“Hi, honey. What are you guys still doing in Brčko?”
“We’re trapped,” I tell her quietly. “They don’t want us here, but they won’t let us out.”
“I’ll come visit,” she whispers. “Stay inside. I’ll bring you something better to eat. Be careful.”
On my way home, I pass apricot and cherry trees I’ve never paid much attention to. I grab a branch and whack them the way I did in the village, dislodging fruit to carry back for my family.
Mom is pleased with the food and thankful for Ankica’s message. She sends me back out to the fountain to refill the empty jugs with water. When I return, she takes out the propane tank and lights the flame under a pot with matches, then makes bean soup, which Eldin and I eat with pieces of bread.
“Why aren’t you eating?” I ask Mom and Dad.
“It’s for you guys,” Dad tells me. “Don’t worry about us.”
“You have to eat too, or your stomach will growl,” I say, pushing my soup toward Dad. He takes a few slurps with the spoon.
“Please,” Eldin says, handing Mom a slice of bread, which she finishes slowly. For dessert, we have three cherries each and save the rest.
My brother’s transistor radio was still in the drawer under the missing TV. He turns it on low for the latest news: missile barrages fell on a nearby village, forcing hundreds of Muslim refugees to flee. We need to escape soon. But we can’t go anywhere now without a Serb escort or the official papers we don’t have enough money to buy.
“Even if we had the cash, how the hell would we make it two miles to the police station without getting shot?” Dad asks.
They’ve stopped saying, Everything will be fine. We know it won’t.
* * *
The authorities have canceled summer camps, outlawed boating, and closed the pools and beaches. Last July, I went fishing with Dad on the river, watched sailboat races, and took swimming lessons in the city pool. Now they’re all abandoned battle zones. I sit inside and draw pictures of camouflaged tanks and Bosnian soldiers in the trenches blowing up the Serb attackers with bullets and bombs.
Behind our building, the piles of trash have become mountains. Green flies buzz around, and it smells gross in the hot sun. On my way back from tossing a trash bag onto the pile, I see Vik, Marko, Ivan, and another kid I don’t know sitting at the entrance to my stairwell, holding a fudbal. For a second I’m excited, about to rush up and high-five Vik, forgetting how mean he’s been. But he won’t let me.
“Oh, look who’s back,” he says in a nasty voice. I’m surprised he even noticed I’ve been gone.
Three others guys who live nearby walk up. Their fathers are soldiers too.
“Let’s get a game going,” says Stevo, a fifteen-year-old Serb kid who lives in my building. His dad has a Doberman that scares me.
There are seven kids. They need eight for two equal teams.
“Need another player?” I ask, scared but acting casual, desperately wishing we could forget the war and just kick the ball around.
“I don’t want him,” Vik yells. “Trebinčević’s yours.”
It hurts to be rejected by my former friend again, but I’m still glad to get in the game. I miss fudbal. I run upstairs to tell Mom I’ll be outside playing for a while, so she won’t worry.
“It’s not a good idea,” she says. She’s cleaning the floors with a dry mop.
“Listen, I’ll have to keep going out to get us food and water from the well,” I bargain. “I might as well try to be friendly so they won’t stop me.”
She’s not convinced. “I don’t know.” She shakes her head.
“You can watch me from the balcony,” I tell her.
She sighs. “Okay. Be careful, Kenji.”
For the first ten minutes of the game I take it easy, dribbling but not taking a shot. We use the stairwell as the goalpost, and my team is pretty good. Then, when I get the ball again, Marko stomps on my foot. The next time, Ivan elbow-jabs me in the waist while Vik pulls on my shirt.
“Hey, no fouling,” I say, jabbing Ivan back.
“Foul on Kenan,” he shouts.
His call they listen to. “How come everyone else can call a foul but me?” I ask.
“Muslim traitors don’t call the shots,” Vik answers.
Of course, Ivan’s team wins. Frustrated, I turn and start up the stairs, and Vik yells, “Hey, where you going, Trebinčević? Get down here.”
But I hurry inside, feeling stupid for thinking we could go back to normal.
