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My day at work began at 9:00 and I woke early to eat breakfast and leave plenty of time to catch the tram. After staying up glued to the television into the early morning hours, Neil rarely woke until the afternoon. Before leaving for work I’d suggest reasons for him to get out of bed.

“Come meet me for lunch? You can stop by personnel and remind them you are here still waiting for a job,” I whispered encouragingly, bending over the mess of sheets and blankets to kiss him goodbye.

“Hmm.” He barely lifted his head pursing his lips up to me without opening his eyes.

When I returned home around 6 PM, he was usually in front of the television. As far as I could tell, his days were spent watching TV, breaking for naps and smoking cigarettes on the small balcony overlooking the neighboring buildings.

“Don’t worry, I won’t smoke in the apartment. And I swear to God, I’m quitting as soon as I get a bloody job,” he assured me.

I didn’t expect living with a boyfriend to be an easy adjustment, but nagging doubts followed me out the door each morning. Was he really the guy for me? What if he never got his act together? I rationalized that everyone goes through periods of doubt in relationships especially during down times. I’d also had a tough time when I left Bosnia. I needed to support him through his. This is what couples do.

Rather than search through my messy shoulder bag for my key, I rang the bell so Neil would have to buzz me, decreasing the chance of finding him still asleep in bed like I had earlier in the week. Today, my worry was unwarranted. Neil greeted me at the apartment door fully dressed.

“Welcome home, my darling,” he kissed me then guided me into the dining room where the table was set with candles, silver, napkins and wine glasses. The apartment was filled with smells of garlic and rosemary.

“Aw! How lovely! I guess you kept yourself busy today.” As the words slipped out, I berated myself for the innuendo.

“I had to do something! I’m going mad just sitting around. You know, I’m a real grafter. I need to be working. When are they going to call me? Never mind, I won’t spoil our evening. Today was a good day! I went down to the market and picked up some gorgeous veg and stopped into the butcher next to the square. Turns out, the butcher speaks German so that was handy. Wait until you see the steaks! Tonight my dear, you are eating like a Queen!”

“I can’t wait. Let me go wash my hands. I’ll be right there.” I went into the bathroom and closed the door. I shouldn’t doubt him. He’d just given voice to all my worries. We just needed to get him a job. I shook my hands and reached for one of the hand towels neatly folded next to the sink. These little touches were so charming. He kept a great home. For the first time in my life I shared a home with my lover – I needed to learn to relax and enjoy it. What was there to worry about? He would get a job soon. I made plenty of money. I should give him time and just relax and enjoy being taken care of. Folding the hand towel, I looked at myself in the mirror and smiled before joining Neil in at the table. He pulled out my chair and bowed while handing me a white linen napkin.

“For your starter, there’s boeuf consommé,” he said in a terrible French accent.

“Wow! Did you make it?” A clear broth with snips of chive steamed in the white china.

“If you call opening a can ‘making it’, yes!”

The steam from the hot broth smelled nourishing and tasted of beef. With a flourish he replaced my empty bowl with a plate of tiny roasted potatoes, brightly colored green beans with a drizzle of butter and a massive steak that sliced easily and was beautifully pink. I closed my eyes in pleasure as I slowly chewed the tender meat with just the right amount of saltiness.

“I can’t remember the last time I ate such a delicious meal, even when we were in Italy!”

“See! And they say the English can’t cook! You just wait and see the special meals I’ll make for you, my darling!”

We ate and filled each other’s wine glasses until the bottle was finished, then kissed over our empty plates until he lifted me from my chair, and with one hand, left my summery-skirt and blouse strewn across the floor on the way to the bedroom.

 

Some evenings we walked into the center of the city to sit at cafes on the main square. Neil gripped my hand as we sauntered down the narrow sidewalks, pausing to peer into shop windows. Zagreb felt like any normal European town with couples and families milling around the fountains, children chasing pigeons. It was easy to forget that only miles away, Bosnia was imploding. We sometimes rented a car and drove out of the city on weekends. I loved these adventures although Neil’s driving sometimes terrified me.

One Saturday as we hurtled towards the Croatian coast at his usual breakneck speed, the road twisting in an endless arc, up and down hills – trees, rocky cliffs, houses only a blur, I followed every curve of the road as if my visual vigilance might avoid the horrendous accident lurking in my imagination. When did I become such a worrier? The threat of shelling and snipers in Sarajevo never made me as anxious as Neil’s driving. I was sure he would kill us on these picturesque roads. Careening along the narrow route, I tried to believe, as he told me, that he was an excellent driver. The best. This is just the way they drive in Europe, I told myself gripping my seat for dear life.

“Please slow down. You’re making me really nervous!”

“Everyone drives this speed! It’s dangerous if you go any slower, I promise you. Don’t worry, love, you won’t find a better driver than me,” he said, squeezing my knee reassuringly. He lit a cigarette and sucked hard, holding his breath until he’d opened the window to release the cloud of smoke. He knew I hated the smell but I was so nervous I was barely breathing anyway. Only a few months ago, I appreciated Neil’s driving as he flew through Sarajevo and Central Bosnia, the better to dodge bullets. Now on these peaceful roads, it felt insane.

A pattern of light shimmered through the trees onto the pavement. The scent of sea and eucalyptus meant we were almost there. I closed my eyes and turned my head towards my open window, inhaling the reassuring fragrance. I thought about our destination. Maybe the Adriatic Sea would be warm enough to swim in.

Bang! My body lurched to the left hard against the belt, my neck snapping like a whip. With the sickening violence of scraping metal against metal we came to a stop.

“Are you all right? Are you hurt? Did you hit your head?” Neil asked, frantically checking me for injury.

“I think I’m fine. Maybe my neck, but…are you okay? What the hell happened?”

“I didn’t see him coming. I couldn’t even see there was a bloody road there.”

Shaking, I got out of the car. Neil went to the other vehicle. A Croatian couple with a young boy got out of the Mercedes, apparently uninjured and their tank-like old clunker was only minimally damaged. The front-end on the passenger side of our rental car was completely crumpled in against the tire. The family, perhaps thinking they might be held responsible and maybe unaware of Neil’s outrageous speed, left hurriedly, promising to call us a taxi from a nearby village.

Circling the wreckage of our car I exclaimed, “We could have been killed!”

“I know. We are bloody lucky.”

“Lucky? Luck has nothing to do with it, Neil. Your driving was crazy. You were careless with both of our lives. You were going way too fast. You always drive too fast!”

He didn’t respond, his lips drawn into a thin line and his eyes downcast. He unloaded our bags and put them by the side of the road.

“I mean do you have a death wish or something? You may have, but I don’t so please leave me out of it!” In our months together, I had yet to lose my temper but now could not contain myself.

“The taxi’s here,” he said, picking our bags up, hurrying to get away from the site of disaster and my wrath.

The taxi dropped us at a small hotel perched at the edge of the water on a cobblestone street. Neil stayed in the lobby to call the car rental company and deal with the mess he had made while I escaped upstairs, still trembling. Our room glistened with light from the Adriatic Sea, so close to our windows that waves seemed to be crashing against the foundation of the hotel. A stunning spot – but how could I possibly enjoy it now? My neck was already stiff. Suddenly exhausted, I climbed into the bed. Burying my face in the pillows, I curled into a fetal position, my back to the door.

When Neil came into the room and dropped our bags in a corner with a thud, I pretended to be sleeping. Without a word, he climbed in next to me. The bed sagged under his heft and I clung to the mattress edge to avoid sliding towards him. The accident replayed itself in my head, speeding around that blind curve and the crushing sound of metal against metal echoing again and again. Finally, I slept, waking often from disturbing dreams involving speed and fleeing.

The next morning, I woke to slapping waves and momentarily felt happy until I felt my body aches and the accident edged back into my consciousness. I tried to visualize the slow-motion images washing away with the tide. Turning in bed, I looked at Neil’s back. I would make peace. Stroking the hair cut short against his neck, I sidled up behind him and whispered “Come for a walk with me. It’s a gorgeous morning.”

Rolling towards me without opening his eyes, he kissed the air answering,

“I’m going to sleep a little longer. You go. I’ll find you in a bit.”

I drew back from him and yesterday’s anger flooded in the space between us. Throwing the blankets aside, I jumped out of bed.

“Don’t bother. I’ll just walk by myself. You go ahead and keep sleeping,” I said, silently added ‘jerk’ to myself and quickly pulled a pair of jeans on. As usual, he probably wouldn’t get out of bed until almost noon. I let the door slam behind me as I flounced out of the room.

