Limbo

by Melania G. Mazzucco

  Fabio Zandonà looks like his brother. He has the same freckles and the same copper-colored hair. Uncomfortable in his double-breasted blue suit, strangled by his tie, which he clearly never wears, disoriented because he doesn’t know anyone, timid like Lorenzo and with the same meek smile on his lips. She gins up some courage and introduces herself. “I’m Manuela,” she says, extending her hand. “I know,” Fabio replies, embracing her warmly, “Lorenzo would send me photos, you were always in them.” “He was like a brother to me,” Manuela says. “Lorenzo would be glad to know you made it,” Fabio says with embarrassment. “He really loved you. He would always write and say that Afghanistan was terrible, if the cold doesn’t kill you, the heat will, the people smile at us and thank us and meanwhile they’re making explosives to kill us, you can’t trust anyone, I feel more like a civilian volunteer after an earthquake than a soldier, but then there’s Sergeant Paris.” Manuela smiles. “You must come visit us in Mel,” Fabio adds, “my mother would like to meet you.” “I will,” Manuela promises, “as soon as I recover and am back at the barracks.”

  Fabio wants to settle on a date because his mother really did insist he bring Sergeant Paris to Mel, but he can’t detain her any longer because the Pegasus soldiers have all crowded around her, showering her with questions. They haven’t seen her since the day they visited her in the military hospital, right after they got back. But she was still immobilized in bed then, foggy from the painkillers, dazed from the drugs, she could barely speak, couldn’t even see straight. On the young faces bending over her she saw solidarity, grief, gratitude, even friendship. But also relief, and embarrassment at their own overflowing good health. It had happened to her. She was on the other side of a divide, in a world of sickness and disability, and no one could or would want to accompany her into that kind of afterlife. After they left, she had the doctor ask Captain Paggiarin to spare her any further visits, she just didn’t feel up to it. And now they all want to know how she is, what she’s doing, when she’s coming back.

  But Manuela wants to know all about them. Some have served their time and left the military: Giuseppe Lando is a policeman, Dennis Venier works for the Veneto region, Ettore Zanchi found out in October that he was accepted for permanent service; Francesco Montano was promoted to lance corporal, he received his stripes in Bala Bayak, before leaving; Andrea Pieri received a commendation. Not a medal, they only give out those to the gravely wounded or the dead. Lance Sergeant Spina is about to deploy again: he’ll be attached to Twenty-Third Company. He gave Diego’s son a magnificent gift, an antique dagger with a curved blade and lapis lazuli on the handle, you should see it. And Angkor, why isn’t she here? She’d like to see Sokha Giani again, with her silky hair, almond eyes, and fear of scorpions. “Don’t you know?” Good Egg is surprised. “I haven’t heard from her in quite a while,” Manuela says in way of apology. “Giani married that bomb disposal expert of hers, a really sweet wedding, in Belluno, she invited us all, we drained every wine cellar in the province, she’s on her honeymoon now, that’s why she couldn’t come, too bad, she really wanted to.”

  The guys are warm, friendly, like at the FOB, like at the COP. Manuela spent nearly six months with them. She was responsible for them, encouraged and reprimanded them, at times even punished them, but for the most part she defended them. They trusted one another. They called each other brothers. But now it’s like she doesn’t know them. The explosion shattered the group, broke their ties, scattered them, just as it did Diego’s body. They share the memory of the past, the cult of the dead, the mourning—but nothing more.

  At the restaurant, even though Puddu claims her, she sits next to Fabio Zandonà. She feels calm next to him, whereas seeing Owl’s face only causes her pain. Puddu had always been the radio operator in her Lince. But on the morning of June 8 he had a fever, 100.4°F, devoured by a cough from the dust that tarred his lungs, he was spitting bloody red mucus, and didn’t feel like sacrificing himself yet again, his tour of duty was almost over and he didn’t have anything left to prove: he was granted a medical excuse. Lieutenant Ghigo gave him two days of rest. So Russo, who was supposed to go with another team, had taken his place, and had taken Ghaznavi along. Puddu is one of the walking dead, just like her, and she doesn’t want to see him again. Avoidance.

