Part Three
People are gathered around Emina and it looks like she has lost a lot of blood. Emina looks up at him and smiles, noting he is still there. She says she wanted to see the cellist again since it is his last day. Her voice is slow and slurred. She says Jovan does not like her going out but she has to.
A car pulls up and loads Emina in. Dragan considers going but the car speeds away. Another man says she will be fine since it is just a flesh wound; Dragan is unsure. He sees her coat and sets it aside, but takes the bottle of pills. His mind flashes back to when she said it would be better to be wounded than killed. The difference is, he thinks, if one wants to stay in the world one lives in.
Dragan remembers something that happened to him a month ago. He was walking home from the bakery and was surrounded by men who demanded his papers and then put him in the back of a truck and took him to the front lines where he had to dig trenches for three days. None of the men laboring there had weapons, but there were armed soldiers behind them, and they were given no food. Every moment was terrifying and they expected to be killed, so Dragan decided then that it would be better to be killed than wounded. Thankfully Dragan’s contacts at the bakery got him out, but he saw no difference between the men on the hills and the soldiers at the frontlines. Today, though, he sees a difference between a trench and these streets which he used to happily traverse with his wife and son.
He should have tried to help Emina; he knows he is a coward. He wonders if he ought to go back to the apartment and forget about the bakery but he really does not want to go home. He starts to imagine what it would be like to go to the secret tunnel and escape the city and eventually travel to Italy where his family is. He imagines meeting them again and the wonderful future they might have. But he has no tunnel pass and this will not happen.
Dragan wonders about the men in the hills—do they wish for the war to be over as well? Do they like when they frighten people or kill them? Did they ever feel remorse? Why would they think he, Dragan, is a threat?
Even after all this, Dragan does not want to go to Italy. He is not Italian; he is from Sarajevo and he still has hope that one day he can walk the city with his wife and son and go to a restaurant and be free from the men with guns. Yet he won’t forget this war and even if life goes back to normal he won't be able to explain the war, as “an explanation implies a logic, but there’s no logic in Sarajevo now” (164).
Arrow is waiting for Nermin for a half hour before he arrives. She tells Nermin the sniper is dead, her voice flat. A teenage boy comes in with coffee and she hesitatingly accepts. Nermin looks at her and says she seems unhappy and maybe she has done this long enough. She tells him the sniper had the shot. He says it is not about that anymore—what he is saying is that it is time for her to disappear since he cannot honor the terms of her deal anymore and she is not safe.
Arrow is confused and Nermin sighs that the war has made many monsters, not just the men on the hills, and there are men down here that “use the war and the city for their own ends” (167). Nermin does not want to be part of that. Arrow has more questions but he tells her she ought to go. He adds that he expects to be removed at any time.
Arrow stands and he gives her a kiss on the cheek and tells her that father never would have forgiven him for turning her into a soldier. All she says is her father is dead and she forgives him. As she walks out she thinks of her motivations in killing, which once were centered on bad men only and now are because she hates the men on the hills. She wonders what will happen to Nermin, and hopes he can stay out of sight.
Three blocks away from the office the shelling starts. Suddenly someone runs by and clips her shoulder; it is the teenage boy and he looks extremely frightened. This confuses her, since any boy Nermin hired would not be afraid of shelling. There must be something else going on. She turns back to the office and takes her rifle off her shoulder. At that moment an explosion rips the building apart and she finds herself on the ground, watching it burn.
It is clear to Arrow there was only one person in it, but the fire brigade says there was no one inside. The explosion came from inside the building and not from the hills but no one seems to care; people are killed every day. Arrow lingers for hours, and then finally sees two soldiers come out of the building with a body wrapped in a blanket.
The night is full of gunfire and shelling. It is cold and the electricity is off, and Arrow is very hungry. She ruminates on what Nermin said about disappearing. Is there any difference between that and being dead? She does not want to die or be shot by anyone, though, and if she disappears she is killing the Arrow that might still be able to have a future.
As for the cellist, he is not yet done so perhaps there will be another sniper. She decides she will protect him.