 

The sky and sea were a wash of blue. I jogged towards the water, filling my lungs with briny air. Climbing onto a rock, I sat down and rolled up my jeans, savoring the heat on my calves. Edging down the sloping stone, I slid my feet into the icy water. Not even the Caribbean was as dazzling as the Adriatic Sea with its magical blend of greens and blues. I tried to focus on all this beauty to calm my doubting heart.

Lately, there were things that bugged me about Neil, but sleeping all the time was the worst of it. No matter how I cajoled him, he rarely got up with me in the morning. And it’s not like we were having any great action in bed either or I’d be there with him. As movie star handsome and affectionate as he was, with his sweet way of wrapping his body around mine at night and not letting go, that crazy, intense electricity I always associated with love, was missing. Recently, too many nights he simply kissed me and continued to watch television while I slid between the sheets alone.

I stepped off the rock onto the beach and kicking stones along the way, walked to the end of a sandy stretch to a jetty. I sat against a boulder, the warmth seeping into my sore back. I rubbed my neck, stretched my legs out, closed my eyes and turned my face to the sun. A fishing boat chugging out towards the horizon made the only sound besides the waves.

Yesterday’s crash replayed itself again and again. I opened my eyes and looked at the horizon. It had been an accident. The roads were treacherous – anyone could have crashed on that blind curve. Why did I get so upset with him? I couldn’t have it both ways: Neil’s crazy fearlessness made my last cold months in Bosnia bearable. Shelling or gun battles never daunted him, he protected me, always sleeping nearest the window and covering me with bulletproof vests at the first cracking sound. And he left his exciting job in Sarajevo to follow me, quit his job to be with me – I mean, how many guys would do that? I shouldn’t be upset with him for loving me so much. Funny, warm, generous, affectionate, considerate: Neil had practically all the qualities I wanted in a man. Of course I hated his constant smoking but he never smoked in the apartment and swore he would quit as soon as he was working. We were both stressed by his unemployment and he was a little depressed, that’s all. I picked up and released fistfuls of warm sand.

Besides, if I wanted a family I needed to get started. Neil promised children and continued adventures. Isn’t that exactly what I had wanted? I just needed to adjust to living with someone, to loosen up a bit. I stood up and walked to the water, wiggling my toes, I watched them disappear beneath the stones until the freezing temperature began to hurt. Leaping back onto the beach, I headed back to the hotel. Surely, this new anxiety knotting my gut since we’d lived together was about my own issues and fears and these would probably go away when Neil found a job. I headed back towards the hotel, the sand slipping beneath my feet.

“Good morning beautiful! I’ve been waiting for you,” Neil called to me from a little table set against a sunny wall of the hotel, the waves of the sea breaking only a few feet away.

“Actually, it’s afternoon by now.” I wanted to retract my snide retort as soon it came out, but Neil took no notice. He gallantly waved me into the chair next to him.

“I don’t remember seeing this table here before,” I said.

“I know. I had the guy from the caf’ help me carry it all out. What a waste that they don’t use this spot, I mean, look at the view!” he got up and slid the chair beneath me and kissed the top of my head.

The table wobbled on the cobblestones as I reached for the cup of cappuccino. How many guys would bother to set up this romantic scene at this hour of the day? He never failed to surprise me when I least expected it. I looked at him, wide-awake and smiling at me. Nuzzling my cheek, he whispered, “Let’s enjoy this beautiful day together, shall we?”

“Yes.” I smiled back at him, my worries already washed away with the waves.

It was simple: he loved me and shared my longing to have a baby. He would start working again and everything would be fine.

 

 

Zagreb, Spring 1993

 

In Zagreb, water flowed with the turn of a faucet and lights with a flick of a switch. I’d found an apartment on the opposite side of town from the UNPROFOR headquarters. A chipping stucco building from the outside, inside the heavy doors, the old Austro-Hungarian influence of the city shone with a grand marble staircase and thick beautifully tiled walls. The apartment was well furnished and airy with parquet floors and metal shutters that could be pulled down to keep out the heat of the sun. I never did that, welcoming the light. Returning home in the evening, I spent a few seconds searching for matches to light the candles before remembering, I no longer needed them. The normalcy of everything – people walking without worry of snipers, tulips blooming on the square – seemed unreal and almost wrong. It felt odd for cars and trams to be honking and clanging through the streets. How can life go on like this with war raging so close by?

Random moments triggered my tears. Inhaling the scent of a rose blooming in one of the squares, glimpsing a father holding his young child’s hand as they walked down the street, set off sobs. I sought heat as if to thaw my spirit frozen by Bosnia, crossing to walk on the sunny side of the street, turning my face upwards towards the light. At home, I let the hot water rush over my hands as I washed the dishes and took long, scalding baths that left my skin raw as if I might bake and steam my sadness away.

Mornings I squeezed onto a crowded tram for a 20 minute ride to the UNPROFOR headquarters where I reported to the Civil Affairs and Press Office. My new assignment was to answer phones and file papers. Dull administrative office work that I wasn’t very good at. Making copies of Security Council Resolutions, I inevitably mixed up the pages, feeling like a dunce not even able to manage the copier. I was miserable.

Peter, the personnel director who’d urged me to leave Bosnia, now insisted I speak with an UNPROFOR mental health profession. Peacekeeping operations are supported by nations around the world and for the last few years of UNPROFOR, the United States was responsible for medical care of troops and staff. I would be seeing a MASH shrink. I went into the first meeting with trepidation, uncomfortable with the idea of a uniformed American officer probing my feelings.

His office was in a building I’d never been to in the far corner of the UNPROFOR grounds. A man in his 50s in military uniform stepped from behind a massive wooden desk to greet me. I sat awkwardly in the vinyl-covered chair across from him, and momentarily felt like I was in the Principal’s office but he soon put me at ease.

“Call me Ken. What part of the States are you from?”

“New York. I was working at headquarters for 4 years before joining UNPROFOR last June. It’s been about a year now.”

“So you’ve seen some rough stuff?”

That’s all it took for me to dissolve into tears. He leaned across the desk with a box of tissues – Kleenex – not the cheap local stuff. I took two and they were soon soaked. I told him about the incidents in Kiseljak between sobs.

“Clearly you’re experiencing post-traumatic stress disorder.”

“Really? How could that be? Compared to the experiences of many of my colleagues, not to mention the victims in this war, my life has been sheltered.”

“Look, you’ve witnessed bullying, terrorizing and have been witness to the aftermath of violence regularly.”

“I guess… there was that woman who lay for days by the road on the way to the airport. She looked about my age. It’s like she just was part of the apocalyptic landscape until someone finally ventured into that no-man’s land to retrieve Her. I thought about her there stiff from cold and death – who was missing her? Where was she trying to get? What right do I have to be experiencing post-traumatic stress disorder? We drove right by, safe in our fancy armored car!”

“Well, first of all, how many hours are you working? Do you take down time?”

“Seven days a week and average of 10 hours a day, sometimes more. But that comes with the territory of being on mission, doesn’t it? I mean, it’s expected of us.”

“Well, in the end I think we’re seeing that the hours you spent at your job and your commitment to your boss goes above and beyond and is not healthy for you. That’s also what might be happening here. Burnout.”

“But since meeting Neil, I’ve been much happier – although also more resentful of how little time we have together. But what am I expecting – a normal life here? I feel like that’s wrong. I mean I knew, more or less, what I was signing up for. Lately I’ve felt so disheartened but how little I can do.”

“Well, I suggest you try to be conscious of setting boundaries.”

He pushed his glasses onto the top of his head as he looked across the desk at me.

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“By boundaries? You don’t seem to draw limits in your relationships, at least certainly not with your boss. What about your boyfriend? So far limits have been set for you by circumstance but will you be able to be clear with him about what you need and say ‘no’ when you need to? Or will you give, give and give until you make yourself sick? I think you’re experiencing the results of doing that now.”

“I’ll have to think about that. But as for Neil – he’s the one who takes care of me,” I answered, thinking about how he spoiled me and made me feel so safe when we were together in Bosnia.

“Good, good, that’s fine. I’m only saying it’s something to be aware of in the future.”