  Fabio talks about Lorenzo’s funeral, but not the state one in Rome, at Santa Maria degli Angeli. The private one in Mel. “Private so to speak—the entire town came, six thousand people, they’re going to name an elementary school after him. They buried him in the part of the cemetery reserved for WWI soldiers, Alpini who died on the Piave or the Grappa, a great honor. Lorenzo didn’t really think of himself as a soldier, but as someone who was just passing through. In his letters home he would write that he was not worthy of licking the others’ boots. But that’s how he was, generous with everyone else and critical with himself.” Anyhow, being buried alongside the Alpini of WWI is an important recognition, and he deserved it.

  Manuela doesn’t want to talk about Lorenzo dead, though. She wants to talk about Lorenzo alive. And besides, she doesn’t want to hear those things about him. Nail wasn’t a dead dog. He never held back. He’d driven his tank over dunes, through mud, and under fire. And he always did his duty, even if he didn’t believe it was his duty, even though he’d never believed it.

  She tells Fabio Zandonà how Lorenzo would offer his music to the wind in Bala Bayak. “He wrote songs in Afghanistan, and he’d play them in the mess hall after dinner. He was learning to play the rubab, but he was better on guitar. Everybody stayed to listen, even the commander. Lorenzo asked us to write the lyrics. He knew how to choose the notes, he said, but his uniform had taken away his inspiration. None of us managed to come up with anything decent, though, only clichés, and so the interpreter recited some verses by a mystic poet. Lorenzo was thunderstruck. One song went: one day the flowering branch will bear fruit, one day the falcon will long to hunt, but we have appeared like the clouds and disappeared like the wind. You have to try and imagine these words sung in his young voice, and the sound of an acoustic guitar in the desert at dusk. I wish I’d recorded it, so I could listen to it again. But you probably found his songs. You must have, in his duffel … He can’t have improvised them on the spot, he must have written down something.” “My mother wants to ask you about the last moments of Lorenzo’s life,” Fabio suddenly interrupts her. “She wants to know if he told you anything.”

  The roar. The roar that rips open the earth. The flash of light. The nail in her neck, her heart beating wildly and her leg gone numb. And Lorenzo’s blood pouring onto her face, her lips, down her throat, hot, dense, viscous. And the fear, the boundless fear in his distant voice that follows her into the void into which she is vanishing. Those desperate syllables—Manuela, Ma-nue-la am I hurt?—that spurt out of his mouth along with his blood, torn out with his last breath, as if she really could help him, save him, instead of lying under him, immobile, on the verge of crashing into unconsciousness. Intrusion. Pain. The sickly sweet smell of blood and burnt flesh. The resurrection of the memory. To go back there, to live that scene again and again and again. It’s too vivid. She can’t bear to think about it. Not even for his mother. Avoidance. “I’m sorry,” she whispers, “but I don’t remember anything.”

  * * *

  Manuela manages to talk with Diego’s girlfriend only at the end of an interminable lunch, when Lieutenant Gautieri informs her that they have to leave soon, it’s a long way and the driver has to return the car to the ministry garage in Rome. Imma thanks her for coming. “You don’t have to thank me,” Manuela says with difficulty, “it’s I who must thank you for choosing me to be the godmother of your child. It’s a great honor, I’ll try to be worthy.” “Ah!” Imma exclaims. “It wasn’t me who chose you, it was Diego. We had agreed that my sister would be the godmother. Then in June he changed his mind. He called me two days before he died, a strange phone call. He was so agitated, you know how he could get, maybe he
had some kind of premonition. ‘Listen, Imma,’ he said, ‘if something terrible happens to me and I can’t be there when our son is baptized, I want Manuela Paris to be the godmother.’ Who’s Manuela Paris? I jumped on him, furious. ‘My platoon leader,’ Diego said, ‘she’s real tough, but she doesn’t pull rank, she’s my best friend in Lambda.’ A woman! I said. ‘What’s wrong with that,’ he said. He’d never even mentioned you before. His best friend is a woman and he never bothered to tell me. I got angry, I knew something was going on. I’m real hot-blooded, I got all riled up right away. I’m crazy jealous. I asked him if he was in love with this Manuela Paris. He denied it, but I didn’t believe him. The godmother of your child’s a big deal, you don’t just ask the first person who comes along, not even if you were in the war together. A godmother is forever. We believe in this stuff, it’s not just for show. Diego was an altar boy, he carried Baby Jesus on his shoulder in the procession, he still went to mass, and so do I. Baptism is a sacrament, you are presenting your child to God, welcoming him into the Christian community, and it’s not like you ask just anybody to present your child to God. It’s sacred. We fought. You know, the next day we didn’t talk because I couldn’t get through, so the last thing I told him was fuck you. I really loved him, he was the love of my life, we were going to get married, I already had the ring, we were supposed to grow old together, and because of you, we told each other to fuck off. Can you imagine?”