Arrow dozes off and is awakened to the sounds of boots. She picks up a loaded pistol and answers the door to three men. They tell her she has to come with them. One seems jumpy; he has probably heard of her. She asks where they are going and one says Colonel Karaman, and to bring her rifle. She lets them sweat it out while she thinks. She cannot say no or she will have to kill these men and then be on the run. She has not heard of the Colonel, which is odd, but she decides to go.
The men bring her to a cafe and she sits down before a hard-looking man. She is uneasy; the situation seems like it is getting away from her. He introduces himself and asks for her real name. She says Arrow is as real a name as she has. He shrugs and says it does not matter. Her unit has been abandoned and she is assigned to him. She tries to push back and say she does not work like he wants her to and she already has an assignment, but he is unmoved and says this is an order, not a request, and the cellist is not her concern anymore. She will not be wasted on these useless assignments, and she must go with the men outside to get her first assignment. Arrow hesitates; she does not work with a spotter. But she has run out of options, so she stands.
As she is walking away, the Colonel calls out that there is “us” and there is “them,” and “Everyone, I mean everyone, falls into one of these two groups. I hope you know where you stand” (179).
Arrow picks up her rifle and feels its familiar weight. She will kill the men on the hills if they want her to. All of her choices have led her here, and the only thing that matters now are the consequences.
Kenan arrives back near home at the marketplace and he sees his friend. Ismet notes his grim face. He mentions the shelling but does not say any more. The two of them head into the market, which is crowded. Ismet wanders into the familiar space.
Kenan thinks of the tunnel and how it could be used to get children out of Sarajevo but it’s actually being used for bringing in goods that are hiked up to ridiculous prices. He sees a well-dressed and clearly well-fed man standing next to a black Mercedes. There is also a large water truck there, and Kenan knows it isn’t bound for anyone who deserves it. This realization shocks him, but of course they buy and sell water, because they buy and sell everything.
Kenan is filled with the impulse to rush over and strangle the man, but he cannot abandon the water. This water is a burden of which he will never be free. He moves towards the man slowly, who has no idea he is coming for him. But before he can get there, the man gets in the car and leaves.
A bit of music filters into his ears. He follows the sound back into the city and comes across the cellist. He knows he has seen this man before but does not know where, but his wife was the one who told him about the cellist playing every day. When he heard of this he thought it was a bit maudlin and foolish and futile, but now he is here and he feels the music seep into him. He imagines the city healing itself all around him. He dreams of normal family scenes and a beautiful future.
As the cellist stops, though, the scenes vanish. Kenan is back on the street where 22 people were killed trying to buy bread. The cellist says nothing and a few people toss down flowers. The cellist wanderers away and so do the people, with only one old lady remaining. They talk for a moment.
Kenan returns to the marketplace and he sees Ismet trading cigarettes for rice. He knows Ismet risked his life for those cigarettes to get something he should have gotten for free. He thinks of Mrs. Ristovski, who is a ghost, but he is determined not to be a ghost himself; “All the words in the world cannot keep him from fading away” (192).
Kenan picks up his water and walks away. He won’t see Ismet again today, but they will talk again. It will be the two of them who help rebuild Sarajevo when the time comes.
He heads back toward the bridge for two canisters of water without handles.
Arrow
Arrow is brought to the Parliament Building, one of the tallest in the town and now quite destroyed. A man her age with curly hair and an amused face waits for her guides to leave and smiles that they aren’t the sharpest knives. He says his name is Hasan and she gives hers.
They walk up to the fourteenth floor. The higher they go, the worse the damage is. He asks her if she is ready to go hunting and she flatly says no. He is confused, and she says she does not know what they are doing. He explains Colonel Karaman probably wants to see how good he is before giving her something harder. Hasan will select a target and she will fire.
On the fourteenth floor Hasan points to a spot but she chooses a different one, which he commends. They get into position. Through her scope Arrow can see Grbavaca is a wasteland, and she does not even know whom she is going to shoot.
Hasan makes small talk and points out where he used to live. They mention their fathers. Hasan’s voice seems full of a desire for vengeance, but she is not sure why it bothers her now since she’s heard that before and has felt it herself.
Arrow scans the world below. It is sometimes hard to tell soldiers and civilians apart. The men on the hills do not wear uniforms and many do not have their weapons visible. She knows an officer can usually be detected with a swagger, and that soldiers tend to travel in groups. She starts to rationalize with herself about what she is doing, but Hasan interrupts and says he has found someone.