 

I nodded to the guards at the compound gate and turned left to the street where the tramline ran so perilously close to the sidewalk, I sometimes imagined myself twisting an ankle and falling off the curb onto the tracks as the tram approached. Did that mean I had a death wish? My session with Ken had me second-guessing myself. I’d never thought of myself as a pushover as he seemed to suggest. I had a good work ethic so of course I never said no to Victor about working when he asked me to work on weekends or stay late to work on a report. He was my boss, I liked and respected him and for most of our time together, I was genuinely compelled by the work. It felt important. This was what everyone did here in this crazy war-world. We did whatever we needed to do.

But to Ken’s point, could I recognize and speak up when enough-was-enough, or did I have to fall apart? Did this relate to my relationship with Neil? I didn’t feel like it. He provided me with joy in this bleak world. Generous and warm, he put me at ease, made me feel loved – not like I needed boundaries. In fact, lately I’d thought it was about time to let down my guard when it came to love, about time to risk in a relationship like I was risking in this war zone. Neil and I would be fine: we loved each other. From down the block, I heard the rumble of a tram approaching, stepped up my pace to reach the nearby stop, and climbed on.

 

The tally of romantic liaisons I’d had in my life made me cringe, mostly short-lived episodes, high on drama and low on commitment. I’d never taken the plunge of living with someone while even the most unconventional of my high school and college friends were now married and having children. I never made that kind of connection with someone until now. At 34, it was about time. I couldn’t wait for Neil to join me in Zagreb.

 

Gradually, I grew used to the relative normality of my life. The war in Croatia had yet to spread beyond an occasional skirmish in the UN protected areas, circumstantially far away from this cosmopolitan, charming city. Walking freely through the streets, wandering the market, eating good food, I began to relax. Sometimes I met up after work with others from the Civil Affairs office. We spent hours at restaurants where whole lambs turned slowly over an open flame and shared chunks of roasted meat and grilled trout, their hollow eyes staring up from the plate. We drank multiple bottles of wine. Tipsy, I returned to my apartment to watch the non-stop news, following reports of battles only miles away across the hills. My relief at being in a warm, lit room was pierced by pangs of guilt.

Every Friday, Neil caught a flight up from Sarajevo. We went to fancy restaurants where he flirted with waitresses and befriended waiters to ensure the best service and because he couldn’t resist. After too many glasses of wine, we stumbled home to the flat and fell into bed. Hungrily, we rediscovered each other. Curled against his beating heart, I faded into sleep. On Sunday, he’d return to Sarajevo. These interludes brightened my weeks, but it became harder and harder for Neil to leave.

One Sunday evening, hours after we’d kissed each other goodbye, I sat reading in the front room. I imagined Neil in the Holiday Inn watching Star Trek or playing poker with the journalists, when the buzzer rang. I looked out the window and there he was, grinning up at me.

“What are you doing here?” I said, surprised at the panic in my voice. I froze at the sight of him on the sidewalk, his bags beside him. Why was he back? What happened? Turning away from the window, I pressed my back against the wall as if dodging a sniper. This was it. He was really moving in. I hesitated before leaning back out the window and calling down to him, hoping that I sounded excited, “Just a minute, I’ll throw you the key!” With a flourish, he caught the key ring. I opened the apartment door and listened as he shifted all his bags into the entrance hall, the heavy apartment building door banging shut, his footsteps on the wide marble stairs as he climbed the two flights.

He stepped across the landing, dropped the bags, spread his arms wide and said, “I’m back!” in his Jack Nicholson Shining imitation. He grabbed me, kissing me so hard on the lips I had no chance to respond.

“I know I probably should have warned you, but I decided so quickly. I got down to Sarajevo and it was so bloody depressing. I’ve had enough. So I picked up all my stuff from the hotel, caught a lift to the airport and here I am!” he explained while piling his bags inside the door.

“So you quit? Just like that?” I asked, the pinch in my stomach getting tighter.

“I left Philippe a note.”

“You didn’t talk to him? You left your boss a note? Are you sure that was the best way to do things?”

“Well, the UNPROFOR personnel office said there will definitely be a job for me so I figured why be away from my darling any longer? Right? I’m dying for a bath. You get so filthy on those planes and today I got a double dose, didn’t I?” He said proudly.

I went into the bathroom to run the water. Why was I shocked? Only weeks earlier I also left Bosnia abruptly. Except my boss told me to leave. I never would have quit my job without some kind of notice. It felt irresponsible and foolhardy. My stomach was in knots. Was this how he operated? It was too late. He was here and it was time to begin our life together and ultimately, to start a family. This was the dream I’d had and it was happening starting now. The water turned hot. I pushed the rubber stop into the drain. Sitting on the edge, I watched the tub fill.

 

 

 

Italy and Zagreb – Spring 1993

 

A day later I boarded a cargo plane from Sarajevo to Ancona, Italy and from there took a taxi to the resort town of Senegalia, populated in this off-season by relief and UN workers on leave. The hotels facing the beach were shuttered except for a bright blue building with doors propped open as if they were under-construction. I slipped in past the plywood into a lobby with sheet-covered furniture cordoned off like a crime scene. The owners, a smartly dressed middle-aged couple, greeted me warmly and explained in perfect English that they were painting for the upcoming season but I was welcome to stay in one of the rooms they’d already finished. The strange desolation suited me. Still feeling the vibrations of the military plane, I followed a maid to an airy room that smelled of fresh paint.

 

Less than 48 hours earlier I’d stood alone in my sandbagged office dialing the number for the head of personnel for UNPROFOR. We’d spoken only the week before about openings in the mission area, someplace where Neil and I might be sent together. He had seemed irritated with me for badgering him and I didn’t blame him. He had other things to worry about besides keeping lovers together.

“Peter? It’s Tricia calling from Kiseljak.” Merely saying the name of this town I broke down before composing myself together enough to launch into a rant.

“Listen, Peter, I can handle hardships like living without water and electricity, I can handle the shelling and snipers, but I can’t take being a silent witness to the ugly violence happening here. It’s horrible and we are doing nothing!” I hyperventilated between sobs.

“Okay Tricia. Tricia, pack your things and catch the next plane to Zagreb. Okay? Don’t worry about what’s next, for now I want you to leave immediately. Does Victor know?”

“Yes, he told me to call you.” I blew my nose into my soggy tissue.

“Good. Leave today, is that clear?” He sounded worried.

Sobbing my acknowledgement, I hung up the phone before putting my head on the desk to weep some more. I felt defeated and ashamed. And where would I go from here? I needed to tell Neil I was leaving without him. I took a few calming breaths and dialed the number to the ICRC office, hoping the phone lines to Sarajevo would be open. Neil picked up.

“Good morning sunshine!”

“Oh Neil!” I started crying again.

“What? What’s happened? What’s wrong sweetheart?”

“I’m sorry. I’m a wreck! I’ve got to get out of here. I called Peter and he said to pack up and go. I’m leaving Kiseljak today.”

“Leaving? Where to? What happened? Are you okay, darling?”

“Yes. Well, no. I think I’m having a little bit of a nervous breakdown. Last night these motherfuckers took a guy down the street away from his family. It was so horrible to watch. I watched and did nothing.”

I described the miserable scene I’d witnessed that I knew was being repeated in villages, towns and cities across Bosnia, Croatia, Serbia along with rape, torture and murder, minutes from where I lived. What house or factory did we pass every day that hid these crimes? Knowing how close and how impotent I was, we were, became unbearable to me, as was my silence. I was here under false pretense. I could save no one except myself.

“Come to Sarajevo. I’ll make you feel better. And there’s a party at the hotel tonight for one of the journalists. Then you can catch a flight to Ancona and I’ll meet you there for the weekend.”

“Okay. I do want to see you. I’ll go home and pack up and meet you at the Holiday Inn today.”

Sarajevo, a city relentlessly under siege as a destination to escape to – how bizarre. I went back to my apartment and within two hours had fled Kiseljak.

 

And here I was in Italy. I had escaped. I opened the window and a chiffon white curtain billowed around me on a gust of humid, salty air. I looked out at the empty beach, a stretch of sand leading to the shifting horizon of waves, barely audible. I breathed deeply and leaving the window open, pulled off my grimy clothes and stepped into the shower. As the hot water beat down on me, I began to bawl. Scrubbing my body roughly with a soapy washcloth as if I were filthy, trying to scrape my guilt and grief away. Wiping the steam from the mirror, I looked back at my swollen face. My mouth a grim line, blue-eyes rimmed red, skin pasty. I pulled a sweatshirt over a t-shirt and jeans and clutching my journal and book to my chest, went out to the beach.

