I Lost My Love in Baghdad (26 page)

RAMSTEIN AFB, DOVER

Ramstein Air Force Base Germany, near Frankfurt. Civilization is immediately apparent. There is a passenger terminal, a real one, without plywood and sandbags, but with clean glass and monitors that actually show what time flights arrive and depart. There are ticket counters and security checkpoints without M-4 rifles and grenades, where the soldiers meeting us are dressed nicely and know what is going on. There is no confusion once you get to Ramstein. This is an operation that moves cargo and people, and it runs smoothly—the airbase's motto, written on the map we are given when we land, is “Supporting the World!” We check into the hotel on base, a hotel like a Holiday Inn. I take a warm shower and change shirts and think about resting my eyes, but don't, and before I know it, I am back in the airport, getting my passport stamped at customs, and back on another plane. This one is a C-17. The caskets are already loaded up and strapped in place—no more ceremonies. There are two pairs of caskets in the first two rows, and then each row has three caskets. Each casket has about half a dozen clips on the side, which are strapped down on the floor with belts and metal buckles. At this stage of the trip, the war now on another continent, it is cargo to be carried.

The C-17 is smaller than the C-5, and the cargo bay is filled up with the caskets. They are close together in two rows, going back to the ramp and up to the cockpit. There is no passenger compartment for travelers; there is a long bench on the side of the cargo bay. I sit toward the front, and Karen sits next to me. We are the first passengers aboard the flight, the VIPs. I keep my sunglasses on. Other passengers file onto the plane, contractors and civilians who live in Germany and are catching a flight back to the States, to Charleston, with a stopover in Dover. There are men and women and families, toddlers and babies, about twenty people in all. They walk past me, being careful not to trip over the caskets, and sit down. I wonder if they got a warning—you can take this flight, even bring the kids, but be prepared, there are twenty-five caskets on board. Or you can take the next flight which leaves in four hours. Who wants a four-hour delay? The aircrew hands out earplugs and blankets, boxed lunches and soda.

The flight takes off.

I am hungry and thirsty and I need caffeine. I drink the Diet Pepsi and eat the sandwich in the box lunch. Other passengers do the same; some have brought their own meals for the flight.

The aircrew member lays down two sleeping bags on the floor, and asks if we want to sleep. Karen takes her up on the offer and lies down. I don't want to. The sleeping bags are lying parallel to the caskets, and I am not that tired. I prefer to sit back and close my eyes, perhaps pass out, perhaps not.

It is nine hours to Dover.

Some aircrew members work during the flight; some rest; others listen to iPods. A mother with two small children walks by me, carrying a baby, on the way to the restroom at the front of the plane.

I take out my iPod and listen to music. The songs Andi chose. I have figured out that her casket is toward the back of the plane, third row in.

I lean my head back.

One song after the other. I am beyond sobbing. I sit and grieve. I grieve for everything, for Andi and me, for Iraq, for my own stupid reasons for being there, for all of it, for this fucking travesty. Andi and two dozen soldiers, all with families dotted across America who are going through something like what I am going through right now, who received the message at the front door from the man in the uniform, who received the phone call with the terrible news, who dreaded this happening, it couldn't happen to them yet fuck if it didn't. And here I am, in this cargo bay, high above the ocean that keeps America away from the rest of the world, with air sickness bags nearby and boxed lunches with soda and military service families heading home for vacation and I feel the tremor of the plane and I close my eyes but I can still see the rows of caskets in front of me. My eyes are shut tight and I can see Andi perfectly in the third row and I know exactly what it would look like if we began the spiral down, if this plane crashed, if the cargo bay burst open right now and shot its cargo out, tearing off the metal clasps, the force of the catastrophic failure jettisoning each silver casket, twirling and spinning, mad batons, temperature-controlled containers though probably not too aerodynamic, flags ripping away from them, not at all like parachutes but like magnificent streamers, the twenty-five caskets falling in a beautiful burst, a grand finale, until finally they hit the ocean's surface one by one, an honorable splash, each making its own powerful ripple but one that will never make it to shore. The war is so far away now. Baghdad is now eight hours ahead, as I move back to the time zone of the United States, and half the passengers on this plane are still dead.

Andi sits in the back of the car. She is satisfied that the meeting went well. Nothing concrete, no progress, but more meetings lined up, the ball in motion. This is Iraq after all. What's progress? She feels cold for a moment. She had left her blue blazer back on her chair in her office. She has her folder, her work phone, her badges. Her body armor is on, snugly. The car is running; Yonni, from Hungary, gets in the front seat. An Iraqi man is behind the wheel. The day is still sunny, though it's not warm. It's January 17, 2007. Still winter in Iraq, or what passes for it. The sun comes in through the windshield, warming the inside of the car, the stale air.

She watches the first car leave the compound, out of view down the narrow street.

A minute or so passes. Her car goes forward. The guards at the Iraqi Islamic Party do not acknowledge them as her car passes through the gate.

The street is empty.

Or so it seems for a moment.

A car pulls in front of her vehicle; her driver has to stop. The noise begins. It takes only a second to know the noise is gunfire. The bullets hit the car. The driver cries out. The bullets hit the engine; her car jerks forward; the tires seem to explode; Yonni yells Get down, get down, get down.

