doors hang open, but not a single passenger climbs in. At other gates people impatiently crowd the doors, but at #3, everyone waits on an attendant to compel them. Circles of conversation form. Suitcases of various colors and cardboard boxes reinforced with twine are piled just outside the cargo area. No one moves before required. The ride to Pristina would take fifteen hours, after all.

Some men stand in a pack of five with a small boy among them. The boy adopts the posture of his heroes: wrists on their hips, hands behind their backs. They rock on their feet and rush their last cigarettes. The boy waits below the smoke, but directly in the cloud of fumes from the idling bus. He cranes his neck toward the wisecracks being traded above.

From a nearby bus or an unseen loudspeaker, the boy perks up…