I tried to focus on the pages of my book, but could not stop staring across the glistening Adriatic towards the madness I had left. With every breath, I tried to release the twisted knots inside of me. I closed my eyes but the sun turned my lids into disconcerting bloody red kaleidoscopes.

When my hunger grew unbearable, I found a restaurant. Pulling my hood up and wrapping a scarf around my neck, I sat outside in the wind with a bowl of pasta and espresso, grateful to be able to relieve at least the void in my stomach.

As dark descended, I missed Neil. Alone between the crisp, white sheets, I longed for his big arms to pull me tightly against his chest. Hugging a pillow, I listened for the sounds of tanks and shooting and heard only the waves of the Adriatic.

 

The next day I fell asleep on the deserted beach, my hands and feet dug into the hot sand, comforted by the sound of water gently hitting the shoreline.

“Hello my sweet. Did you miss me?” I opened my eyes to Neil’s heavy boots beside me. Dropping his pack he flopped down and pulled me towards him for a kiss.

“How did you find me?”

We’d agreed to meet in Senegalia but had made no plans beyond that.

“Easy. There aren’t too many places open and I went in to every one that was and asked if there was a ‘bella Americana’ there. They told me at the front desk that I’d find you out here. Looks like a nice hotel.” Neil pulled off his shirt and lay back on the sand sighing with pleasure.

I watched him surrender to the sun and felt a flicker of disappointment. I looked at his profile as he settled back, head propped on his backpack, his eyebrows spiking crazily against the cloudless sky. Why were we not scrambling across the street to the hotel to rip each other’s clothes off? I felt so numb, I wasn’t inclined myself but I hoped he might save me from this paralyzing funk. I tried to explain myself to him.

“It’s lovely, but I can’t shake off this terrible feeling. I’ve been looking across the water and all I can think of are the hideous things people are doing to each other – right over there!” I gestured towards the water. “Entire villages destroyed. No electricity, no water, not enough food. And here we are in this beautiful place less than an hour away and there is no sign of any of it. Everything is normal. It’s surreal to me that we’re so close to such insanity. I can’t wrap my head around it. I feel angry, guilty and …so sad!” I almost started blubbering again.

“Well, let’s enjoy it while we can! And anyway, you’ll be based in Zagreb now and soon, so will I. From now on, our life will be better,” he said without opening his eyes.

“Yes, our lives will. But I feel like it’s wrong for me to be able to escape while so many innocent people are stuck there.”

“I know, it is terrible,” he mumbled sleepily, squeezing my hand. I could sense he was getting annoyed by my dismal mood and had no idea how to talk me out of it. Besides, he was here for a holiday and didn’t want me ruining it. He sat up.

“Let’s go to the hotel so I can drop my stuff off. I’m parched and dying for a good cup of coffee and some decent Italian food.”

We gathered our things and headed across the sand to the ghostly hotel where we were the only guests.

For the next few days, we ate and drank too much, let our skin turn an angry red in the sun and slept past noon. I seemed to have lost the ability to feel pleasure. I embraced the excess hoping to feel something besides the twisting in my stomach and weight on my chest. At meals, I sometimes cried over my pasta. After two days of lying in the sun, Neil’s touch on my livid skin became unbearable. Making love hurt but we did it anyway.

Neil seemed relieved when it was time to leave, happy to be heading back to his adrenaline packed life in Sarajevo. He seemed to feel purposeful and thrived on the excitement, the constant danger whereas I felt exhausted and defeated by it, like I was giving up. We sat side by side on a roaring cargo plane, this time, holding hands. The Italian cargo plane was loaded full of relief supplies so we had to prop our feet on the boxes piled high and wrapped with heavy rope netting. Flying away from Ancona airport, Neil spotted the beach where we’d been hours before – and in less than an hour, we were over the snowbound mountains of Bosnia. I could feel his excitement at being back to the heart of the war while I was relieved to be moving on to Zagreb.

 

 

Bosnia and Croatia – Spring 1993

 

My solitary nights in Kiseljak became harder to bear after Italy. Winter dragged on into what should have been spring and for days on end my apartment remained without heat, electricity or water, the phone line – dead. I crawled into bed early for warmth and read by candlelight, falling asleep as a way to pass time. As I shivered between the ice-cold sheets I craved the reassuring warmth of Neil’s body beside me, the comfort of his voice. During days when the sun made a rare appearance over the mountains I felt the promise of spring, but nights remained long and frozen. Listening to the terrifying grumble of tanks rolling through the darkness, I wondered what the hell I was doing here alone in this terrible place? How was I any kind of “peacekeeper”? What made me think pushing a pen at my desk could change anything for the people here? The expectation I should at least try was set in my childhood.

 

Swept along in a sea of towering adults protesting the Vietnam War, I gripped my father’s soft, papery hand with sweaty fingers. I hoped he might notice my fear, and as if willing him to look at me, I locked my eyes on his profile afraid I’d otherwise be lost in this shouting crowd. I dared not tell him I was afraid. I was 7. My English teacher parents often brought us kids to marches and peace rallies. Personally and emotionally, they followed the up-tight Irish-Catholic script of the 1950s, getting married at twenty and producing four children within 5 years. But socially and politically, they were proudly liberal and would join rather than cross, a picket line. Grievances at home were muted and mostly involved slamming doors and long angry silences, while out in the world we were encouraged to speak up against social injustice.

We lived in a non-descript apartment building in the nicer part of the Bronx. My brothers squeezed into one tiny bedroom, my older sister and I shared another. When we wanted to speak at the table, we raised our hands to be recognized by either of our teacher-parents. While shoveling forks of pork-chops and potatoes into my mouth with one hand, my left hand would be stretched high, waiting my turn to be recognized. After dinner, we watched the news – gunfire and dead soldiers in black and white images of war. Growing up with a war felt natural, and it was understood that I should speak up against it, that I should do something.

Idealism ran through my veins and anti Vietnam War protests were my training ground. But this was the real thing and I was losing heart. Just as I hoped my distant father might lift me up above the terrifying anti-war crowd and hold me tight, I wished for Neil to sweep me away from the darkness of this war. And he seemed ready to step into that role.

 

My flat in Kiseljak sat on the main road of a predominantly Croat populated town in the violent patchwork of Central Bosnia. I heard everything. Nights, I hid under a ridiculous number of blankets as much to muffle the drunken shouting and yelling of local soldiers in the street as to keep warm. I knew I’d be reading military reports at work of Moslem families being bullied from their homes, men taken away in the night. That is, if anybody paid attention. I wasn’t alone in listening-but-doing-nothing about the evil soundtrack of those sleepless hours, was I? What about my neighbors, their neighbors? These people had lived side-by-side for generations and now, under the veil of darkness, families who’d always lived together were forced from their homes. The Croats were ethnically cleansing the town of their Moslem neighbors right on the doorstep of the UN base, supposedly here to protect them.

Man’s inhumanity to man being played out so close around me, clouded my excitement of my new love. Instead, an icy fear and anger clutched at my throat, tightening with every night. Years later I remain haunted by that Bosnian-Croat town – the dark secrets and nights of violence spilling into daylight. Of course a love born in such a place harbored grim secrets.

On a March morning I stood on the corner waiting to cross the road to headquarters. Closing my eyes to soak up the feeble rays of morning sun, my feet cold in dirty slush, the momentary pleasure disappeared with the sound of yelling and commotion in front of the UN gate. A Danish soldier was yelling at three men wearing green uniforms who were yanking a man in ill-fitting jeans, a jacket to thin for the frigid weather, and unkempt hair, out of a beat-up black Zastava. Laughing, they began punching him.

“Stop! Stop it!” The UN soldier yelled in English. The Dane waved his gun but did not leave the UN HQ entrance security booth, steps away from the fracas. A group of villagers gathered, joining me to watch the violence. Others hurried away. I stood, frozen liquid seeping through my boots, unable to continue out of the dirty snow drift to cross the street, not wanting to draw closer to the violence. Nor did I want to turn away. Where would I go? There was no one to call from my empty flat, even if the phone worked. No calling ‘911’, no police. The perpetrators wore uniforms.

I told myself to scream, ‘Leave him alone!’ but my protest stuck in my throat. I remained silent. The thugs ignored the young soldier in the blue helmet whose face crumpled in horror as he yelled from the UN booth, “Fucking, stop it!” More Danish soldiers joined the guard, now all of them yelling from the gate. The international soldiers clutched the sidearm to only be used in self-defense, screaming first in Danish then in English, their voices cracking in the cold air. The thugs did not even glance up, instead laughing, enjoying the audience as they continued to hit and kick the man in the snow.

