Braco

by Lesleyanne Ryan

  “Fine,” Drach said, his eyes shifting between them. “You can all stay here and watch over the dead. It seems that’s all you’re good for. If I feel like it, I might send a vehicle back for you.”

  The sergeant kicked an ammo case at Niko, striking him in the shin. A Scorpion spat at Niko’s feet and walked away. Drach, Ivan, and the Scorpions drove away.

  They were alone with only the lights from the bulldozer. Niko struggled to keep his mind clear. Petar climbed up in the bulldozer, turned off the headlights, and sat silently in the seat. The others wandered near the bodies, smoking. Niko turned away, dropped his rifle, and walked into the darkness until he was sure no one could see him.

  Then he collapsed into the tall grass and pulled off his helmet.

  The picture of Natalija and Mira shone in the moonlight. Niko pulled them out and kissed them.

  He struggled to breathe.

  His chest hurt.

  Then his shoulders convulsed and his teeth clamped together.

  Tears poured from his eyes.

  FRIDAY: ATIF STAVIC

  “BRACO.”

  Atif opened his eyes.

  Darkness.

  His eyes adjusted to it. The moon. Treeline. A faint glow in the east. A man called out to his wife.

  “Braco.”

  Atif stiffened and then relaxed.

  “Tarak?” he whispered, trying to move. “You’re alive!”

  Tarak grunted behind him.

  “Are they all gone?”

  “I think so,” Tarak said. He coughed then spit. “Some of them stayed for a while, but then a truck came and took them.” He paused and took in a laboured breath. “I don’t think they left a sentry.”

  Atif looked: all he could see was the treeline.

  “Can you move?”

  “No.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  “I can’t feel my legs. My arms are numb. You’re going to have to pull yourself out.”

  Atif tried, but his own legs were not responding. “I can’t feel my legs,” he whispered. “Am I shot?”

  “Your legs are probably asleep.” Tarak drew in a long breath. “Use your arms. Quickly.”

  When Atif tried to move, he knocked his head into someone’s knee. He pushed it aside. An arm dropped on him. He flipped the lifeless arm across a body and planted his hands on a chest. He raised himself up, but then one of his arms slipped between the bodies. He pulled the arm free, planting his hands firmly on the unmoving chest. He pulled his protesting legs along; they snagged on a limb. Atif shifted course, his hands finding muddy earth between the bodies. He pulled hard and slipped free. Tarak grunted. Atif looked back: he could see his bare feet. His legs ached from his thighs to the tips of his toes.

  He looked around. Nothing moved. He turned to Tarak.

  The soldier lay on his stomach, his face upturned towards Atif. Atif pulled up Tarak’s shirt and inspected his back. There were two holes, one dead centre and the other to the right.

  “I think one of the bullets is in your spine. The other one might be in your liver.” Atif bit his lip. If they were near a hospital, Tarak could survive either wound.

  “It’s going to be light soon,” Tarak said. “You have to go.”

  “What? No. I can’t leave you like this.”

  “I can’t walk.”

  “I can carry you,” Atif whispered. “Into the woods. I can leave you there and get someone to come back for you. I can….”

  “Stop it, Braco. You can’t do any of that and you know it.”

  “I can’t leave you.”

  “If you stay here, the Chetniks will find you. Is that what you want?”

  “I want you to live. I want you to come to Tuzla. I want you to meet my mother and my sister. I want you to come with us.”

  “I know. I know. But I can’t.” Tarak coughed and spit out a mouthful of blood. “I don’t have much longer. I need to know you’re safe in the woods. I need you to tell the army where I am. Where we all are.”

  Atif wiped Tarak’s face with his shirt.

  “It’s not far,” Tarak said. “Go. Keep walking until you find someone.”

  “I don’t know if I can do it without you.”

  “I’ll be with you, Braco. Promise.”

  An engine revved. Atif froze.

  “They might,” Tarak said. “They might be coming back. Go. Please, little brother. Go now.”