  “I’m sorry,” Manuela mumbles, blushing. “But this is ridiculous, you shouldn’t have accused him, Diego talked about you all the time, you and the baby. He was going nuts being so far away from you. He didn’t know you were pregnant when he signed on for Afghanistan, and I remember when you told him—because you didn’t tell him right away, you didn’t want him to worry, that was really good of you, you were really brave—it was April, I remember because we were at mess, eating some disgusting tomato-and-meat soup. He showed us the DVD of your ultrasound. He was practically in tears. Someone suggested he get himself sent home. Captain Paggiarin would have understood. But you know how he was. He liked being there.”

  The baby chirps feebly and Imma gently rocks his carriage, to soothe him. Diego junior is a little bundle in a blue blanket. “He’s pooped all over, can’t you smell how stinky he is?” Imma’s sister says leaning over him. “I’ll go change him.” “No, let him be,” Imma stops her. Manuela doesn’t know what to do with babies. Her colleagues don’t have children, and when Alessia was born she was far away. By the time she got her first leave, Alessia was already sitting up on her own.

  “I have a sixth sense,” Imma says. She speaks without resentment, leveling Manuela with her black eyes. She keeps her eyes fixed on her as she takes the sleepy, rosy bundle out of the carriage and presses her son against her abundant chest. She’s still breast-feeding him. “I could tell by the way he denied it. In fact, the more he denied it, the more I knew I was right. I figured it out, and he was sorry to ruin everything. I had told him not to go. I didn’t want him going over there, I told him he had to settle down if he wanted to be with me, I didn’t want to move up north and be a soldier’s wife, I’d already seen it with my cousin, alone for months, glued to the computer—but you can’t make love to a computer—constantly terrified she’d lose him; it wrecked her health. We would have found the money somehow. But he wanted to get married. He was fixated. I didn’t want him to go for permanent service, he’d already reenlisted twice, he’d served for eight years, that’s a lot, too many, find another job, something safer. My uncle has a pizzeria, he would have taken him on. I’m not made to be a waiter, Diego would say, I want to bust up the world. That’s how he was, a born gladiator. I’ll do six months in Bala Bayak, he’d tell me, I’ll take the money, and we’ll get married. And then I’ll go back, I’ll do two or three more tours and then my soul will be at peace, we’ll settle down in Belluno, there are mountains there, it’s as clean as Switzerland, no dioxins like here, we’ll buy a house with a yard, our kids will grow up healthy. I knew something would happen if he went. He was crazy about you, Manuela. Which is why I respected his wish and made you the godmother of my child. Just go fuck yourself, Diego, I told him, and then I slammed down the phone. Understand? Thirty-six hours later he was dead, and I slammed the phone in his face. Do you want to hold him?” she asks all of a sudden, holding out the baby to her. “He’s so good, he doesn’t cry, he’s an angel, this little one.”

  Manuela holds Diego junior awkwardly in her arms. He’s so light! He weighs less than a bulletproof vest. She’s afraid he’ll start screaming in a stranger’s arms. Six months old, black down on his head, tiny hands with transparent fingernails, puzzled, half-closed eyes of an indefinable color. But he doesn’t cry. I am your godmother, Diego junior. But what does that mean? I’ll never see you again. And the other Diego Jodice will never see this sweet, minuscule creature. He waited for him every damned day, and he would never see him. Diego junior’s skin smells of lotion, but his little blue onesie gives off the unmistakable stench of shit. He really did need his diaper changed. Manuela doesn’t know what to do with the little bundle in her arms. Imma stares at her, sad but not resentful. It happened. And there’s nothing she can do about it. Or Manuela either. Manuela brings her lips to the baby’s warm head. She kisses him. Diego junior opens his eyes and looks at her in surprise. Oh, what the eyes of a child can see.