Finally, they shoved their now-bloodied victim off onto the shoulder of the road and squeezed into his car. Flooring the gas, they took off with smoke belching out of tailpipe leaving a gray cloud hovering behind as the car disappeared. The man lay in a bank of snow, his limbs at strange angles. Was he dead? I should help him, but what could I do? It was as if my feet were nailed on this spot. For what seemed forever, he remained completely still. Finally, he stirred, his face a bloody mask. Pulling himself out of the snow, he held his head up high and limped away from us silent witnesses, following the smoke of his stolen car.

The smear of blood would remain visible until the snow melted. The man, at least for now, had his life but his car and dignity had been stolen in broad daylight in front of the United Nations and me.

I willed myself to cross the street, flashed my ID and passed through the gate, gaze down. The Danish guard who usually greeted me with a jolly good morning, avoided eye contact, but I felt our shared shame of the United Nations – or for that matter – the human race. My eyes blurry, I stumbled down the stairwell to my office, every bone in my body heavy. I wanted to sleep. It was the fastest escape I could think of from this terrible place. This was a minor incident especially compared to what was happening elsewhere, everyday. I knew that. Accusations that the United Nations in Bosnia was doing nothing here were true. I had done nothing. Not even raised my voice.

 

I began to dread my basement office – the orange room with taped up windows and a wall of sandbags to absorb shattered glass. Roundtrip rides into Sarajevo where I might see Neil but still be able to get back to Kiseljak for work the next day, were not always easy to find. I spent hours pushing papers in the musty cell, returning home alone to my flat. I had been on this mission for more than 9 months. The initial hope and idealism I felt in the beginning was now hard to muster.

 

For the first six months I was based with Victor in Knin, the self-proclaimed capital of the Serbs in what was officially Croatia. Every day felt like we were on a ‘mission’ as we drove around the stark but gorgeous landscape to meet with local leaders from opposite sides, trying village-by-village to build peace. Once old friends, even relatives, sometimes enough middle ground could be found to allow for check-point meetings, prisoner, or sadder – body exchanges. But since being posted to this isolated town in Bosnia, the futility and my feeling of impotence had become depressing. And now in love, I began resenting the 14-hour -7-day week requirement. Neil had applied for a job with the UN so we might be posted somewhere together. I would request to be sent wherever he went and a bit guiltily, we hoped it would be in a place like Split, one of the cushier-posts with views of the Adriatic Sea.

Most mornings I woke early enough to join the Danes and other UN staff for breakfast at the base – a smorgasbord of pickled fish and dark breads, cereal and coffee. But lately I slept fitfully and as a result, found it harder to pull myself out of bed in time. Those days, I stopped into a bakery near my flat and picked up a cheese burek for breakfast. I liked this shop because the family, two women who looked to be mother and daughter, always greeted me warmly – a rare thing in this cold town. “Dober dan! Kako ste?” We asked after each other, our conversation limited to greetings and the weather. I nodded as the younger woman chatted to me as if I understood. She wore her dark hair pulled away from her ruddy face, a smock apron tied neatly around her waist. Sometimes a little girl was there too. “Moja kci.” The middle-aged woman said proudly holding her dark haired daughter’s little shoulders, beaming proudly. A flowery curtain was usually drawn across the back of the shop but on a recent morning, it was open enough for me to glimpse a man who looked in his thirties with dark curly hair, sitting at a table. At first he peered back at me nervously, his eyes haunted as he flipped worry beads with one hand and clutched a little coffee cup in the other. I smiled and waved at him and his face brightened as he flashed a smile of crooked teeth and nodded.

A few nights after the assault and theft outside of headquarters, I woke to yelling. My heart in my throat, I peered out from behind the bedroom curtains. The noise was coming from about five buildings down the street from me. Four men in uniforms standing between a Yugo and the bakery entrance were restraining a man dressed in a t-shirt and sweatpants. The mother and her young girl ran out of the building, weeping and clutching at the man I’d seen behind the curtain. He was being dragged to the car.

“Stanite! Molim vas, stanite!” Stop! Please stop! The woman begged. “Pustite ga, molim vas. To je moj muz molim. Moja muz!” My husband!

“Tata! Taataa!” the little girl wailed.

There was no other movement on the street but I knew others were probably watching this terrible drama from behind their dark windows. The man from the bakery was shoved into the back of the Yugo by one of the men in uniform, who then hit him with the butt of his gun. His family screamed and wailed as the soldiers drove off with their husband and father. The daughter held onto her mother as she collapsed in the road, her cries echoing through the street. The grandmother came out and led the two back inside. I stared at the deserted street.

Bile filled my mouth. I crawled back to my bed as if I might be seen, as if they might come for me next. Shaking under my covers, I wondered where they would take him, what they would do to him? What had he done? I suspect he was one of the remaining Moslems in this nationalistic Croat town. I remembered the hunted look I’d seen on his face a few mornings before.

Teeth rattling, I wept into my pillow until the first signs of light. How could these neighbors so shamelessly inflict violence on each other? What was I doing here? My presence was a farce. I needed to leave.

I walked the short distance to the UN base. The bakery remained shuttered. The normalcy of everything in daylight was disconcerting. And a lie: this place was not normal – it was wicked. I searched the faces of the villagers. The scowling lady selling candy and sundries from a corner shop, the grizzled man leaning on cane with a cat by his side, the mother with a young child on her hip. As I passed them on my short walk to the UN base, I wondered how they could let this happen around them every day and night? Were the men in uniform their sons, their husbands? Once, before this war, maybe the man in the bakery had been their friend. Certainly his daughter played with their children or grandchildren? I hated them but even more, I hated myself. Fear and secrecy permeated every corner and I too was afraid.

Victor was at his desk when I got to the office. I barely stepped through the door before sobbing and recounting last night’s drama.

“Oh the creeps! They are creeps! The bastards. I’m so sorry, Treesha,” Victor exclaimed, putting an arm around my shoulder he turned me to look me in the eye, hands on both my shoulders. “Call Zagreb. You have had enough. They’ll give you a post another post. I don’t want you to leave but I understand. It’s time for you. Listen, I need to go to my morning meeting with the Chief of Staff but call – call personnel and tell them you need to go. Tell them that I said so. Everything will be okay.”

Grabbing a pen and pad of paper for his meeting, he gave me a hug and hurried out the door.

I agreed. I’d had enough. I wanted to get out of here before witnessing worse and more hideous crimes. Before I lost my soul.

Bosnia and Italy, February – March 1993

 

Less than a month into our relationship, we were having a rare evening telephone call. Lines between Sarajevo and Kiseljak were usually down, communication another casualty of war. Huddled by the fireplace with the receiver balanced between my shoulder and ear, I poked a glowing log until it flared in an attempt to get some heat into my frigid flat.

“So when are we going to get married?” he asked nonchalantly.

I responded to Neil with a nervous giggle. I hadn’t thought about getting married. The idea of it almost embarrassed me. I’d never harbored fantasies of wedding.

 

The dysfunctional family I grew up in provided me with no blueprints for love. My parents always seemed vaguely annoyed with each other although it was mostly my father with my mother who also was perpetually irritated by us kids. It should not have surprised me the day my father announced he was moving out. Between alarming sobs he explained he wanted to live alone for the first time in his life at 40 something, to pursue his dream of writing a book. A lie – of course it was another woman. My three siblings were at college. My mother had left town instructing my father to deliver the news to me and then move out. Sitting cross-legged on the scratchy love seat next to the wingback chair where he held his head in his hands, I awkwardly offered my father comfort, reassuring him that I understood and it was okay. I was seventeen.

Wiping his face he thanked me, patted my leg and began packing, first removing the knock-off Van Gogh prints from the walls and packing up books I’d never identified as ‘his’. After loading up the Chevy Vega, he drove away forever. My remaining months of high school in the stripped-down split-level were excruciating. Glass of booze-soaked tinkling ice always in her hand, my mother wept bitterly and confessed her fear of growing old alone. To my teenage narcissistic self this seemed an awful reason to stay in what I perceived as a loveless marriage. I vowed I would never to be like her – fearing solitude.

But now in my third decade, I didn’t want to be alone either.

 

I reached for another log, the receiver wedged between my neck and ear as I placed it in the fire.

“I’m serious. I want to get married and have a baby and so do you, so when are we going to do this?” Neil asked.