  The rumbling grew louder. Headlights bounced off the buildings next to the road. Atif ducked between the bodies.

  “I think they’re coming here.”

  There was no response. Atif looked down. Tarak’s eyes were wide open, staring straight ahead.

  “Tarak?” Atif pushed his shoulders. “Wake up. They’re coming. Please, Tarak. I can’t do this alone. Wake up!”

  The headlights turned towards the farm.

  “Tarak?”

  Atif swatted a tear.

  “Okay. I’ll go.” He drew his hand over Tarak’s eyes, closing them, then leaned down and kissed his forehead. “I won’t forget you.”

  When Atif tried to stand, his legs collapsed in a bed of pins and needles. The vehicle lights struck the trees above him. Atif crawled over arms, over legs, over heads, feet, and torsos. Then he touched wet grass. His legs came to life, pushing him towards the woods, his bare feet digging into the soft ground, his fingers clawing into the grass.

  The headlights floated above him.

  He heard voices.

  A branch struck him in the head.

  Bushes!

  The trucks stopped. Doors slammed.

  Atif crawled away.

  FRIDAY: JAC LARUE

  JAC STAYED AT the window until the sun broke the horizon and the echo of gunshots were replaced with those of engines, dogs, and human voices. He’d counted over three hundred gunshots. At six o’clock, the Serbs offered the peacekeepers breakfast. Jac didn’t eat. Maarten threw up.

  “We have an escort for you,” the Serb captain told them after breakfast. “You can return to Potocari immediately.”

  “About time,” Maarten whispered next to Jac’s ear.

  They walked out of the school. As they waited, Jac loitered towards the shed where he’d seen the man the night before. After a few steps, he realized its doors were wide open and no one was standing guard.

  “Is that the shed?” Janssen asked Jac as they jumped into the back of the truck.

  “Yeah. Looks empty now.”

  “Write it down, Jac.”

  Jac sat next to the tailgate, watching the scenery pass by in a blur. Hundreds of Serb soldiers patrolled the road. Trucks and armoured vehicles moved north. Bodies littered the shoulder and ditches. Jac committed every sight to memory.

  The truck ran unmolested through roadblocks and dropped the peacekeepers at the entrance to their camp. Jac stood in the middle of the road and stared at the deserted street and the factories. Where there had been thousands of women and children the day before, only garbage and clothes remained.

  “I didn’t think they’d all be gone by now,” Maarten said.

  “Yeah.” Jac shook his head. The compound was quiet.

  Too quiet.

  He and Maarten trotted across the yard and stood in front of the building in which five thousand people had been sitting the day before. The building was empty.

  “Where are they?”

  Maarten took a few steps inside.

  “They’re gone,” said a voice.

  The two peacekeepers turned around. Amir, the translator, was sitting on the bottom step of the interior staircase. His eyes were vacant. Jac walked up to him.

  “What do you mean they’re gone?”

  Amir raised his eyes
. “Like I said. Gone. All of them.” The translator stood up and walked into the sea of garbage. He picked up a doll and held it up. “You gave them to the Chetniks. You walked them out the front gate and gave them to those murdering bastards. The women, the children, the men. My little brothers.”

  “I’m sorry, Amir. I didn’t know.”

  “I tried to stop them.” He threw the doll deeper into the building. “I tried to get them identification, tried to pass them off as employees, but no one would give them identification. They’re dead now because of you.”

  Jac stared at the translator.

  “That’s all that mattered to you,” Amir said. “Just get them out of here so that you don’t have to be responsible.”

  “That’s not true.”

  “It is true. You came here and took our weapons and told us that you would protect us.” Amir stepped forward, throwing out his arms. “Where was that protection?”

  Jac looked away, his eye catching a glimpse of a rope hanging from a rafter.

  “Where are they, Jac?” Amir said, picking up a boy’s jacket and throwing it at his feet. “Where are they?”

