William Vollmann: Last Stories and Other Stories

Where’s Enko?

Asleep, he said.

Ah. With her.

They sat there, listening for the shells, and after awhile the old woman lit a cigarette and remarked: They say it is better not to go out now. Very dangerous. Sometimes it is true, and sometimes the other way. Anyhow, one cannot stay inside forever.

Just before ten the door of Enko’s bedroom opened. Enko, shirtless but already wearing his gun, strode into the bathroom and shut the door. Then he returned to the bedroom, rubbing his forehead and yawning. After another quarter-hour the girl came out, fully dressed, and darted shyly into the bathroom.

Listen, said Enko. I need another advance.

Why not?

Give me a hundred.

How about fifty?

I said give me a hundred.

If I give you a hundred, then after that fifty I gave you last night, we’re square for today, which is fine by me. The only thing is, I don’t have much cash on me in case we need to eat.

Don’t worry about that, said Enko.

All right, said the American. He took up his bulletproof vest. Jasmina had just left the bathroom, so he locked himself in there, dropped his pants and removed another hundred Deutschemarks from the money belt. Of course he had lied to Enko, who probably knew it; there was no safe place to leave cash, so he carried it all. Like the others, this was a good new banknote, the kind that the people here preferred. He folded it three times and dropped it into his pocket. Then he lifted the heavy vest over his head, lowered it into place and snugged the two tabs across the torso panels. Over this he zipped up the light windbreaker, to make him less conspicuous to snipers. It had always seemed to him elementary logic that the wearer of a bulletproof vest would be in and of himself a target.

Jasmina stood at the dining room table, with her purse in her hand. Enko’s mother ignored her.

Enko was staring at him. No doubt he wanted his advance. The American said: Do you have a second? — Enko rose and followed him down the hall. The American gave him the money.

What’s all this secret bullshit? said Enko.

I keep my finances private, said the American. That’s how I like to do things.

Fine, said Enko. Amir’s downstairs.

Where are we going?

The frontline, if you promise not to shit your pants.

I’ll do my best.

We need petrol. That’s what the money’s for. On the way we’ll drop Jasmina at her cousin’s. Let’s go.

The American shook Enko’s mother’s hand. — Come back, she said. I’ll pray for you.

Enko was whispering something in Jasmina’s ear. She giggled.

Here everyone runs, said Amir. This corner is very dangerous. Serbian snipers shoot from the hills. We must speed up here.

Okay, said the American. Enko was in the back seat with his pistol on his lap.

The car turned onto the sidewalk, then rushed across a pedestrian bridge. — This place is very dangerous, said Amir.

I think I can see that.

Amir’s ancient M48 rifle jiggled between the seats, the barrel pointing ahead.

Now they were on a straightaway, and a single bullet struck the car somewhere low on the left side of the chassis, harming nothing so far as they could tell. Nobody said anything. Amir slammed the gas pedal to the floor. No more bullets came. The American felt that slight sickness which always visited him on such occasions: in part mere adrenaline, which was intrinsically nauseating, that higher form of fear in which his mind floated ice cold, and a measure of disgust at himself for having voluntarily increased his danger of death. Over the years, the incomprehensible estrangement between his destiny as a risk-taking free agent and the destinies of the people whose stories he sometimes lived on, which is simply to say the people who were unfree, and accordingly had terrible things done to them, would damage him. Being free, however, he would never become as damaged as many of them. And, like Enko, he did get paid for his trouble. Mostly he broke even or better. On this day, of course, he was simply considering how to live out the day while writing the best notes he could. His mind subdivided checklists into sub-lists, in hopes of preparing him for anything: If Amir gets shot, I’ll take the wheel, but he’ll be in the way, so I’ll hold the wheel steady with my left hand and crook my right arm around his neck, and then if Enko helps me…

Hey, Enko, said the American.

Shut up, said Enko.

Enko, I hope your finger’s on the trigger guard.

Fuck you.

Just don’t shoot me in the back when we drive over a bump. Unless you do it on purpose.

Enko laughed.

Amir rounded a corner on three wheels, and they sped into a tunnel lined with sandbags, already braking now, and parked in the garage of some partially ruined building.

Listen, said Enko. We’re going through that hole in the wall. The Chetniks can see us there, so we’re going to run up the hill about two hundred meters.

Okay.

So that was what they did, the American journalist stumbling once, topheavy under the weight of his vest, and nobody shot at them. After that it was still only mid-morning there behind the wall of sandbags where half a dozen men, some in the uniform of the old National Army, stood smoking cigarettes while another half dozen loaded munitions into the military police truck not far from last night’s shards of broken glass which were something like new-fallen snow. Enko clashed his fist against several of theirs in turn, while Amir stood expressionless, perhaps smiling behind his sunglasses. A grey and ghastly look was in their faces as they listened for the shells.

They were friendly to the American, because in those days his government considered Bosnian Muslims immaculate victims, hence allies to rescue; in later years it would consider all Muslims to be potential terrorists. So they gave him colorful interviews while he wrote diligently in his notebook.

A militiaman showed him a paddle studded with nails and said: You know what we call this? We call this Chetnik teacher.

The American knew enough to laugh heartily, and after that they liked him even better.

You know, you missed a big story, said an eyes-alight French reporter to the very young British journalist whose handler was Enko’s enemy. Four French was wounded last night, and one Egyptian!

Buy you two a drink? the American offered.

Very funny. Find your own story.

I will, said the American, excited because he and Amir were about to go to Vesna’s. Enko would come later; he was with Jasmina.

Amir accepted one whiskey and no more. He liked to drive carefully. He said: I think you like Vesna.

Sure. Do you?

A real Bosnian woman.

Bosnian women are very pretty.

Good.

Last night Marko was telling me his theories about Slavic beauty. He’s fond of an actress named Olga Ilic—

Who?

Olga Ilic. He said she died in 1945.

Forget what Marko told you. That’s just some dead Serbian bitch. Are you ready?

Sure. By the way, do you think Vesna minds when I stay over there?

She understands. You are a guest, and a friend.

Thank you. You’re all my friends—

He paid the waiter, and they went to the car. It was another point of difference between him and them that so many of them lacked bulletproof vests, and his was more invulnerable than most of theirs, although that made it proportionately heavier. The best model he had ever seen was manufactured for members of the Warsaw Pact. It had a collar to protect the carotid and subclavian arteries. His own went only as far as it went. Amir sat in the driver’s seat, very slowly smoking a cigarette, staring straight ahead. An automatic rifle chortled far away. The American understood that Amir was listening to the night and forming the best plan that he could. He waited quietly. Presently Amir started the car.