To her shock, she sees that the man is a civilian, and looks around until she finds a soldier. Hasan insists on the first and she refuses to kill an unarmed civilian. Hasan is irritated and tells her they are not negotiating here; she is not an ordinary soldier and Karaman’s unit is not any unit. Surprised, she asks if they kill civilians. He laughs and says they do a lot of things. Besides, he adds, that man isn't innocent—why is walking the streets freely? Why isn’t he dead or in a camp? Arrow knows it is because the men on the hills view him as one of their own but it is still not enough for her. She insists they are better than this and tries to argue futilely that there are good and bad people on both sides. Hasan smirks and says there is only us and them.
Arrow thinks about what brought her to this moment, how it was not hard for her to get here and how she wishes she had resisted. There is no way to go back in time, though. She announces she will not do it, and moves to leave. Hasan tells her he hopes she knows what she is doing.
Hasan does not follow her. She leaves the building and begins to run.
Dragan
A man is about to cross. There is another man setting up a camera. He is clean-shaven and his clothes are immaculate. The man about to cross notices the camera and hesitates, but goes anyway. Everyone holds their breath. It almost seems like the cameraman is disappointed that the sprinter lived and he did not get a shot of the run. Dragan finds this irritating. He also does not want the man’s camera to capture the hatless man’s body. This is because there’s nothing in a dead body that suggests what it means to be alive; it will do nothing for the outside world.
Dragan looks again at the hatless man. It is him, or could be him. They both did nothing when Emina needed help. Dragan sighs that his city is a place where a dead body can just lie in the street; he feels like he has been trying to live in a city that would not accept this, but it isn’t true.
Dragan decides to cross and it feels like time has slowed. He reaches the body of the hatless man and reaches to grab him. The sniper fires and misses him by half a meter. Dragan is only able to pull the heavy body back the way he came.
He does not feel fear. There is no bravery, “no heroes, no villains, no cowards. There’s what he can do and what he can’t” (211). Another shot sounds and he wonders if he has been hit. He hears shots from the men in the hills and shots firing back, but all he can think about is that there is not a body just lying in his city’s street and the cameraman did not capture it.
Dragan covers the man with Emina’s coat, puts his hat on him, and stands up to walk away. He thinks that “if this city is to die, it will be because of the people in the valley. When they’re content to live with death, to become what the men on the hills want them to be, then Sarajevo will die” (213).
Part Four
Kenan
It is the cellist’s last day and another day for Kenan to get water. He prepares his bottles. Today the electricity pops on for a bit, which gives him a flicker of happiness and hope. He and his wife joke a bit as they always do, and he leaves. He does not want to be out there but he has to be. He wants to be one of the people that rebuilds the city and he has to go outside and face the men on the hills. He is not a hero or a coward.
Every day since the shelling at the brewery he has been to hear the cellist and he will today as well.
Dragan
He has been at the intersection for two hours now, stuck in a veritable no man’s land. He will cross because he has to, because he will not let the men on the hills stop him. He does not run because if he runs then he will not be alive, and the Sarajevo he wants will not be alive. He does not want to be asleep anymore.
No gunfire happens. He is surprised and not surprised. He walks toward the bakery, but then feels the pills in his pocket. He decides to deliver the pills, then get bread, and then stop and tell Emina what happened.
On the way he sees an old man and says good afternoon in a bright voice, and the surprised man does the same.
Arrow
It has been ten days since Arrow walked away from Hasan. She is only now back in her apartment and they’ve already found her; she can hear the footsteps in the hall. They have found her because she allowed them to. She stayed and listened to the cellist and saw the men hunting for her and even could have shot Edin Karaman, but she did not. She saw the cellist’s last day and felt sure the men on the hills had given up on him.
The music filled her with a sense of lamentation and the notes felt like part of her. She felt that the music was telling her she did not need to be full of hate, and that the music wanted her to know the world was still full of goodness. The cellist stopped playing and cried, but no one did anything. Silently, he packed up and left, as did the audience.
