Sasa Stanisic - How the Soldier Repairs the Gramophone

But come they did — with the war. Where's the war? Mickey Mouse had asked. His mother said: still far away, thank God. Good, he said, whose side are we on? You're a Serb, his father told him. So the next day there was Mickey Mouse, standing in the doorway with a rucksack that, on his broad back, looked like a makeup bag. He told his father, his father's ten fried eggs, the pale blue tiled kitchen, the notched cherry-wood table, the dusty yard, the stink of muck from the cowsheds, the plow that had strengthened the muscles in his back, and the countless sacks of maize that he kicked hard night after night because he was angry with his father, with the ten fried eggs his father ate every morning, with the table into which he had carved his name, with the yard where his father had knocked him down in the dust and kicked him, with the muck through which he'd waded all his life, with the plow because he wasn't an ox — good-bye, he told them all, good-bye, I'm going away, I'm going to war.

Mickey Mouse walked for five days, asking the way and saying he was Serbian, until he was given a gun. Can I go shooting now? he asked, and he learned how to load the gun and take the safety catch off. He was sent to Mount Igman, where the Serbian troops were preparing for the siege of Sarajevo. Mickey Mouse never complained. He liked these remote places better than his home, although his comrades said God had abandoned them long ago, and a God like that doesn't come back again. This place lies behind God's feet, they said.

Mickey Mouse didn't mind his nickname. I like the duck and the dog too, he said, though Pluto is rather clumsy. He hadn't been called Mickey Mouse at school though, so Kiko still called him Milan.

Milan, said Kiko, putting his hand on Mickey Mouse's upper arm, your lot fucked up Ćora last night.

By way of answer Mickey Mouse raised his eyebrows, ducked his head and took a deep breath. His face lost any kind of symmetry. It looked like unhewn stone, pale and scarred with acne. Kiko was waiting for some kind of response, but Mickey Mouse just breathed out and closed his ever-open mouth.

A shrill whistle signaled the end of warm-up.

Mickey Mouse took Kiko's hand off his arm. Kiko, they told me: Mickey Mouse, you're playing in defense again. He didn't add that he was the only man who had fired a shot that night.

A heavy bird flew up from the woods, and the big man went back to the defenders.

Gavro, the key player on the Serbian side, a black-haired, curly-headed man with a raven tattooed on his shoulder, whistled as the bird flew away. Gavro never stopped whistling or humming tunes except to talk or eat. Even in his sleep he would snore a resonant “Blue Danube” through his mustache. The bird flew over the clearing and soared south toward the valley beyond the trees. Gavro picked up the ball and went over to the ref, who was gazing at his watch as if spellbound.

Fuck the sun, man, what are you waiting for, a sign from Allah? We don't have all day!

It had been quiet on Mount Igman more frequently over the last few months, particularly at night when the guns in the clearing and the valley fell silent. But there hadn't been such peace and quiet here behind God's feet as there was now, before kickoff, as Gavro began to whistle something that could have been Glenn Miller.

General Mikado, commander of the Serbian unit, slapped the back of the whistling man's head, took the ball away from his foot, whistled shrilly through his own fingers and made the first pass. You can whistle for the end of play seven seconds early, called the sturdy commander with the slanting eyes to which he owed his nickname. He raced past the ref and swerved to the right wing, where he was to set up a score of one-nil for the Serbs less than two minutes later — a ball centered toward the head of the whistling Gavro.

Mickey Mouse made it two-nil for the Serbs with one of his mighty shots. He captured the ball near the corner flag — a gun rammed into the ground — and forged through the enemy ranks accompanied by shouts of derision. He didn't seem to mind the insults this time. He was still in his own half when he aimed for Dino Zoff, his mouth wide open as always. A one-two, a feint, the shot at goal, uh! , and Dino Zoff couldn't deflect the ball properly. Mickey Mouse stopped abruptly and watched the ball sail through the air with his arm raised, as if waving an old friend off on a long journey.

The Territorials had their one good chance of a goal at the end of the first half, when Kiko finished a solo run through the opposing defenders with a shot that hit the woodwork of the spruce goalpost. Gavro countered this shot by passing to Marko, who then went on the attack, but Meho from the Terri-torials got to the ball just a tad faster and hammered it with all his might out of their penalty area, off the playing field, out of the clearing and into the forest.

Oh, fuck the forest fairy, said Meho, shaking his head and crouching down as if he wanted to throw up. The referee whistled and pointed first at Meho, then at the forest — a gesture unlikely to be seen in any other soccer game in the world — meaning: Meho bungled this, so he has to retrieve it. But no one could give him a plan of just where the mines were planted; presumably no such thing existed. The mines, however, most certainly did exist. Even before the front lines were entrenched around the clearing, the Serbs had lost two men in the forest during an attempt to come up on the Territorials from behind, and a third man had lost a leg. That's right, they'd shouted from the Territorial positions at the time, take 'em all back like good lads and don't leave any of them lying around, shame about losing the goats though.

Dino Zoff took Meho's arm. For God's sake, Meho, he whispered, haven't we been over this a thousand times? A good defender doesn't knock the ball away! Good clearance behind, short passes, it can't be that difficult.

Can't be that difficult, Meho whispered to himself as he arrived at the edge of the forest with two paramedics in attendance. All the players and both touchlines were looking his way. Someone waved and Meho waved back. The ball, about sixty-five feet inside the forest, was lying peacefully on a bed of moss under a reddish fern. The sun was flooding the woodland with bright light that slanted across the slight rise of the forest floor, which concealed dozens of mines from the trembling man in the Red Star shirt. The shirt! In panic, Meho took off the red and white strip of his favorite team, kissed the star, folded it carefully, and laid it on the ground.

Hang on, Meho! Marko had followed his opposite number up the slight slope. Here, it's for the ball, said the Serbian striker, winking, and he handed Meho a bulletproof vest, wrap it up well before you bring it back.

Meho stared at the black vest.

Hey, Meho, what's the idea? Marko picked up Meho's shirt and shook his head. They're from Belgrade, right?

Meho's chin was quivering. The Red and Whites forever! he growled, wiping the sweat from his brow. He put on Marko's bulletproof vest, said: you better go back, and then added in English without a trace of accent: this could get fucking dangerous!

Marko went back to the others, carrying Meho's shirt. They were all sitting on the grass talking, looking at the trees even after Meho had disappeared under the shade of their canopy. Gavro was scraping dirt out from under his toenails with a wooden splinter, whistling a playful tune. The full tones of his whistling floated past the bare chests of the Serbian eleven and danced before the Territorials' tense faces. A klezmer tune, and they were all listening to the same song, some of them tapping the grass or their thighs in time to it, some not, but that was the only difference. Watching the trees become forest, they listened and waited — for Meho, for another song, or for a bang.