* * *
After sunset, Mom lights candles and I sit in the rocking chair in our living room, bobbing back and forth. A knock on our door makes me jerk to a stop, scared that Mr. Miran has returned to get us. Or that Petra’s back to snatch more of our stuff.
“Can I come in?” a lady asks when Mom peeks out into the hallway. “I’m Zorica. I knew your father.”
Mom opens the door. Zorica has short, puffy brown hair and wears jeans, a T-shirt, and sandals. No lipstick or makeup. She seems about my mother’s age. A shy little boy hides behind her, holding her hand. “This is my son, Dejan. He’s six.”
Zorica says that she’s a Bosnian Serb who had been living in Croatia. But now they’ve moved in right below us, into my old pal Huso’s two-bedroom. My back stiffens. I don’t like that Huso had to leave and that she’s taken his home, but Mom invites her in.
Zorica removes her shoes at the door, instructing her son to take off his sneakers. She politely shakes hands with me, Eldin, and Dad. She isn’t armed or eyeing our belongings—she already has Huso’s place. What does she want from us?
“I’d offer coffee, but we don’t have any left,” Mom says, embarrassed.
“I heard the boys outside playing and recognized your son’s name. Your father and my Uncle Novak were friends during World War Two,” Zorica tells her.
“Kenan, why don’t you go show Dejan your miniature cars?” Mom says.
“Okay.” I want to hear more about my grandfather and the war so we play with my police van, the Mack truck, and my green American Sherman tank in the corner of the living room. That way I can listen to what they’re saying.
Mom sits in the rocking chair while Eldin settles onto the floor in front of her. Dad and Zorica sit on opposites sides of the couch. In case of stray bullets, we’ve been avoiding the middle, since it’s under the window.
“During the war, your father jumped out of a moving truck to escape from the Germans,” Zorica says to Mom. “He ran to the village where Uncle Novak lived. Your father hid inside my uncle’s house for three days.”
Dad and Eldin listen closely as this stranger talks about my Djed Murat, who died before I was born. Majka Emina used to tell me all about him. She said he was a very handsome gentleman, well-dressed, and beloved by everyone and everything, especially the thirty parakeets and canaries he fed and cared for. Aunt Bisera got her love of animals from him.
“To thank my uncle, Murat promised to buy his milk from then on,” Zorica says. “So for the next forty years, Novak visited him on his bike twice a week, bringing him fresh farm milk. Your dad could get milk anywhere, but Novak was poor and needed the income. He helped keep Novak in business. Your father was a good, loyal man.”
“Oh, I remember your uncle!” Mom says, smiling.
I do, too—the milkman coming to Majka’s door. He wore a dark suit and a hat just like Humphrey Bogart in Casablanca, Dad’s favorite movie.
Zorica pats my mother’s hand. “We know you’re having a rough time, and we want to help you, however we can. Whatever my child eats, yours will eat as well.”
Mom starts crying. But who is the we Zorica mentioned? If they’re living in Huso’s apartment, that means her husband is a Serb soldier, like the rest of the house-stealers.
She and Dejan don’t stay long, but at midnight, she returns alone, holding a candle and a paper bag. There’s no set bedtime or mealtime anymore, since we’re woken up at all hours by gunfire and bombing, so we’re awak
e to see the food she’s brought us. Mom puts it away in the kitchen: meatloaf, a slice of chicken pâté, coffee beans, and two rolls that Eldin and I share on the spot. They’re delicious.
“My father drives to Germany through Serbia, where he fills his car with groceries for us,” she whispers as she and Mom sit on the couch. The candlelight casts shadows on the floor.
It seems Djed Murat’s good karma from another war is saving us from starving now. But can we trust a lady whose husband is killing our people?
* * *
Every week, Zorica comes by with a bag for us—full of coffee, tea cookies, a can of sardines, more candles—always late at night, in secret. If someone like Petra sees and reports her, she’ll get into big trouble for helping the enemy.
One night, she arrives with food, her son, and her tall husband, Miloš. He stoops over to say “nice to meet you” to me. Dad and Eldin are polite, so I am, too. But I don’t trust him.
