Soon after, Baba is diagnosed with terminal lung cancer. Amir asks his father to ask for General Taheri’s permission for him to marry Soraya, and Taheri gives his consent. But on a chaperoned stroll, Soraya tells Amir that when the Taheris lived in Virginia, she had run away with a Pashtun man and lived with him until her father came to retrieve her. Soon after, the Taheris moved to California to escape the gossip about this. Amir is shocked by Soraya’s revelation, but still pledges his love, and they marry. Baba dies soon afterward.
