by Carrie Arcos
Ramiza gave them each a small cup. “Sorry I don’t have any sugar,” she said, nervous with excitement at Faris being home. It was like having an important guest.
* * *
∙ ∙ ∙ ∙ ∙
By candlelight they sipped coffee, and smoked, and listened to Faris explain the battle at the front. He gave elusive details, mostly generalities, as if to spare them. Nadja knew he would speak to Amir in private, low whispers later. The most specific was the story he had told Nadja upstairs. The fighting wasn’t getting any closer to ending.
“We need better weapons,” he said. “It’s a joke.”
“What about the tunnel?” Amir asked.
Underneath the airport, there was a secret tunnel that ran from Dobrinja and came out in Butmir. Both entrances were heavily guarded. It was kept secret from the Serbs. The tunnel was built so supplies and aid could be smuggled into the city. But it also provided a covert way out and in. It took two hours to walk it, stooped over and wearing a mask because of the low ceiling and poor air quality.
“Even though it’s hard, it’s still better than running across the tarmac. Too many people still get killed trying to do so.”
Nadja knew how dangerous it was firsthand. She remembered trembling with fear and dropping down in the grass, crawling on hands and knees as the man in front of her pressed his fingers to his lips. “When I tell you to run, run,” he said to her. She was with another woman and her young daughter. They were just one group out of four who were trying to cross the airport into Sarajevo. The problem was the Serbs had a direct view of the tarmac and shot at anything that moved. The airport was also controlled by the United Nations (United Nothing), and if the UN caught you, they would arrest you. Or they would return you to Sarajevo, thinking that you were trying to escape. It was fine for those wanting to get in, like Nadja. But for those wanting to get out, it was a problem. No one was allowed to leave Sarajevo, but refugees from other cities fled there in the beginning of the war. Many thought it would be safer in Sarajevo or, like Nadja, had people there to help them.
Nadja had made it across the tarmac. The woman hadn’t. The last Nadja saw was the woman lying on the grass with her eyes staring open. Her daughter sat next to her. The man pulled Nadja along as the lights from the UN truck found the crying girl. This is what had allowed them to make it. The woman’s death had been the perfect distraction. Nadja had felt nothing as she left them.
* * *
∙ ∙ ∙ ∙ ∙
As they enjoyed Faris’s return, outside the shells came in spurts. After a relatively light day of shelling, the night turned heavy. It was as if the enemy was pummeling them with big fists across the valley. Other times the army that surrounded them was a cat and just toyed with the civilians, picking them off one by one. Playing with its prey.
They ate a small dinner of beans and rice that Ramiza had fried up with oil. Dessert was a kind of cake made without sugar, eggs or milk that Ramiza learned from another woman in the neighborhood who had learned from someone else. It was a recipe passed around and around. It didn’t really taste like cake, but no one complained.
Nadja watched the family like she watched most things now—with reserve. It was in moments like these, the four of them all together, sharing family stories and intimacies, that she knew she wasn’t really a part of their family. She had been added on like an appendage, but she could be easily severed. She sat on her mattress and pulled her legs up to her chest, making herself as small as she could.
* * *
∙ ∙ ∙ ∙ ∙
By 21:00, everyone was lying in their own makeshift bed. Nadja and Dalila were back to back, sharing the mattress, not only out of a sisterly friendship, but out of necessity. They had started sleeping this way at the onset of winter and agreed to continue. Their bodies gave more warmth when they were together.
Nadja took longer than the others to fall asleep. She was still nursing a headache. She could tell by their breathing who was up and who wasn’t.
In the end, she wasn’t sure whose body gave in first: hers or Faris’s.
She wondered what he was afraid to see in his dreams that kept him awake. She already knew her own demons.
In the morning, Nadja woke, tired. Her breath thick in front of her. Dalila and Faris were still asleep, but Ramiza and Amir were up, trying to light a fire. Amir cursed and cursed as if the words were an incantation that would bring heat and flame.
Nadja went to the small window, the only one with glass that remained, pushed aside a sandbag and saw white.
Snow.
July 6
DAD SLAMS HIS hand on the steering wheel.
“That’s appalling,” he says. He’s fuming because I told him about my interview with the police officers. “I really can’t believe that. Dammit. I should have been there.”
Yeah, you should have, I think. I rub my temple. I feel a headache coming on, and it seems like it’s going to be a bad one.
“Did you get their names?”
I pull Officer Steve’s card out of my pocket, now all bent at the edges. “The guy gave me his card.”
I’m careful not to sit back against the car seat. My back still aches, and there’s no way I’m taking any more of those painkillers. Not even Tylenol. In some twisted way, part of me wants to feel the pain. Because when people ask me how I’m feeling, I’ll have something to tell them.
“Good,” Dad says, snatching the business card from me. “I’ll be calling him up. You’re not to talk with anyone else, media, officers, whoever, unless I’m present, okay?”
I look over at Dad. Is he serious? “It’s not like I ever wanted to talk to them in the first place. You’re the one who left me with them alone.”
I feel his eyes on me, but I’m already facing front.