“Aren’t proposals supposed to be done in person? Shouldn’t you be on your knee?” I teased.

“I will, I promise. Darling, get ready for a lifetime of romance! You’ve never met such a romantic guy as me!”

Neil’s promise of commitment was a first for me with my history of flakey boyfriends. His open determination to be with me both flattered and terrified me. I deflected his casual proposals with jokes, never giving him a straight response, acting as if he were only playing a game. But he was serious. He wanted a wedding. Could I see myself marrying him? Did I want to commit to a lifetime with this man? Was he the father I imagined for my children? Our lives in Bosnia were surreal and sometimes I felt like we were playing roles in a movie – Neil’s movie.

I had doubts. Although affectionate and warm, he avoided intimate communication. The focus of our connection was fun. We never gazed into each other’s eyes. We never had heart-to-heart talks about our deepest dreams, hopes and never – our fears. What I knew of his past was a collection of mostly amusing anecdotes. Nor did he ask enquiring questions of me. How much did we know each other? Was my perception of our relationship being skewed by this dangerous place so full of sadness? He brightened my days and made me feel safe.

In his lumpy bed at the Holiday Inn, flak jackets on the floor beside us just in case of a nighttime mortar attack, Neil pulled me close, muffling the gunfire blasts with his kisses and holding me in what he called ‘spoony-style’ as we watched fuzzy episodes of Star Trek. Sounds of battles and my doubts became muffled behind heavy blackout curtains, as we got lost in each other’s arms.

Neil was always surprising me. When long days in the office and the relentless misery of war and winter felt overwhelming, he appeared bearing gifts. I was as if he knew I needed cheering up. Snow lay thick on the ground the day he showed up with a bouquet of flowers he’d found god-knows-where in shattered Sarajevo. Love letters full of longing and sweetness were delivered by Danish transport soldiers who drove the armored personnel carriers between Kiseljak and Sarajevo. Our lines of communication were limited so he enlisted the help of a cast of characters to pass along his messages of affection including The New York Times reporter, Pulitzer Prize winner for that year, John Burns who said as he passed me in the hallway, “Neil sends his love!” He religiously tried the telephones and when they worked, we talked for hours. He was right: I had never known such a romantic guy so determined to convince me I was loved.

We planned weekend get-away to Italy for the end of March. From Kiseljak we would drive through the mountain roads to Split and catch the ferry across the Adriatic. On the morning of our departure, we woke to a blizzard. The mountain passes of central Bosnia were treacherous at the best of times, but Neil was undeterred. We loaded our bags into a UN Land Cruiser and headed into a wall of white for what should have been a few hours drive.

The car slipped at every turn. Sometimes the road completely disappeared in drifts as we climbed up and down mountains. Entire convoys of trucks were stalled on the icy roads and Neil barreled past them, protectively reaching his long arm across my chest as he ploughed through drifts. Wildly shifting gears, he made the car leap over flooded roads. He was fearless – or maybe reckless – but I was in the flush of new love and thought it fantastic. We were escaping! As darkness closed in on the mountains, we stopped at a village where the ICRC had an office and an extra bed. Squeezing onto a narrow mattress, we held each other tightly, quietly making love before collapsing into sleep. The next day was clear and sunny and the roads more manageable. We arrived to the snow-free, coastal town of Split in time to board the ferry.

In Italy, we packed our flak jackets and helmets into the trunk of a tiny Fiat rental. In the 1980s, Neil toured through Italy with the English group Spandau Ballet and he remembered these roads. Stopping at highway rest stops, we savored cappuccinos with pastries and in contrast to the deprived world we’d left little more than an hour ago, marveled at the treat-packed shelves – an infinite choice of coffee, cigarettes, beautiful breads and candies. In Rome, Neil sped through the narrow streets to a hotel near the Spanish steps.

“You’re going to love this place. We used to stay here with Spandau and they treated us like royalty. Bring your flak jacket and helmet – they’ll help to get us a great room.”

Our bags flung over his shoulder, he scooted ahead. I followed, clutching my purse, flak jacket and helmet. Never would I have ventured into such a posh hotel on my own. Covered from the dust of our travels, I followed Neil past the doorman and ritzy entrance pretending not to be intimidated by the fanciness of the place. He strode up to the front desk.

“Buon giorno,” he greeted the scowling man. “I wonder if you could help us? We work in Sarajevo and have been living without water or electricity for months and we’d like to book a room for a few days to recover. What have you got for us?”

“How many nights do you wish to stay sir?”

“At least two. And can you give us something special? You know, I used to come to your beautiful hotel years ago when I worked with the bands. Maybe you remember? Spandau Ballet?”

The man listened politely but registered no reaction, peering up at Neil over his tortoise shell glasses.

“There was a fantastic room with a balcony that had incredible views of your beautiful Roma. Any chance you could let us have that room, mate? At a reasonable price, por favore, signore?”

Simultaneously embarrassed and impressed, I stood back and watched Neil do his thing. I’d never been any good at bargaining and certainly not in a place like this. By myself, I would have sought out a tiny room in a crumbling pensione on the outskirts of the city. Neil was undaunted by this expensive hotel or snobby man. He believed we belonged here and his charm and confidence worked. Finally, the man seemed amused by their exchange and handed Neil a ring with a large, old-fashioned key on it.

“Thanks mate, or rather: Grazie signore! Come on darling, I’m taking you to the most beautiful room you’ve ever seen,” He bellowed so anyone in the hushed lobby might hear.

We followed the bellhop to a tiny elevator that took us to the penthouse suite. The room was elegantly furnished, the bed bursting with pillows and stunning views even from the bathroom window. We stepped out onto the terrace.

“There! The Colosseum is over there – isn’t this beautiful?” Neil grabbed me by the waist and pulling me against his chest he rested his chin on the top of my head as we looked out across the Roman skyline together.

“Wow. It’s hard to believe that a few hours ago we were in Bosnia and now we’re here,” I whispered.

“Isn’t it amazing. I knew you’d love this.” Neil squeezed me. “Get ready for a fantastic weekend! There’s a restaurant I know near the Trevi fountain where I’ll take you to dinner and after, we can make our three wishes.”

Cuddled on Neil’s lap, we paused kissing only to sip wine. I could not imagine what else to wish for. In Rome with this handsome, confidant, affectionate adventurous man who loved me and wanted babies completed my fantasy.

Even the weather was perfect, the air fresh and balmy enough for us to lounge in bathrobes. After a long hot bubble bath together, we took turns posing for goofy pictures in the hotel’s plush robes worn beneath our flak jackets and helmets against the panoramic landscape. As the sun went down over the city, I relaxed into the luxury. Only an hour’s flight away, people were suffering but we were in love and we were in Rome! Why shouldn’t we treat ourselves? I pushed guilty thoughts of suffering in Bosnia out of my head and the weekend flew.

 

We stayed until the last possible hour before boarding a sleeper train that hurtled us through darkness back to Croatia. The plan was for Neil to pick up an armored car from the Zagreb ICRC office so we could drive to Sarajevo together. Driving seemed a better idea than counting on the unreliable United Nations ‘Maybe Airlines’. Heavy fighting around Sarajevo meant the airport might stay closed for days.

The next morning, groggy from a night of travel, I sat and read in the ICRC Zagreb office while Neil prepared what he needed. Charging from room to room, he left a wake of laughter. But when he discovered things were not in order he became uncharacteristically serious.

“The Land Rover they sent from England doesn’t have any bloody spare tires. There’s no way we’d find them in Sarajevo and I refuse to make the drive without a spare. Let’s go get something to eat while they work on this. I’m starving!”

“Okay, but I’m kind of anxious – I know Victor is expecting me. Maybe I should go ahead and try and fly to Split on my own. I could probably get a ride back from there.”

I had already taken a longer weekend than usual and felt like the need to get back to work. I know Victor counted on me. Neil’s face fell.

“I’m sorry, but I can’t drive without the spare. If anything happened we’d be buggered. And these wankers don’t have a clue about what their doing. I keep hounding them to call different garages to find the right tires but they take so bloody long, it’s really winding me up.”

“That’s okay,” I answered weakly. “Can I use the phone here to see if I can catch a flight?”

Neil sprang out of his chair.

“Let’s go. I’m going to go find the bloody thing myself. Vesna darling, give me some Deutsche Marks. Those guys in procurement are useless.”

Vesna, manning the desk in the front office, peeled off some bills and had Neil sign multiple documents of receipt.