She inhales. She moves down in her seat. She hears yelling. The words are not clear. She looks out the window. Men are rushing toward her; they are wearing bandannas tied around their faces and pointing AK-47s at the car. She is down in her seat now. Does she scream? Does she cry out? The men have grabbed the door handle and are yanking it, yelling; the noise has not stopped, not yet. They are pointing and waving the guns and trying to open the doors. The car is not moving. Why isn't the car moving?

She is now an observer. She is watching. It is all very clear to her.

This does not seem real. Why is it when things do not seem real, that's when they get real? When it is real it becomes unreal. She knows she will be safe. She knows that. No matter what happens.

It is happening so fast. It is so chaotic.

The men cannot get the doors open. They cannot get into the car. They cannot get her. They are like insane panhandlers in a traffic jam, in a nightmare, faces pressed against the glass. Distorted, excited, screaming. They decide to blow the car open.

The grenade doesn't make a sound when is it is dropped. The men run.

The explosion. In less then a second, the gas tank will catch fire.

Yonni sees the grenade. He somehow—he doesn't know how, he just does—he throws himself in the backseat. He covers her up, protects her from the blast.

Andi doesn't make a sound. She sees her guard do this; she sees him move to the backseat and cover her. The seat actually breaks as he climbs back. Crack. She is calm. She is looking at nothing now. She closes her eyes.

She sees her life. It all comes at once.

In her front yard, her mother calling. Her dad watching in the bleachers at a softball field in Perry, Ohio. She crashes against the centerfield wall. The room she stayed in during summers with her grandmother. The red dress she wore at her sister's wedding. Chasing her two younger brothers around the couch.

There is more noise; there is a loud noise.

What is faster, sound or memories?

Her two nieces hugging her on the front porch, her sister snapping a digital picture. Her sister's husband serving swordfish just for her. A field of pine trees, snow covered, rows of white candles.

The flames are hot. It is so hot now.

What burns faster, memories or flames?

Ice skating. Raising her hand in a high school classroom. Graduation day. First day of college. Crossing the state line in a Ford. Moving into an apartment in Boston. At her desk in the governor's office, late at night, busy. An apartment in New York; a view of Central Park. Turning to tell her best friend the most recent crisis in her new office. She sees her friends; she sees her stones and her angels.

It is all there, it is coming.

There is her boyfriend, her significant other, the man she will marry. Seeing him that first night. Standing on the Charles Bridge in Prague. Standing at a glass counter looking at diamonds. Holding hands over the ocean, in a plane, through turbulence. Squeezing, twice for love. Staring into each other's eyes. Falling asleep, together.

She sees what happens.

Her father on a reclining chair in the living room crying, holding a picture of her, inconsolable. She sees her mother shaking softly in church, looking at her face, framed in a picture. She sees her sister on a bitter cold night alone in a snow-covered field screaming why, why, into the wind. She hears her niece ask where's Andi? She hears her brothers, playing music, loud, very loud, for her. She watches her fiancé writing with tears in his eyes.

It is almost over now.

She sees the rest of her life. She sees the ring. She sees a pure white wedding dress and an aisle. She sees her parents and brothers and sisters and friends smiling proudly. She sees the children and the house. She sees the reunions in Ohio; she feels the warmth and hears the laughter and feels the love for her.

The noise continues, but she is gone.

Due to the deadly nature of working in Iraq, I've changed or used only the first names of the Iraqi security guards and interpreters employed by
Newsweek.
The exception is Mohammed—his full name is Mohammed Heydar Sideq, and he is currently studying in the United States on a Fulbright scholarship. I have changed the names of the men and women working for NDI and URG. The name of the Mortuary Affairs officer has been changed. The names of the Western security managers working for
Newsweek
have been changed. Also, Tony is not the real first name of Crazy Tony the German.

I have slightly altered one aspect of a
Newsweek
security procedure described in the book: the color of cars we drive in Iraq. The cars are currently in use, and I do not wish to put anyone's life at greater risk by giving out those details.

There are a number of books I've read that have served as a source for inspiration. In chapter 1, the actual quote from Kapuściński's
Imperium
is: “But experience has taught that whenever people are taking me on a hazardous, uncertain improbable expedition, it is inappropriate to ask questions. If you ask, it means you don't trust them; you are uncertain; you are afraid. But you said you wanted to do this. Make up your mind—are you ready for anything or not? Besides—there is no time! It is too late for indecision, for hesitation, for alternatives.” Other books:
Once Upon a Distant War
by William Prochnau,
If I Die in a Combat Zone
by Tim O'Brien,
Slightly Out of Focus
by Robert Capa,
Born on the Fourth of July
by Ron Kovic, Neal Sheehan's
A Bright and Shining Lie, Bernard Fall: Memories of a Soldier-Scholar,
a memoir by his wife Dorothy Fall, and Timothy Findley,
The Wars.

The events recounted in this book are largely drawn from my own notes, observations, and conversations over a two-year period, from August 2005 when I first arrived in Iraq to August 2007 when I completed the reporting for this book. But I also relied on day-to-day news accounts. For this, I am indebted to the excellent work of the Baghdad press corps—
The New York Times, The Washington Post,
the
L.A. Times, The Wall Street Journal,
AP, AFP, Reuters,
Newsweek, Time, The New Yorker,
CNN, and the other networks. I also found the Brookings Institute's Iraq Index website very helpful for chapter 14, as well as the Iraq Coalition Casualties website. The scenes describing my relationship with Andi are how I remembered them. The emails, text messages, and instant messages are all real. The scene that the book opens with—and the one it closes with, that of Andi's death—is what I imagined happened, based on the reporting I was able to collect.