When they invite me over to play with Dejan, Mom pushes me to go. The next day, I take my fudbal cards and miniature cars with me and knock on the door of the apartment downstairs, just like I used to with Huso.
Yet it feels wrong to be back in my friend’s two-bedroom flat. His family escaped in such a hurry, they just grabbed their clothes and left everything else. Dejan has claimed Huso’s toys and World Cup trading cards. I don’t want to touch anything of Huso’s without his permission. I’m ashamed to even be in the bedroom where he and I once played video games. I would hate it if some Serb soldier’s kid invaded my home when I was gone and played with my stuff.
“Give this eggplant to your mom,” Zorica says after I’ve finished shooting marbles with Dejan in the kitchen.
“Thank you,” I say, taking the oblong food. I haven’t seen one in months. I vow to one day say I’m sorry to Huso, when he returns. I hope he’ll forgive me for selling out our friendship for a purple fruit.
Eleven
August 1992
One late summer night, when I’m sitting on the steps of my building, Stevo’s dad comes home carrying treats: Twix, Mars Bars, Milky Ways, and Mallomars, all with Bosnian labels. As he walks into the courtyard, kids swarm around him, and I can only see the top of his red beret as he bends down to hand out the sweets. My brother says that the Serbs who wear red hats belong to a paramilitary group that loots abandoned Muslim homes. They walk in with bags to take all the money and jewelry they can find, and then they raid the pantries.
I want chocolate so badly, my mouth waters. Stevo’s dad knows my dad, so I think he’ll give me a piece. But as I step forward, he looks at me and says, “No candy for your kind.”
I turn away, wanting to disappear, knowing nothing I say will change his mind. It’s bad enough getting picked on by my former friends, but now I’m also being bullied by men my father’s age.
* * *
On mornings when the blasts aren’t too close, I walk to the fountain on the hill to refill our two plastic canisters, a white one and a yellow one. The fountain is the only water supply for everyone in the neighborhood. Mom rations what I carry home for bathing and drinking.
One day while I’m at the well, I do a quick wash as usual—splash my face and under my arms—then drink up. My stomach growls from hunger, but the water makes it stop for a few hours. On the way home, I see Stevo and his dad walking behind me with Stevo’s sister, Ana, and their scary Doberman. The jugs are so heavy, I have to stop to rest. They catch up to me.
“Hi,” I say to Stevo, trying to act normal.
“Sic him,” he tells his dog.
The pointy-eared Doberman barks, rushing forward. I jump back, but his paws scratch my legs beneath my shorts. Then he licks my toes. He’s just a sweet puppy who doesn’t understand the war and isn’t taking sides. He spins around, barks happily, then runs back to his owner.
“Don’t talk to my son anymore!” yells Stevo’s dad. He’s wearing his crooked red beret and camouflage pants with pockets everywhere. I can see that he’s armed with two guns, a knife, grenades, and a stick. Before I know what’s happening, he takes his handgun from the holster and shoots twice at my yellow plastic jug. The sound shudders through me, and I jerk. For a second I think he’s shooting at my feet to make me dance, like Yosemite Sam does to Bugs Bunny in the cartoons. I leap away from the canisters, covering my head with my hands. Water spews out from the bullet holes. They all laugh.
I’m shaking so hard, I can’t feel my feet. “Nothing lasts forever!” I manage to yell as I run away, taking my white canister but leaving the ruined yellow jug on the side of the road. I pray for the day they’ll get what they deserve. I wish their own bombs would blow away Stevo, Ana, and their dad, along with Petra, Mr. Miran, and my so-called friends who’ve turned on me. I spare only the puppy from my curse.
Coming home with one less jug, I keep thinking, I should have pushed my father to leave. We could have tried escaping by swimming across the river. Or I could have insisted we go with our cousins to Vienna. If we’d tried to go to Majka Emina’s, we might have made it over the bridge with her before it was blown up. My head is filled with regrets.
“The yellow jug cracked, so I had to throw it out,” I lie to Mom when I get home. But I can’t stop myself from adding, “We can’t stay here where everyone hates us. What are we going to do?”
“Hopefully the war will end soon,” Mom says.
