by Carrie Arcos
“It’s okay.” Dalila patted her back. “I don’t need to bathe for another week.”
Nadja wiped the sides of her eyes where the tears had started to mix and sting with her sweat. She felt one of her headaches coming on.
“No, you stink,” Nadja said.
“You hear that?” Dalila yelled toward the snipers. “That’s how we’ll get you out of here. We’ll all be so stinky, the stench will fly up to where you hide and kill you!” Dalila held up her arms as if to expose her armpits. “Get a good whiff of that!”
Nadja raised her arms too. The girls were answered with a couple of bullets ricocheting off the side of the building. Dust flew off the side, clouding the air around them like tiny billows of gray smoke.
“I don’t think they like your plan,” said Nadja.
Dalila shrugged.
“Fucking snipers,” they both said.
July 6
IN THE MORNING, I wake up gasping for air. The nightmare lingers, and I see a dark shape move at the foot of my bed. I close my eyes, count to five and open them.
The shape is gone.
I’m alone in my room.
I’m not at the farmers market. I’m not running. My body is not on fire. I’m not screaming. No one is screaming. There is no explosion.
I’m safe.
My door creaks open. I close my eyes, pretend to be asleep. I sense someone looking at me, but the door closes just as I’m about to see who it is.
Now that it’s been a few days, I’m finally allowed to shower, so I get up and turn on the faucet. My back feels like it’s on fire as the water pounds into it. After I get out, I carefully redress my cheek and go spend time with Benny. Dad doesn’t think it’s a good idea for him to go back to the hospital. I agree. I’m not even sure if it’s such a good idea for me.
Benny asks me to show him the pictures I took of him on his scooter. We scroll through them on my laptop. It’s weird to look at these now. The world was a different place then.
“Let’s get some more cool shots,” he says. “You can catch me in the air. Like this.” He stands on the couch and jumps off, kicking his leg out.
I smile but make no effort to grab my camera. I think it’s somewhere in my room, which feels way too far away. “Maybe later. I’m tired.” And I’m struck by the fact that I haven’t taken a picture in days. Just the idea of even picking up my camera now seems exhausting. I feel my eyes well.
What is wrong with me?
“Ready, Z?” Dad calls.
I blink back the tears before they can fall. “Yeah,” I say.
Then I hug Benny good-bye, wave to Aunt Evelyn and leave with my dad to go see Mom.
* * *
∙ ∙ ∙ ∙ ∙
Shortly after arriving at the hospital, two police officers ask to speak with me. I don’t know what I could tell them that they probably don’t already know, but Dad signs the paper they put in front of him and gives them permission to question me in his absence. I don’t want to do this. I want him to stay. But before I can even speak, Dad explains how he needs to get back to work. His patients need him.
He’s not fooling me.
I know it’s his way of dealing with what’s happening with Mom—throwing himself into work, never stopping, because if he stops, he’ll have to feel.
What about how I feel? And Benny? Does Dad honestly think his patients need him more than we do?
I glance at the officers. We’re in one of the doctors’ offices, a woman who works in pediatrics. Children’s crayon drawings line the walls in white frames. I feel a heat creep up my spine, adding to the continual pain I’m in.
“Thank you for talking with us, Zara,” the female officer says to me.
As if I had a choice.
We sit in three chairs, kind of in a triangle. Across from me, hanging on display, is a stick figure with long hair riding an elephant. There’s a small table in the room pushed up against the wall. Two coffee cups and two water bottles adorn it.
“Would you like something to drink?” she asks.
“No.”
I glance at the door, making sure it’s still open. It is. Even so, my heart races. This was not a good idea.
“First of all, how are you doing?” She leans toward me, concern in her eyes.
“Okay.”
“I can’t imagine the ordeal you’ve been through,” the male officer says.
“No.” The woman shakes her head. “Are you sure we can’t get you anything?”
I relax a little in my chair. “Maybe I’ll take a water.”
She hands me a bottle. I open it and see that my hands are shaking. Some of the water spills down the side of my mouth as I take a drink.
“First off, my name is Steve, and this is Mona. We’re questioning everyone we can who was at the farmers market when the explosion happened,” Steve says. “Would it be okay if we record this?”
“Um, I guess.”
He takes out a small device, presses Record, and sets it on the table.
“Can you take us through what you remember?” Mona asks.
I tell them about the morning, starting with when we arrived at the north end of the market. Where my mom parked and the direction we walked. I tell them what I saw, which was a normal day at the farmers market. There were people walking around, talking, shopping. I try to go back through the experience slowly, as if I am moving through a movie frame by frame. Stopping to examine each moment.
There were the tomatoes and the vendor with the hat. What is his name? I’ve seen him many times before. He’s always at the market. Why can’t I remember his name? And then we were walking again, I think. Looking at . . . other things. My brain feels fuzzy, almost like it’s got these tangles and webs now that it didn’t have before.
“I don’t remember,” I mumble.
“You don’t remember what happened after that?”
