Rose of Sarajevo (19 page)

“Mother, don’t get so excited. When we go back out there, you’ve got to act like nothing out of the ordinary has happened. Okay?”

“What?”

“Remember: act like nothing’s happened,” Nimeta said.

She was surprised by how firm she sounded, ordering her mother around like that. Perhaps Burhan was right and she really was stronger than she realized.

A short while later, mother and daughter tiptoed back into the dining room. Fiko and Raif were still sitting at the table, but this time Fiko was telling his uncle something. When they walked into the room, Fiko looked up and announced, as if it were the most natural thing in the world, “Uncle Raif wants to go up to the mountains and fight with Dad.”

Nimeta spoke up before her mother could. “In that case, I’d better find Esat,” she said. “He’s the one who arranged everything before. Fiko, remind me to put another ad in the paper tomorrow so he calls me.”

“I’ll remind you,” Raif said.

His voice sounded perfectly normal for someone who hadn’t uttered a word for so many months. If anything, it was Nimeta’s voice that sounded slightly choked when she replied, “Okay.”

Then she turned to her mother. “Why don’t you go take a peek into your room to make sure Hana’s not getting up to any mischief in there?”

Raziyanım didn’t move a muscle.

“Come on, Mother. We can continue our chat in there while we keep an eye on Hana.”

Nimeta ended up propelling her mother down the hall by the elbow. She sat Raziyanım on the bed and rubbed some cologne onto her temples and wrists.

“You always talk about blessings in disguise,” Nimeta said. “Burhan’s being up in the mountains has given Raif a reason to live. Nothing focuses a man’s mind like a thirst for revenge.”

On the way home, Nimeta tried to learn every last detail of how Raif had started talking again, but Fiko would only say, “He asked how we got up to the mountains.”

Nimeta probed him for more information.

“Who talked first, Fiko?”

“He did.”

“Well, what did he say? Did he just ask you out of the blue?”

“I’ve told you a hundred times. You were in the kitchen and I was clearing the table when all of a sudden he asked how we’d found Dad and how we’d gotten up to the mountains.”

“Well, what did you say?”

“I told him you’d organized everything. He also asked about the camp. He must have been listening the whole time.”

“Do you think he really wants to go up there?”

“Of course he does. And so do I.”

Nimeta recoiled. “You’re too young. Wait a few years.”

“There are a lot of guys my age fighting.”

“Is that what your father told you?”

“No. A soldier told me up in the camp.”

“You can’t go, Fiko. You’ve got school. You’re too young. Your father would never allow it, and nor will I.”

He didn’t say a word, but as soon as they got home, Fiko slipped into his room, silent as a shadow.

The following day Nimeta set about organizing her brother’s departure. She placed an ad addressed to Esat. They’d had a long chat when he’d called her at work to tell her how to get to Burhan’s camp. He knew that she had two children and a brother who hadn’t spoken since his wife and son were killed in the Zvornik massacre. She’d wanted to thank him with a gift of coffee or cigarettes, but he’d turned down her offer and refused to give her his address. When she pressed him, he said that if there was ever an emergency, she should put an ad in the paper and he’d call.

After placing the ad, she waited. She’d been visiting her brother every day after work. Raif had seemed fine ever since he decided to fight, but she worried that he’d get depressed again if he had to wait too long.

When several days had passed without any word from Esat, she considered taking her brother up to the mountains herself. Then she remembered the sniper fire and the mines. Though she didn’t fear death for herself, she couldn’t bear to leave Hana and Fiko orphaned.

Then one Thursday, just as Nimeta was giving up hope, a note arrived at the TV station in which Esat promised to take Raif up to the mountain a week later, when a food and medicine delivery was scheduled. She would be informed of the exact time and meeting place at the very last minute.

Nimeta dropped everything and raced to her mother’s house.

“Where’s Raif?” she asked when Raziyanım opened the door.

“Where would he be? In his room staring at the wall.”

She burst into his bedroom, where he was sitting on the bed and, yes, staring at the wall.

“It’s finally happened, Raif. Esat sent word. You’ll be leaving next week.”

“You came into my room without knocking,” Raif said.

They’d been squabbling over this since childhood. Nimeta had always complained about her mother walking in on her, and Raif got annoyed at his big sister for the same reason. Nimeta started laughing.

“I’m sorry. At least you weren’t up to anything top secret when I came in. You weren’t even picking your nose.”

“I was thinking private thoughts,” Raif said.

“Aren’t you excited about the news?”

“I’m not excited about anything anymore. We’re all like zombies these days: the living dead.”

“I thought the prospect of fighting in the mountains had brought you back to life.”

“Nothing’s changed. Before, I was dead and didn’t talk; now I’m dead, but I talk. I hope that I’ll be dead at the hands of the Serbs when I go up to the mountains next week.”

Nimeta sat down on the bed and put her arm around her brother.

“It’ll pass. It’ll all pass, Raif,” she said. “One day we’ll have grown into old people who’ve known real pain. But we’ll have happy memories too. Don’t give up on life. It’s always worth living.”

Raziyanım had managed to cram a lifetime’s worth of underwear and socks into her son’s duffel bag.

“Mother, where did you find all this underwear?” Nimeta asked.

“Some of it belonged to your father,” Raziyanım said, “back when we got married.”

“Mother, do you really expect Raif to run around in forty-year-old underpants?”

“If he doesn’t want them, he can give them to someone else. Waste not, want not.”