“Bloody hell! You’d think I was signing out the Queen’s jewels here,” he said and Vesna tittered.

“Come on sweetheart. Let’s go show them how this is done.” Taking my hand, he led me to where the fancy new armored Land Rover was parked. With racks atop the roof and the steering wheel on the opposite side it felt like we should be heading off to safari, not driving through the streets of Zagreb. Neil pulled into every petrol station and auto repair shop and with a mix of Croatian, German, English words and hand signs, asked for the tires to no avail. After about an hour, we headed back to the ICRC office when Neil stepped on the gas to speed through a changing light, maneuvering the heavy Rover past beat-up Yugo’s and Zastavas to another Land Rover ahead of us in the farthest of four lanes of traffic.

“Hold on tight!” he yelled, as always, putting his arm in front of my body protectively. “Hey, molim!” The windows on the armored car could not be rolled down so Neil had opened the door as he pulled up alongside the other truck from his English, left-sided driver seat. The driver looked at him wide-eyed.

“Hey mate! I’ll give you Deutsche Marks for your spares! Dobro?” Neil had struck gold: tires were piled on the roof. He motioned to a side street and within minutes, Neil made a quick transaction through a cloud of shared cigarette smoke and his usual creative cobbling together of languages. Watching him from the warmth of the car, something shifted inside of me as if my future had clicked into place. I would do this! Life with this man would never be dull. I felt giddy with my new clarity, a decision: I want to be with Neil. I do want to share his life, be in on his capers. As we’d done over these past few days, I wanted to live bravely, travel the dangerous roads ending up in either fancy hotels or share a narrow cot in the middle of nowhere – it wouldn’t matter. Together, we’d find joy in any situation and out of this joy, make our family. Neil’s indefatigable quest for tires inspired me. Like him, I never wanted to be defeated by my circumstances.

“What do you think of that? That’s how you get things done now, eh?” he said grinning.

I laughed, “You’re incredible! I can’t believe you spotted this guy and bought those tires right off of his car.”

“He probably would have jacked up his car and taken off the wheels for the amount of Deutsche Marks I gave him. I don’t know how happy the ICRC will be, but he’s pleased as punch and we get to hit the road back to Sarajevo.”

“Well, I’m impressed. So we can go now?” I wanted to start the long trip back to Bosnia. Victor would be wondering where I was.

“I need to stop back to the office for a few minutes and we’ll be off,” he said and leaned over to kiss me and whispered, “I love you.”

“I love you!” I practically shouted.

Bosnia – January 1993

 

Back at my desk on Monday, I read though a stack of grim situation reports and a wave of guilt flooded out the thrill of the weekend. While I was drinking cappuccinos and cavorting with Neil, families hid in basements while mortars destroyed their homes. Deliveries of food and medical supplies and evacuations were blocked in places the UN had just declared ‘safe areas’ while we, the international community, had done nothing to make them so. I punched holes in the slippery fax paper and filed more terrible stories away in my binders. Looking past the sandbags in the windows, I replayed scenes from Zagreb as if remembering a dream, the warmth of my hotel room at the Intercontinental, the softness of the sheets, room service, Neil.

The hotel door clicked shut behind us, we dropped our coats onto the thick hotel carpeting, and Neil steered me to the wall. His hand behind my head as a cushion, he kissed me hard as I stood on tiptoe to reach his warm lips. Eyes closed, I grasped the jam of the bathroom door to steady myself. He pulled away for a moment and gave me a mischievous smile.

“Just a cuddle, eh?” I said breathlessly.

Laughing, he lifted me up, kissing me while stepping with two strides over to the gigantic bed where he gently lay me down, peeling off our winter clothing, first his own – pulling his jacket off, snapping his ascot off with a flourish, unbuttoning his shirt, then turning to me, my hair crackling with static as he slid my turtleneck over my head. In bed with this long and big boned man, I felt petite and safe as I burrowed into his chest, exhaling in relief after months of guarded living. We explored each other’s bodies. His skin was soft, just the right amount of hair on his chest, Sean Connery style military tattoos on his forearms including a heart with the words “True Love Roslyn” etched in the middle. I held his arm out and pointed.

“Roslyn?”

“That’s ages old! My ex-wife. I’ve been meaning to get that taken off. Anyway, I don’t want to talk about her now – I only have eyes, and lips and …”

 

“What are you day dreaming about, Treesha?” Victor came bustling into the office. “A good weekend?” His eyes twinkled. He already knew. Of course, he did – UNPROFOR was such a fishbowl and one of the Russian officers from Kiseljak had been checking out at the same time I did, with Neil by my side.

“Who told you?”

“Ah, I have my sources! I’m happy for you. It’s good to have love in the midst of this mad war. We need to go to Pale after the my morning briefing – half an hour?”

“Sure. I’m ready when you are.”

Neil did not, as I expected of men, disappear behind what would have been the believable excuse of the usually dead-phone lines or long workdays. Instead, he came up with reasons why the ICRC needed to travel to the UNPROFOR base 20 miles of muddy roads through military checkpoints to visit me. And when we had meetings in Sarajevo, I could spend the night in Neil’s room at the Holiday Inn.

A bright yellow box of a building right on the front line along ‘sniper alley’, the Holiday Inn was a strange flash of color in the grey landscape. Only the side facing away from the Serb neighborhood of Grbavica was considered safe enough to stay in. UNHCR plastic covered the blasted windows like bandages. Neil’s room was on the second floor.

“Look at all the souvenirs I have in here. There’s some shrapnel lodged in this corner and I pried a bullet out of here – you can still see the hole,” he said, proudly pointing out the scars in his walls.

He pulled the heavy blackout curtains tight across the windows meticulously making sure there were no cracks of light to attract alcohol-stoked-soldiers on sniper duty. Popping a ‘Phantom of the Opera’ or Freddy Mercury CD into his boom box, he opened two beers and we settled back into his double bed, piled with extra pillows he’d cajoled out of the housekeepers.

“What do you think? Not a bad setup, eh?” He grinned at me proudly.

“It’s very cozy. You have everything you need, don’t you? More than I do in my cold little place.”

“Now that you’re here, I do.” He said reaching for my bottle and setting it on the side-table then pulling me close.

“Time for cuddles,” he whispered, swooping me beneath him and lifting my sweater up to lay his warmth against mine. I lost myself between his kisses, beneath his heavy limbs, intoxicated by the still-new but already familiar scent of him. Our skin pressed close and damp, the battles around us melted away in the heat of our love. Pressing my face against his chest, I felt home even as machine gun fire echoed through the streets outside.

After I untangled the knots in my hair, we floated hand-in-hand down to the window-less dining room at the center of the hotel. The carpeting and moveable walls muffled gun battles but mortar shell hits sometimes rattled the china. Tables were set with linens and the waiters wore mustard-yellow jackets with black bow ties. Neil knew them all.

“Kako ste, moja Muslima friend?” He teased a favorite waiter, affectionately grabbing him in a half-hug. The waiter, like the rest of the hotel staff, seemed genuinely fond of him. Neil explained that he “looked after them” regularly bringing them presents of cartons of Marlboros and bottles of Johnny Walker for use in place of the useless local currency or to feed their own habits. Everyone in his orbit seemed to enjoy Neil’s kooky humor and the waiters always offered him an extra portion of instant mashed potatoes or butter when others were told nothing was left.

Dinner at the Holiday Inn consisted of dubious meat and overcooked vegetables but we ate with pleasure with Neil’s ICRC colleagues and other humanitarian aid workers and journalists. Christian Amanpour might be at the next table, Bianca Jagger once made an appearance and Susan Sontag was a regular, parked in the same corner each night, deep in discussion with her journalist son David Rieff.

 

The Holiday Inn felt the center of the world but I felt like a fraud there. These journalists regularly lambasted the UN as being idle witnesses to the war, or even complicit. I was beginning to agree. I’d filled books of meeting notes on the front lines of this mission, repeats of the same entreaties, accusations, atrocities, and the sense of doing any good had faded. I felt increasingly frustrated and impotent. I wanted to do more and envied my colleagues working in humanitarian relief. Earlier that week, to placate me, Victor assigned me to, along with a US civil affairs officer, meet a young girl who’d come to Kiseljak headquarters to ask for petrol for their car to escape to Moslem territory as tensions and violence was building in the Croat run town. The girl was sixteen – sent as her families’ emissary because she spoke the best English. The family was frightened. The answer was no. UNPROFOR could not be seen as assisting in ethnic cleansing, it was not in our mandate to provide petrol to individuals. I felt sick. And sitting at the Holiday Inn with journalists and relief workers that did provide real aid, I felt like I was on the wrong team. I kept a low profile, not engaging with anyone but Neil and his coworkers, ashamed and also wary about saying anything that might show up in an article.