Arrow hears the steps right outside her door. She is not going to pick up her gun and fight back. She will not kill them and become a fugitive, and she will not hate her pursuers.
Soon the men will burst open and the bullets will fire at her. Before the door splinters to pieces, she says aloud, “My name is Alisa” (231).
Analysis
The novel ends for most of the characters with a whimper, not a bang: the cellist finishes playing his twenty-two days and nothing happens to him; Kenan goes home and prepares to set out again in a few days for water; Dragan crosses the intersection and will continue to do so on his way to and from the bakery. Arrow has a dramatic fate unlike the others, but all four demonstrate the ways in which they’ve managed to hold onto a sense of humanity even as the world crumbles around them.
Kenan faces the temptation to simply give up and prevails. He knows that “if he wants to be one of the people who rebuild the city, one of the people who have the right even to speak about how Sarajevo should repair itself, then he has to go outside and face the men on the hills” (220). He is afraid and exhausted, yes, but he has to get water for his family and his neighbor; he knows the city “is full of people doing the same as he is, and they all find a way to continue with life. They’re not cowards, and they’re not heroes” (220).
Dragan also does not do anything grand or dramatic, but even the small things he does are meaningful. First, he takes umbrage at a cameraman trying to capture someone getting shot in the intersection. Though he does not accost the man, he does decide to move to body of the hatless man so the cameraman cannot film it. He feels that “This man is him. Or it could be. He lived in this city under siege, and he was shot crossing the street. They both did nothing when Emina needed help” (209). He also knows he cannot live in a city in which a dead body is simply allowed to lie in the street. Thus, he heads out into the intersection to move the man, and while he is there he is shot at. This does not make him back down; rather, he thinks “At this moment fear doesn’t exist. There’s no such thing as bravery. There are no heroes, no villains, no cowards. There’s only what he can do, and what he can’t. There’s right and wrong and nothing else” (211).
There are also two other telling moments in Dragan’s concluding narrative. The first is that when he decides to cross the intersection again, he does not run, for if he runs then he lets the men on the hills know they have won. If “he doesn’t run, then he’s alive again. The Sarajevo he wants to live in is alive again” (224). It is as if he has woken up from a sleep he’s been in since the war started; he thinks, “In defending himself from death he lost his grip on life” (224). Having successfully made it across, Dragan then passes by an elderly man and says “Good afternoon” in a “bright” (225) tone. The old man is surprised but replies in kind. This is a small exchange, but it is a hopeful one; it speaks to simple human connection, to acknowledgement that someone else exists and is worthy of one’s regard. For Dragan, who has withdrawn so much since the siege started, it speaks to a potentially burgeoning sense of reconnection with his fellow citizens.
Finally, there is Arrow. Having been reassigned to Colonel Edin Karaman, lost her mentor Nermin, and seen the terms of the agreement she was able to live with eradicated, she is unsure if she will be able to live and work in Sarajevo as she once did. Indeed, just how much and how quickly her situation has changed becomes clear when she is told to fire on an unarmed civilian. She protests to her handler, Hasan, that the man isn’t “one of the men killing us” (201) even though she does know “the men on the hills view him as one of their own” (201). She will not start to make excuses, will not start to see the world as Karaman told her to see it—us and them. She tells Hasan “We’re better than this” (201) and tries to think about how she got here and what she could have done differently. She “hopes that, somewhere in the city, there are people who are resisting the temptation to turn these men into devils, to say that all men are like them, to oppose their very existence the way they always said the people of Sarajevo did” (203). In her choice to flee her assignment, she knows she is sealing her fate. She spends some time hiding out but decides that she cannot do that forever. The cellist’s music comes back to her, and she realizes that “the men on the hills didn’t have to be murderers. The men in the city didn’t have to lower themselves to fight their attackers. She didn’t have to be filled with hatred. The music demanded that she remember this, that she know to a certainty that the world still held the capacity for goodness. The notes were proof of that” (228). What this translates to for Arrow is an acceptance of herself, good and bad, and an acceptance of her fate. She will not pick up her gun when her killers arrive, and she will not fight back. What she will do is a small but profound act of self-realization and resistance: she will shed “Arrow” and that identity and reclaim herself as her true name of “Alisa.”