“No, wait, I think Benny wanted . . . um . . . something.”
“Like what?” Steve asks.
I stare at him. “I don’t know . . . he wanted . . .”
What did he want? A toy? No, there aren’t any toys at the market.
“You must have been terribly frightened,” Mona says.
But my mind is with Benny. We were on the ground. He was scared. His hand felt so light in mine. And it was sticky, I think. His hand was sticky with something.
Mona pulls out a detailed drawing of the farmers market. Every stand is labeled. There are purple X’s and marks scattered throughout, a code I can’t read. “Can you point to the spot on the map where you found your mother?”
I trace my finger along our path and leave it in front of the stand I think we were near when we split up for some reason. I can’t remember why we split up.
“Thank you,” Mona says. She makes a mark with her pencil. “And you and your brother were . . .”
My finger hovers above the map. I don’t know where to place it. I’m not exactly sure where we were. At least a couple of tents down and across from Mom? But really, what does it matter now where Benny and I were standing when the bomb went off? This questioning is making me tired and annoyed, and I’m ready for it to be over. I place my finger four tents down from where I found Mom just to hurry it up.
Another mark.
“I know this is difficult,” Steve says. “You’re doing a great job, Zara. We have just a couple more questions, if that’s okay?”
I sigh. “Fine.”
“Did anything stand out to you that morning?” he asks.
“What do you mean?”
“Thinking back now and given what you know happened, did you notice anything that seemed unusual? Any people that seemed out of the ordinary?”
I try to remember, but most of the morning is still foggy. Why did we even go to the farmers market? Mom was buying
something. What? Apples? Some kind of fruit? I close my eyes and try to think.
“It’s okay,” says Mona. “Take your time.”
A wave of nausea comes over me then as I suddenly remember the super-sweet smell of gross, rotting peaches.
“Peaches,” I say.
“What about peaches?”
“She bought rotting peaches. My mom. It was disgusting.”
Mona and Steve look at each other. “Was there someone odd by the peaches?” he asks.
“I don’t know. I’m not sure what you mean by odd.”
“Like anyone who was acting strange or who looked suspicious? Maybe someone who looked—”
“Like a terrorist?” I finish. “Do you mean did I see any men who looked like they were Middle Eastern?”
“Did you?” asks Steve.
“Not that I remember, no.”
“Terrorists can look like anyone,” says Mona.
This is starting to make me uncomfortable. I can feel my temples throb. A migraine is coming on. I glance back at the door, and it seems to have narrowed. Like someone has inched it closer to closing. I shouldn’t be here. I should be with my brother or my dad or anywhere but here.
“How is your mother doing?” Mona asks.
I shift in my seat. “She’s still in critical condition.”
“Has anyone from her mosque come to visit? Her imam, maybe?”
“What? She doesn’t have a mosque,” I say, confused.
“Oh, I thought she went to . . .” Mona checks her notes and says the name of a mosque in our area.
“Maybe once or twice a year,” I say. “During Ramadan. But she doesn’t, like, go on a regular basis or anything.” How do they know the name of Mom’s mosque?
“Have any of her Muslim friends come to visit the house before? Anyone recently?”
“Her Muslim friends?”
“Yeah.”
I stare hard at Mona. “Are you trying to imply that my mom had something to do with this?”
“No, of course not. We’re simply trying to get as much information as possible.” She leans forward, invading my space, but I don’t back away from her. “People died. Good people. Innocent people. Many others were wounded. Some will never walk again. It’s our job to get to the truth of how this happened, who orchestrated it.”
“My mom isn’t even religious. But the last I heard, America is a free country and we’re all free to practice any religion.”
“Zara, I think you might have misunderst—”
“No!” I don’t let her finish. “You’re suggesting that because my mom is Muslim, she might have ties to terrorists? That she could be one herself? Do you think I’m a terrorist too?”
“It’s okay, Zara,” says Steve. “We’re all very tired and on edge. We know you and your family had nothing to do with this. Would your mom be lying in a coma if she did?”
I can’t help it, my eyes water. I feel my face flush with embarrassment at my tears and anger at what they’re suggesting. The wound on my cheek burns under the bandage.
Yeah, sure, my mom fits the profile. Refugee. Muslim. Kind of a loner. Terrorist. They’ve checked all the boxes.
This is bullshit. My dad will be furious when he hears what they said. I stand to leave.
“Listen, if you think of anything else that might be useful to our investigation, please contact me.” Steve hands me his card. I fold it in half and stuff it in my pocket. “Anything. Anything at all.”
I leave the small room and walk down the hospital corridor, feeling beat-up. Again. Everything hurts, inside and out.
How could they even insinuate that Mom was some religious fanatic who would not only blow up people, but almost kill herself, her own children? It’s absurd.
But then I remember the box and the money. I head straight for the elevators.
There’s no way Mom is a terrorist. I know she didn’t have anything to do with the bombing. But why did she have all that cash hidden? Was she planning something?
The elevator door slides open, and I step inside.