  * * *

  Sunk into the backseat of the army car, Manuela doesn’t say a word the whole way home. She stares at the driver’s shaved neck and sees Fatimeh. She stares at the bare banks of the Volturno, the splashes of snow, and sees Fatimeh. The three lanes of the Rome–Naples highway and sees Fatimeh. The tractor trailers and Fatimeh. The white headlights of the cars on the other side of the median strip, and Fatimeh. She closes her eyes and she sees Fatimeh. It is neither a hallucination nor a memory. It is a presence. She can even smell her—goat, sweat, hair, and something unidentifiable, maybe the soot of the fire, a pleasant mixture of ashes and wood. A silent ghost who insinuates herself between the barriers of the base and slides along the protective wall without making a sound, her dirty feet in rubber flip-flops. A bundle pressed to her chest, her eyes glued to the ground. An emaciated boy precedes her, dragging a cart piled with rosaries and postcards, Chinese sunglasses, and phone cards. Bright green eyes and thick, jet-black hair, the body of a malnourished child and the hard gaze of an adult. Manuela could not have said how old he was. Because she was a woman, Manuela had been assigned the task of asking Fatimeh what she wanted: she had refused to say a word to the soldiers on guard duty who had interrogated her.

  Fatimeh didn’t understand English, and Manuela knew only thirty words in Dari. Water, capture, arrest, cold, weapons, desert, village, well, dust, canal, old man, mountain, pass, mosque, street, river, prison, friend, words like that, useful for orienting yourself, for imposing order, describing a place, or expressing a need. Besides, maybe Fatimeh didn’t even speak Dari. The linguistic and ethnic tangle of the province exceeded her expertise. And Ghaznavi, Shamshuddin, and the other interpreter had left Sollum on a village medical outreach mission. Manuela and Fatimeh were a few inches apart. Fatimeh stared attentively at her uniform, her helmet, the black-bordered gold bars on her shoulder. In Fatimeh’s bright green eyes, lively and intelligent, Manuela read neither curiosity nor admiration nor desire to be like her, nor the vaguest aspiration for the authority and liberty she enjoyed. But no hatred or rancor or scorn either. Merely a cosmic distance. And an absolute desperation. The last thing that woman wanted to do was to ask for help, but that’s what she did.

  Without ever looking Manuela in the eyes, Fatimeh held out her bundle and practically forced her to take it in her arms. Manuela moved aside the filthy blanket and glimpsed the gray face of a baby girl, just a few months old, racked by fever. The woman had come in search of the doctor. But Lieutenant Ghigo was out on the medical outreach mission with her assistants. The only one in the clinic was a nurse Manuela called the Skin
ner—she wouldn’t have let him treat a cat. She had to detain Fatimeh until Ghigo came back. She gave her back her bundle and gestured for her to follow her to the clinic. Fatimeh looked at her son, as if asking his permission. The boy merely moved his head slightly.

  Fatimeh laid the baby girl on an infirmary cot and opened the blanket so that Manuela could see her belly, which was monstrously bloated. Then she collapsed into a folding chair. She looked like a heap of dirty rags. Mother and child were exhausted and starving, and Manuela sent a soldier to the kitchen to get something for them to eat. The cook—happy to have an excuse to get away from the hot stove—came carrying two plates, still hot. “Korean frozen fish,” Manuela said, stupidly, because the woman didn’t understand English, “it’s like chicken, some say like tuna, anyway it’s tasty.” But neither the boy nor his mother touched the food, and the cook withdrew, mortified. He really did try his best, and he did a good job. He would gladly have bought goats from the shepherds to make a tomato meat stew, but after the company was decimated by dysentery, Captain Paggiarin started worrying about food poisoning and preferred to order cases of frozen and prepared foods from the TFC warehouses in Shindand.