  “The buses got through to Tisca.”

  “My brothers didn’t get on a bus, Jac. The Chetniks put them on a truck. How many trucks do you think went to Tisca?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “That’s because you don’t see what’s going on around you. The buses took hours to return. The trucks were gone for less than half of that. Do you really think they went all the way to Tisca?”

  “The officers must know about it.”

  “They don’t give a damn. They’re too busy having drinks with Mladic.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Of course you don’t, Jac,” Amir shouted, tears streaking his cheeks. “You’re walking around with blinders on just like everyone else. Fuck the UN. You’re the fucking Mafia.”

  The translator turned and strode away. Jac looked at Maarten.

  “You’re quiet all of a sudden.”

  “What am I supposed to say? I don’t know about you, Jac, but I’m beginning to feel like the bad guy.”

  Jac went into the building. It reeked of urine, feces, and vomit. He scanned what remained of the people of Srebrenica. Garbage, plastic bags, diapers, clothes, luggage littered the floor. He looked up at the rope and took a step towards it. His foot slipped. He looked down: his boot was immersed in shit. He stepped back and wiped it against a canvas bag. Maarten handed him a rag. He examined the piece of white fabric: cotton, long sleeves, collared neck.

  A man’s shirt? Jac dropped it and backed out of the building. He turned away and rubbed his boot clean in the grass.

  “Hey, guys.”

  Jac looked up. Arie was jogging up to them.

  “Nice to see you back in one piece,” he said. “Erik is cleaning out the carrier. He has mail for you.”

  “Mail?” Maarten asked.

  Arie motioned to the empty building with his head.

  “After they left, the Serbs let our convoy in. We got fresh food, mail. Even coffee and chocolate.”

  “Bastards.”

  “You better get back there before Erik throws your kit out,” Arie said as he walked away.

  “Oh shit,” Maarten said. “My porn.”

  Maarten sprinted around the building. Jac glanced back inside. He thought of Atif. Did I make the right choice? Was there even a choice to begin with?

  He wiped his face with his sleeve and then followed Maarten. Erik was sitting on the ramp of the carrier sorting through his kit. Karel was already there, digging into his own bags. Jac crouched next to Erik.

  “I’m fine, Jac,” the gunner said before Jac could open his mouth.

  “I heard what happened.”

  Erik looked up. “We had to stand there and listen to the women beg us to take their sons. We did nothing when those bastards piled all the men into trucks. No, no,” he said, raising a finger. “We did do something. We wrote down their names, as if that is going to magically keep them all alive.”

  “Who cares,” Karel said, dropping his kit on the ramp. “Let them kill each other. Just as long as we can get out of here.”

  Jac’s mind flashed. Atif cowering under the bus. The old man beating himself in the head with a rock. Bodies on the roadside. The girl screaming in the factory. The empty building.

  A fist formed.

  Jac stood up and spun around. The momentum carried his fist into Karel’s jaw.

  “Jac!”

  He ignored Maarten and followed Karel down, landing hard. He grabbed Karel by the collar and swung his fist.

  He connected.

  Once.

  Twice.

  Maarten grabbed Jac’s arm and pulled him off Karel.

  “Jesus, Jac. He’s not worth it.”

  Karel wiped blood from his lip. “The sergeant will have your head for this.”

  “For what?” Maarten replied. “I saw you fall off the carrier, you clumsy idiot.”

  “Erik saw it.”

  Everyone looked at the gunner.

  Erik picked up a pebble and tossed it away. “I didn’t see anything.”

  Jac pushed Maarten aside and glared at Karel. “Get out of my sight.”

  “I did my job, Jac. Nothing said I have to care about these people. What would that get me? Hey? Tell me that?” Karel leaned down and snatched his kit bag. “That kid you sent in the woods. He’s dead, like the rest of them. So, what did you get for caring about him? Nothing. He was dead one way or the other and now you have to live with that.”