When I get to my mom’s room, I linger in the doorway. Looking at her now, lying there, you’d never know she’s capable of keeping so many secrets, and I’m struck again by the force of it all. I think about the bomber. Did he have a family? Did they know what he was plotting? Or was he good at keeping secrets too?
There’s so much we don’t know about other people, even those we’re related to by blood. It’s even crazier to realize how people of the same family can be so completely different.
And not for the first time, I think, Who are you really, Mom? as the oxygen machine clicks on.
1993
Winter
Sarajevo
BiH
AFTER SEVERAL MORE blocks uphill, darting from doorway to doorway, Nadja and Dalila made it to the once-bustling center of Bjelave, one of the neighborhoods in Sarajevo.
Empty.
No open market. No one selling anything. The old dry fountain, which used to always run fresh mountain water available for drinking, mocked them as they passed. Down a couple more streets, they turned right and found the door they wanted—a green splintered one—on the opposite side of the main entrance of the house.
The smells of ash, human BO and mold met them as they descended. Once inside, they removed their large black boots and left them by the door with other pairs of shoes on a rack. They kept their coats on because the basement was freezing. It was set up with a sleeping area composed of mattresses taken from the bedrooms upstairs and piles of blankets that Ramiza, Dalila’s mom, made them fold every morning. According to her, even in a basement, they weren’t going to live like animals.
In the far corner, Amir, Dalila’s father and an old friend of Nadja’s father, had set up a makeshift aluminum stove. He built shelves and tore one of the cabinets out of the kitchen for Ramiza to be able to store items. Throughout the basement, flames flickered from the tin cans of vegetable oil they used as candles—the only light because sandbags covered the single window. The window that allowed them to see the street, and allowed others to see in.
Amir sat on the couch that he and Faris, Dalila’s brother, had brought down to the basement when the shelling got so bad that it looked like they would have to dig in for the winter. That was earlier, when everyone said the war wouldn’t last past fall. Now they said it couldn’t last into spring.
The room was a little warmer than upstairs because of the heat that came from the stove. A haze of smoke hovered in the air from the cigarettes and whatever else was burning. Probably the closet doors from the fourth bedroom upstairs. Amir had decided they would begin with the bedrooms on the upper floors before working their way down, using whatever they could for firewood.
“Back, Mom,” Dalila said to Ramiza, who knelt at the stove.
“Thank goodness. No trouble?” She held out her hand for the jugs.
“Some snipers, but they were just playing with us,” Dalila said.
“I lost a jug. I’m sorry, Ramiza,” Nadja said, and set her single jug next to the stove. She removed her headphones from her ears and let them rest around her neck like usual.
“Were either of you hurt?” Ramiza said, pulling Dalila close.
“No,” said Dalila.
But still Ramiza examined Dalila’s body for any wounds or scratches. She did the same with Nadja, even though Nadja strained a little at the touch.
“Fucking snipers,” Amir said from the couch. He unwrapped a pack of Drinas—the brand of cigarettes everyone smoked—read the inside of the paper and snorted. “Nothing good this time. Advertisement for Yugos.”
Amir was a handsome man with dark but graying unkempt hair and a beard. One side of his glasses was held together with silver masking tape from when they were knocked off his face four weeks ago. He had been at the
hospital, where he worked, when a shell hit the side of the building. He’d been thrown across the hall.
His bad leg was propped up on a pillow, injured from a bullet wound fighting on the front lines last year.
When the Serb-controlled JNA surrounded Sarajevo and started attacking its citizens, Amir had been one of the first men to dig through an old box, find his grandfather’s WWI pistol and head off to fight. He had never even fired a gun. In the early days of the siege, men from each neighborhood in Sarajevo volunteered and fought, sometimes with only a handful of bullets. They weren’t soldiers. They were ordinary men, like Amir. Fathers protecting their families. Even though Amir now walked with a limp and suffered from the searing pain of sciatica all the way down his right side, there was a fierce pride when he spoke of those first days. Today his son fought in his place.
Most days Amir sat on the couch, his brown trench coat wrapped tightly around him, refusing to talk about what he had seen. Sometimes he raged at the world, especially the West and “Bill Fucking Clinton,” who, in his opinion, had left Sarajevo citizens to be slowly exterminated like they were nothing more than cockroaches. He worked at the hospital as an anesthesiologist in forty-eight-hour shifts. He spoke even less of what happened there.
Before the war, Nadja would have looked to the adults around her for answers. Now they seemed just as dazed and bewildered as she was. As the war dragged on, they burrowed themselves into the basement and the side of the hill like they were already in a tomb.
When she’d first come to them, they had pressed her for answers, but Nadja couldn’t speak. She didn’t talk for two months. Dalila took her hand and led her from place to place like she was a little child, and not eighteen. When she finally spoke, the first word Nadja said was Why?
Now she didn’t think there were answers to the why. The why that raged across Sarajevo. The wringing of hands up to the sky, why? Why was this happening to them? Why didn’t anyone stop it? What had they done?