The Bosniaks had always been a thrifty people, storing away everything in wooden chests and never throwing anything out. It was the tribal mentality of a people accustomed to displacement and forced migration, born out of the ever-present fear of finding themselves destitute and dependent on others. Since Ottoman times, their homeland had seen a succession of wars and occupations: the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Kingdom of Serbia, the Balkan Wars, World War I, and World War II. The Bosniaks had good reason to keep everything they owned in wooden chests.

“What’s in there, Mother?” Raif asked, pointing to a second bag.

“Don’t open that until you get there.”

“What’s in it?” Raif asked again, seeming not to hear. “Is there food in there?”

“I made you some zucchini
börek
, Son.”

“Do you think I’m going off to a picnic?” Raif asked as he reached inside and tried to unknot a plastic bag.

“Stop it, Raif,” Nimeta said. “Once you’re up in the mountains, you’ll be grateful for whatever’s in there.”

“Do you want to turn me into a laughingstock, Nimeta? She’s done everything but pack me lunch.”

“Nobody will be laughing at you,” Nimeta said. “They’ll be thrilled you’ve joined them and, believe me, they’ll be even more thrilled when you share your
börek
with them. They’re even worse off than we are, Raif. I can only imagine how much Burhan has missed Mother’s cooking.”

Raziyanım shot Nimeta a look of appreciation. The shops were empty, but everyone with a patch of soil was growing tomatoes, zucchini, and potatoes, and selling whatever extra they had. A friend with a backyard vegetable patch had been providing Raziyanım with her pick of produce at a reasonable price before they were sent off to market. This was only the latest example of her mother’s resourcefulness. Twice a week, Raziyanım pushed a handcart all the way to the brewery in Ciglane to get fresh water from the spring there. The mains, electrical grid, and gas networks were being bombed on a regular basis, and they had sometimes gone up to two weeks without a single drop of water from their taps. Electricity and gas they could do without, but life was impossible without water. “Mother, don’t get yourself killed chasing after water,” Nimeta had said.

“It would be quicker and more painless than dying from not having water,” her mother had retorted. And she was right.

“Raif, don’t forget my letter,” Nimeta said. “Make sure Burhan gets it. I’m counting on you.”

“Look, I’ve already tucked it away in my pocket,” Raif said, showing her the inner pocket of his jacket.

“They’ll pick you up at five in the morning. Have you set your alarm clock?” Nimeta asked.

“I’ll be up all night in any case,” Raziyanım said.

She had mixed feelings about Raif’s decision. No mother is happy about sending her son off to war, but she had to accept that it was war that had brought him back to life.

“Mother, don’t try to stop him,” Nimeta had told her. “Just for once, put your own feelings aside and support him when he goes up to the mountains. I know how much you want to keep your children tied to your apron strings, but just this once let him go.”

She’s never forgiven me
, Raziyanım thought to herself.
She’s still blaming me for something that happened twenty years ago, and she’ll keep blaming me for not sending her to Istanbul until the day she dies
.

Actually, Raziyanım deeply regretted not having allowed her daughter to marry that Turkish boy. If Nimeta had settled in Istanbul, she and the rest of the family could have gone and lived with her when the war started. Her daughter-in-law, grandson, and sister-in-law might have been alive today. And Raif wouldn’t have been forced to choose between a life staring at walls and probable death up in the mountains.

Nimeta threw her arms around her brother.

“Be careful, Raif,” she said. “Don’t take any foolish risks. Stay healthy, and come home with Burhan one day. We’ve still got some good days ahead of us. Believe me, we’ll put all that we’ve suffered behind us.”

“God tests us in this world,” Raziyanım told her son. “None of his servants can escape the trials of this world. Nimeta’s right. Stay safe, and don’t cause me any grief.”

Here we go again
, Nimeta thought to herself.
Emotional blackmail from Mother
.

“Come here my little nephew,” Raif said to Fiko. “You and I are going to have a private man-to-man talk before I leave.”

“Keep it short,” Nimeta said. “I’ve left Hana with Azra.”

Raif went off to his room with Fiko, leaving the women in the living room.

“You see that?” Nimeta remarked to her mother. “Raif’s being a good uncle to Fiko again. It’s a good sign. Once he comes face-to-face with death up in the mountains, he’ll forget about his pain and the past. He’ll realize that life is all that matters.”

“Is that what you think, that life is all that matters?” Raziyanım asked.

“Don’t you?”

“When you reach my age, you’ll think differently about what is and isn’t important,” Raziyanım said.

When Fiko appeared at the end of the hall with his uncle, Nimeta hugged her brother one last time. She gritted her teeth to keep from sobbing. At the front door, Raif kissed Fiko and his sister again.

Hand on the doorknob, Nimeta said, “I’ll pick you up after work tomorrow, Mother. You can stay with us for as long as you like.”

“Come stay with me here,” Raziyanım said.

“But Mother, there isn’t enough room for the four of us. And it’s too far from the kids’ school.”

“Can’t you talk about this tomorrow?” Fiko said. He seemed impatient to get home.

“May God’s blessings be with you, dear,” Nimeta said on the way out the door, the tears she’d suppressed running down her cheeks as soon as Raif couldn’t see her anymore.

Raziyanım stood at the window and watched as Nimeta and Fiko raced across the green lawn of the park next door. In a few hours, she’d watch from the same window as her only son went off to war in the chill of early dawn, perhaps never to return.