Another friend, a translator, had all his paperwork filled out. He had been telling me for months of his plans to leave, asking about what it was like in the United States. He’d already done his interview in July and gotten a medical exam on August 7.

But he hasn’t heard from anybody since. He doesn’t know where his visa is. For the past week he’s been listening to Chinooks fly over his house. They’re not stopping for him.

A friend of a friend, this one a female journalist, made it to the airport after being stopped on the way and robbed at gunpoint. She didn’t get to say goodbye to her family. Like so many other women in Afghanistan over the past 20 years, she dared to build a life for herself based on promises we made. Now she’s hunkered down at the airport, which is under fire. She is awaiting an escape that may never come.