“I know,” he says. Pause. “I’m sorry. I know we’re both just doing our best here. There’s no manual for any of this. But don’t worry about those officers. Our lawyer will handle this.”
“We have a lawyer?”
“We do now.” His jaw is set like his hands on the wheel, hard and tense. “I’ve got to get gas and then we’ll head straight home.” He pulls into a gas station. “You hungry? I can pick up something.”
“Not really.”
“Okay. Me neither.”
He parks the car next to the available pump. I notice some commotion near the front door of the convenience station and point.
“Great,” Dad says sarcastically. “What now?”
Two men surround a third. Even though our car windows are up, I can hear the raised voices. I roll down the window. I can’t make out everything they’re saying, but I catch enough to know it’s something about protecting our country and how Muslims hate us and are trying to kill us. The second guy says how do they know he’s not one of them, one of the people who tried to blow us up? The man they think is Muslim backs away from the other two, but they don’t let him pass. The bigger one strikes him in the face. Then there’s another hit, and he’s pushed. He falls to the ground. It all happens so quickly. The man on the ground covers his head and gets into a fetal position as they kick and beat him.
“Call the police,” Dad says. He opens his door, but points at me. “Stay in the car!”
He runs over and yells, “Hey!”
“Dad!” I shout after him. I don’t want him to get involved. What if they turn on him?
I dial 911.
The voice answers on the third ring. “This is 911. What is your emergency?”
“Um, there’s a fight.” My voice is shaking. “Two men against one. They’re beating him pretty badly.” I tell her where we are. She says an officer will be here in five minutes.
Five minutes? That’s too long. I open my door.
Dad shouts at the men, but they don’t stop. He grabs the bigger one from behind and pulls him off the downed man. The att
endant runs out of the store at that moment with a bat, followed by a woman who has a spray bottle in her hand. The guy swings at them, but he doesn’t even come close because Dad has him in a head hold.
“Get off me!” the guy yells.
“Not until you calm down.” Dad pushes him to the ground with his knee in his back. I had no idea Dad knew how to do that. The guy struggles, but he can’t get out of my dad’s hold.
The woman sprays something at the first guy, who screams that his eyes are burning. It must be pepper spray.
“All right. All right,” the guy my dad’s holding says.
Dad releases him, and the man shouts a few obscenities, but Dad positions himself in front of the man they attacked.
“Zara?” he calls to me.
“Five minutes,” I yell.
“Police,” Dad says, out of breath.
The two guys run to their car, with the blinded one now crying out about how he can’t see. If I had my camera, I could get a beautiful, clear shot of the license plate. But my camera is at home. And by the time my fingers stop trembling and I remember I can use my phone, they’ve already sped away.
Dad bends down and begins helping the man on the ground. There’s so much blood on the concrete. My head is spinning.
“Zara, my pack and blanket,” he yells.
I hear him. But I can’t move. My eyes are locked on the man who was badly beaten.
“Zara!”
The man on the ground moans. Blood oozes from the side of his head. The images that, until now, have only come to me in bits and pieces begin flooding back. All the bodies. All the blood. All the screaming and crying. Where’s Benny? Isn’t he supposed to be with me? And then I look over to where Mom is supposed to be, but she’s not there either. Everything is fuzzy. I can’t catch my breath. The wound on my cheek aches.
Someone calls my name. I turn around and wonder why I’m in a gas station parking lot.
“Zara,” Dad calls again, bringing me back to this moment. “My bag, please. Now!”
Suddenly I’m unfrozen and running toward the car. I get the blanket and Dad’s medical bag from the trunk—the one that he always has on him in case of emergencies—and run over. I give him the bag. Dad hands me a wallet to look through while he makes a call to the hospital, asking for an ambulance right away.
The license in the wallet says Matthew Patel. There’s also a Providence College ID with the same name. Bank card. Credit card. Patel. I’m pretty sure that’s Indian. I show Dad. He nods, then places the blanket underneath the man’s head. He’s checking the man’s injuries and using whatever he has to help him. The station attendant and woman are still nearby, and other bystanders are now crowding around too.
Police sirens sound in the distance.
“Matthew?” Dad says. “Matthew, I’m a doctor.”
Matthew says something. Dad doesn’t catch it the first time, so he bends closer.
“What was that?”
“Matt,” he says.
“Matt,” Dad repeats. “You have a concussion. Some broken ribs and mild contusions on your face and body, but I don’t think much more beyond that.”
“Not even Muslim,” he says.
What are we becoming?
“We’ll stay with you until the ambulance comes,” Dad says. He holds the man’s hand. “Is there anyone we can contact for you?”
“My parents,” he says, and Dad finds them on Matt’s phone.
Matt closes his eyes, and tears run down his face.
The police sirens that had been building now pierce the air as a car pulls into the lot.
“Is he going to be okay?” the woman with the pepper spray asks.
Dad nods. “I think so. I should probably call his parents.”
Will he be okay? He will live, if that’s what she means. But who knows if he will be okay. How does this man recover from being jumped in a gas station parking lot? How will he ever be able to walk around and not watch his back? How will I?