“Basically, we’re screwed,” Eldin clarifies.
* * *
As day after day of endless artillery fire passes, the sounds of gunshots and bombs start to feel almost soothing. At least it means my old gang will stay inside and can’t beat me up. During the most intense fighting, Mom makes Eldin and me sleep on the floor of the hallway outside our bedroom so the wall will protect us from the bullets whizzing outside the windows. If we hear whistling followed by a bang, we know the mortars have landed a safe distance away. If there’s a one-second pause after a high-pitched whistle, I brace myself, leaning against Eldin or face-down on the floor, closing my eyes and holding my breath. Our home vibrates like a guitar string, walls absorbing the shock waves. Soon I can’t fall asleep without the noise. The rare nights of silence keep me up.
One evening, Petra opens our door without even knocking. “What are you guys doing?” she asks. Before we answer, she comes in, sizing up our furniture, light fixtures, appliances, the artwork on our walls.
“I want your electric iron,” she says. My mother stares at her blankly, handing it over.
The next day, Petra takes a denim skirt from Mom. I want to scream, How dare you take advantage of us now, you disgusting thief! But I glare silently, knowing not to speak. We have to give her whatever she asks for, so we won’t be turned in.
Another time, Petra comes over wearing Mom’s skirt. She brings coffee, which we know is just an excuse to case our place to see what else she can grab. We wait for the well water I’ve gathered to boil. Then she and Mom have their coffee in the kitchen.
I know Petra’s wearing the skirt she stole just to rub it in. Before the war, she was a nobody. This is her only power now.
“Soon you won’t be needing that rug. I may as well take it before someone else does,” she says. I feel like crying as I watch my mom hand over her beloved black and white carpet, humiliated.
“Who cares about objects, as long as we’re safe,” Mom tells me later. But her bloodshot eyes give away how stressed and sad she is. “Her bad karma will catch up with her,” she adds.
Mom isn’t very religious, but she’s superstitious, big on the idea that “you reap what you sow.” If you do something bad, you get what you deserve. Majka Emina once told me that God doles out mercy or punishment, and if you don’t get penalized for your sins in this world, you’ll get yours in the afterlife.
I want Stevo and Petra to get what they deserve and for good to win over evil. But I’m losing hope.
* * *
When Petra invites my mother over to her place on Saturday, Mom takes me too. She feels
safer with me there, hoping Petra will act with more decency in front of a kid. They sit at the table, drinking coffee, Mom’s black and white carpet under their feet. I scan the boxes on the floor and the couch, stuffed with blenders, clothes on hangers, boxes of soap, china, wineglasses. So she hasn’t just been taking our stuff. She’s looted the homes of all the Muslim people in our building who fled.
Petra sees me eyeing the loot. “They’re never coming back. I may as well fill up my summer home in Serbia,” she tells us, smiling.
I hate her and her fake friendship game. I hate being surrounded by enemies, ex-friends and their dads bullying me. If I could enter my neighbors’ homes and take anything, even without getting punished, I wouldn’t do it. It’s bad karma to cash in on someone else’s misfortune. I think of the army equipment I swiped with Vik and the guys, and I console myself by recalling that Uncle Ahmet didn’t mind me robbing the bad guys.
* * *
Mom has had a toothache for weeks, and the day after we go to Petra’s, she runs out of painkillers. Her head is pounding so badly she says, “I’ll use your dad’s pliers to extract my own tooth.”
Dad insists that she needs a dentist. We’ve heard the closest medical center is treating only wounded soldiers, with what little medication is left. We don’t know if the smaller health clinics are still in service or will help us, but we decide to take the risk.
Since it’s too dangerous for a woman to go outside alone and they throw Muslim men over eighteen into the camps, we decide I’ll go with Mom. I’m small for a bodyguard, but accompanying her makes me feel useful. I want to protect her.
The town is empty as we pass roofless, demolished buildings. The streets smell like gunpowder and metal. Our shoes crunch through layers of glass and rubble. The sound of shooting echoes in the distance, and I notice bullet casings on the ground. I reach down and put one in my pocket, to remember.
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