  Maarten tackled Jac before he could reach Karel.

  “Get out of here, Karel,” Maarten shouted. “Or I’ll let him go.”

  Karel smirked and ambled away.

  “Don’t listen to him, Jac,” Erik said. “We went up there this morning.”

  “Where?”

  “The road. They needed to bring fuel up to the guys stuck at Tango so that they could drive back. I went with them. I saw a lot of garbage and junk on the road but nothing else. We didn’t stop, but I didn’t see any blood or anything. I think we just ran over all the stuff they dropped.”

  Jac crouched next to Erik and nodded. “That’s what I think, too.”

  Erik picked up a stack of mail and handed it to Maarten and then he handed a single envelope to Jac. Maarten glanced over his shoulder.

  “It’s from your mother, right?”

  Jac stood up and stared at the envelope; his mother’s writing was unmistakable. He flipped it over and started to open it. Then he stopped. His hand dropped to his thigh pocket and felt the book.

  Still there.

  He folded the letter in half and stuffed it into his back pocket. He opened his kit and pulled everything out.

  “Anyone got a pen?”

  Jac felt a tap on his shoulder. He turned around. Maarten was holding a pen and a blue sheet of letter paper.

  “Promise me you won’t start this one with ‘Dear Mother,’ okay?”

  “Yeah, sure.” Jac replied, folding the sheet. He walked a few paces. “I’ll be back.”

  “I’ll be here,” Maarten said, shuffling through his stack of letters.

  Jac went back to the building. Civilian employees were shuffling among the former belongings of their friends and neighbours, clearing away the garbage.

  Jac looked up. The rope was gone.

  He sat on the staircase where they’d found the translator and pulled the book from his pocket. Inside was the letter to his mother, its edges crinkled and soaked with sweat. He opened it.

  Dear mother.

  Jac smiled, tore up the letter, and threw it into the sea of garbage. He laid the clean blue
sheet on the book and wrote:

  Hi mom....

  FRIDAY: ATIF STAVIC

  ATIF LAY ON his back, staring at the sky. He raised his finger and traced the constellations the way his father had taught him. Cassiopeia, the Little Dipper, the Big Dipper, Draco. Lyra drifted directly above him. He turned his head to look south. Jupiter hung above the horizon; to the left, the full moon was rising.

  Must be close to midnight. Have I been here that long?

  Hours earlier, he had crawled away from the field and through the woods to the edge of a meadow bathed in the early morning sun. But the pasture had been too exposed to cross in daylight; he’d spent the day hiding in the bushes. He’d listened to a bulldozer chew at the earth a few hundred metres to the south. The grinding, cracking, and pounding continued until dusk.

  When nightfall came, Atif found he didn’t have the strength to keep going. His feet were cut, blistered, and swollen; every step like walking on a bed of razors. He had soaked them in a nearby creek, but the pain had gotten worse.

  He remained on the edge of the meadow, forcing his eyelids to stay open. Every sound was a Serb soldier searching for him; every rumble a truck driving in his direction; every branch swaying in the wind a blautsauger. Gunfire and explosions echoed from the south.

  “I can’t walk two kilometres, Tarak,” he whispered to the night sky. “I barely made it a few hundred metres. What if the front lines have moved? They could be five or ten kilometres farther north by now. Maybe I’ll just stay here. Someone will find me. Eventually.”

  But no one found Tata.

  “I can’t take you this time, Atif,” his father had said that day in April.

  “But you’re not going that far.”

  “It’s not how far I’m going,” he said, pulling on his blue shirt. “It’s where I’m going. There have been attacks in the area.”

  Atif didn’t reply. Nothing he said would change his father’s mind. They went downstairs and Atif stood back as his father said goodbye to Tihana and his mother. Then he followed his father into the early morning fog.

  “I was thinking,” Atif said as they walked, “that I might get a job.”

  His father adjusted the pack on his back and glanced at Atif. “What kind of job?”