The world crumbles around me. The ground shakes, rolls. Everyone is running, screaming. The air thick with smoke and dust. I can barely breathe.
July 6
AFTER DAD DRIVES me home, he stays with us for the rest of the evening instead of going right back to the hospital. He and Aunt Evelyn sit outside on the patio, drinking beer. I’m still shaky from what happened at the gas station. I read on my phone that attacks have been happening all over. I feel so bad for that guy, Matt. I wonder if he’s still in the hospital, if I’ll see him there tomorrow.
I find Benny in his room, drawing in his sketchbook at his desk. Benny loves to draw. He especially likes to create characters from different dimensions and worlds. Tonight, his drawing looks familiar. I peer over his shoulder.
He’s drawn the farmers market. He’s sketched people running and body parts. Pools of blood. But there is a large figure in the middle who looks like he’s trying to help someone up.
“Benny, who’s that?” I ask him.
“That’s you.”
“Me?”
“Yeah. I’m not finished with the hair,” he says as he begins to draw long hair on his comic version of me.
“What’s she, I mean, what am I doing?”
“You’re rescuing us. That’s me you’re helping up after the bomb went off. And then, see . . .” He points to the candy stand, surprisingly untouched in his drawing.
“And . . .” He flips the page. “Here. This is where we find Mom and help her.”
He’s drawn a mound of rubble and a shoe sticking out. I feel light-headed.
“You remember all of that, Benny?”
“Yeah.”
He turns back to the page he was on and continues to sketch me.
“I wish Mom was home,” he says. “I miss her.”
“Me too,” I say, and my eyes well with tears, because I mean it.
* * *
∙ ∙ ∙ ∙ ∙
Later I sit with Mom’s box. I feel guilty, like I’m doing something she wouldn’t approve. Like I’m prying into a space she keeps just for herself. But things have changed. It’s been four days. I know the chance of her coming out of this gets smaller with every minute that passes. Now isn’t the time to care about her privacy or rules. This might be the only way I have of ever really getting to know her.
I study the photos, especially the one of her by the bridge. Whoever took the photo obviously has an eye. I find the one of her and the boy and put the two photos side by side. They look like they were taken on the same day; their clothes and location are the same. I turn it over and read their names again: Nadja and Marko ’92. Maybe this guy was her boyfriend. Whoever he is, the photo hasn’t aged too well being trapped in a box. The corners are worn too. I wonder how many times Mom stared at it. The shot reminds me of something.
I get up and rummage through the bottom drawer of my dresser. I find the photo album underneath my sweaters, right where I stuffed it—months ago. I almost threw the whole thing out, but in the end, I decided to keep it.
The album is labeled Mike and Zara. Mike, my first and only boyfriend, now ex. I don’t go slowly through the pictures. I’m not in one of my sadistic nostalgic moods that I sometimes indulge in. And it’s not like I only save evidence of the good moments either. If I truly am about capturing all the little pieces of life, then these are a part of my story. I don’t want to erase Mike from it, even if he was kind of a jerk in the end. Besides, if I ever have a daughter someday, I want her to be able to look at them and laugh at our styles, like I do with Dad and his eighties outfits.
If I have a daughter, I’ll answer any question she has about me. I won’t keep things from her. I won’t be like my mom.
I quickly find the picture I’m looking for. Mike and I are side by side, looking up into the camera. He’s taking the selfie. It’s practically the s
ame pose as my mom and her guy’s.
Classic. Timeless boyfriend-girlfriend shot. It’s strange—sure, this photo is from another time and place, but it doesn’t really seem that different from today and the pictures I take with my friends.
The pictures I used to take.
How many days has it been now? I’ve barely even held my camera. I’m so behind on my 365 project, maybe I’ll just abandon it altogether.
I keep looking at Mom and this guy Marko, and I wonder why she kept this photo. Nostalgia? Or did she love him? I suddenly feel that thing in my throat, like I’m going to cry. If Mom were here, maybe I could ask her about it. Maybe she would pat a spot beside her on the bed and tell me everything. She’d make some coffee. Maybe she’d finally let me in.
Maybe not.
I put the photo aside and look again at some of the other things in the box, like the pages of writing.
I pick up one and stare at the words in Bosnian. I could wait for her to wake up and then ask her about them.
If.
If she wakes up. The tiny word catches in my throat.
I could try to translate them on my own. It might not be perfect, but at least I’d get an idea. I download a translation app and take a picture of one of the pages. In a few moments, it translates the Bosnian into English for me. It’s an awkward translation, so it takes me some time to rewrite the words so it makes sense in English.
Today we are trapped in the basement again. Too dangerous to go outside. They pound us from the air, trying to exterminate us. They should flood this place if they want us rats to die. I’m so hungry all the time. I wish I were dead. I think about it. The ways I could do it. I never tell D.
The rest of the translation is too difficult for me to make out the meaning. This will never work for all of the letters.
I read her words again. I wish I were dead. I think about it. The ways I could do it.
Did Mom ever take it one step further? Did she ever try to kill herself? The thought makes me shiver and sends a wave of pain up my back.