We usually sat with the more staid, ICRC table. “Bonsoir,” Neil’s colleagues greeted us as we joined them for dinner. Like the hotel staff, they appreciated the crazy Brit responsible who got them safely to and from meetings and prison visits while cracking jokes, enjoying the comic relief he provided during and after a grueling day in the field. My favorite of this crew was Alberto*, a soft-spoken Italian who specialized in helping new amputees adjust to their prosthetics. He had taken leave from his usual post in Afghanistan to help out in Bosnia for a few months. Neil regularly harassed Alberto on the madness of this.

“How many people take a break from one war zone to work in another? My friend, you’re either a saint or insane,” Neil regaled Alberto, who smiled and shrugged, adjusting his rimless glasses while answering softly,

“It’s what I do. But I miss Afghanistan, I can tell you.”

“You’re taking the piss, right? You’re from Italy, one of the most beautiful countries in the world and you’d rather be in Afghanistan with the mujahdeen?”

“I’m serious. I’ve been here almost a month and I miss the people and my work there. The Afghans are the warmest you’ll ever meet in your life.”

“Bloody hell! Isn’t this place something?” Neil shook his head.

Alberto made a point of trying to engage Neil beyond his jokester persona, gently urging him to cut back on his smoking, questioning him on why he chewed his fingernails to the quick. Alberto worried about Neil even as he chuckled with the others at his comedic antics.

 

After dinner, we climbed the steps back upstairs to his room (the elevator never worked) for a cup of what he described as “proper English tea” made from his stash of PJ Tips, just in time to catch Star Trek on television. Neil had literally taken control of the hotel’s television selection by sneaking up on the roof of the Holiday Inn to tilt the satellite dish while communicating via ICRC radios one of his Sarajevo colleagues who sat on the bed and guided Neil while risked sniper danger and tilted the satellite dish until Star Trek reception was just right. The next morning at breakfast, Neil laughed into his coffee as a CNN reporter complained to the hotel manager, “Hey man! What’s happened? We can’t get our news station anymore. You need to get that fixed. I mean we’re paying for almost all the rooms in here.”

“I’m very sorry sir, I don’t know what happened. The satellite must have shifted. I’ll see what I can do.” The manager looked at Neil and shrugged. Eventually, CNN and Sky News dominated the screen again but not until more complaints came in and someone else was willing to brave the snipers.

 

Entering the UN offices in Sarajevo together, Neil draped his arm over my shoulder, leaning down for a kiss as we neared the gates manned by French Legionnaire soldiers. I squirmed at his public display of affection but he tightened his embrace, as the soldiers hooted approvingly.

The French Legionnaires are a special French army unit of volunteers from many countries. Some were fleeing a shady past, like the Texan who told me he held a degree in graphic design and hinted at trouble with the law. He’d previously been a mercenary in Central America before deciding he wanted the more formal structure of the Legionnaires. This exotic army of renegade soldiers spoke French between themselves but when talking to us, often broke into English that revealed a twang or brogue. Once, crossing the parking lot of the PTT building with helmet in hand instead of on my head, a Legionnaire yelled at me from his guard post with a Cockney accent, “Eh! That’s no’ a bloody pocket-book, y’know!”

Neil struck up a friendship with a freckled soldier from Belfast, the name O’Connell incongruously embroidered above the French flag on the sleeve of his uniform.

Twenty years ago this Belfast soldier and Neil had been deadly enemies. Neil joined the British army at 17 to escape the boredom of the West Midlands and landed right into the killings of Bloody Sunday. Neil was armed with a rifle to O’Connell’s rocks and Molotov cocktails, both only boys. They shared cigarettes and stories and when they thought me out of earshot, talked about women.

“Did you see that bird there? ‘Caw, she’s lovely,” O’Connell commented as a group of local women who worked in the kitchen and as interpreters passed through the security check outside the former telephone company building that had been taken over by the UN.

“Not my type,” Neil answered, “Besides, I have my love from New York.”

I sat in the ICRC car with the door open, pretending to read. Neil blew a kiss in my direction then turning away from me, continued in a lower voice,

“Although there’s an interpreter in the UNHCR office that if I weren’t with Tricia, I wouldn’t mind doing.”

What the hell? But I knew he was a flirt and it’s not like I had exactly stopped checking out the multitude of men around me. How could we not? I chuckled. In fact, eavesdropping on these former adversaries sharing cigarettes and banter on a cold Sarajevo afternoon comforted me. My Brit and this Irish man were proof that the terrible generational cycles of hate and ancient wounds could heal. There was hope for this torn land too.

Neil clearly bore deep wounds from his military service but was uncharacteristically mum about the time he served. When I pressed him he said what he had seen and done were too awful to tell. But sometimes I glimpsed his torment when I woke to him sweating and flailing beside me. In his dream, he was fighting for his life and he always worried he’d hurt me by mistake. I never pressed him for details about his nightmares unsure I wanted to know about what haunted him.

* Alberto has yet to lose his love for Afghanistan and in fact was just awarded citizenship there! Check out his TED talk to get a sense of what a special man he is. https://www.ted.com/talks/alberto_cairo_there_are_no_scraps_of_men?utm_campaign=tedspread&utm_medium=referral&utm_source=tedcomshare

 

Zagreb – January 1993

The next day, I rifled through my backpack as if a more flattering outfit than my faded turtleneck and corduroys might miraculously appear. I felt frumpy compared to the elegant women in Zagreb. People in Europe seemed so easily stylish. Even in under-siege-Sarajevo, with no electricity and running water, the women were stunning with coiffed hair and perfect make-up. Sighing, I swabbed on more mascara and coated my lips with tinted balm. After some fussing, I finally pulled my hair back in a bun to accentuate my blue eyes. As I passed through the lobby I glanced at myself in the glass doors. I looked fine.

Crossing the long blocks to the city’s main square, I turned my face up to the sky to feel the sun’s warmth.  We had arranged to meet at 3:00 at Zagreb’s standard rendezvous point in front of the saber wielding man on a horse. Jelacic Square bustled with people meeting friends and lovers. Everyone in Zagreb seemed to be out on this fluke, warm winter day. I saw him from a distance, tall and handsome. Even amongst this crowd of attractive people dressed-to-the-nines, both men and women did a double take, like maybe he was famous. I walked faster as if to keep up with my racing heart, pigeons flapping out of my way. Neil bent to kiss me on the cheek. He smelled of aftershave. Around his neck he wore a red ascot neatly tucked into a pressed white shirt poking out from under his jean jacket.

“Hello! I’m happy to see you again. You look beautiful!” He took my hand. “Let’s sit outside,” he said, steering me towards the tables set up in front of one of the coffee shops where young and old couples, entire families and groups of friends sat enjoying the sun.

“It’s nice to be able to sit in the open. Can you imagine doing this in Sarajevo with all the snipers?”

“It’s too bloody cold there. But yes, there are actually a few little places tucked away. I’ll show you when we get back.”

I loosened the scarf from around my neck. Was it the sunshine or his presumption of a future between us warming me up?

“Dva kava molim!” he called to the waiter as we settled into a table in the last patch of light. “You want coffee, right? I’m sorry, I should have asked. I love the local coffee but maybe you’d prefer a cappuccino?”

“No, I like the coffee here too.”

The waiter delivered our order, barely a shot glass full of thick coffee in little cups. I watched as Neil piled an alarming number of sugar cubes into his.

“When I first got here, it took me a few cups before I managed to not end up with a mouthful of muddy sludge from the bottom of my cup.” I was chattering, still stirring my one cube of sugar into the cup and he’d already downed his and was waving at the waiter for another.

“So what were you doing before you got into all of this craziness?” I asked.

“I worked in the film game.”

“Cool! Doing what?”

“Ducking and diving. I doubled for a lot of the taller actors and sometimes did stunt work. But I don’t think I’ll go back to it. The business slowed in England; there’s not much happening at Pinewood Studios these days.”

He puffed on his cigarette, looking over my head and across the square, turning the dregs in his coffee cup round and round.

“What actors?”

“Let’s see, Chevy Chase, Christopher Reeves, Jeff Goldblum (he’s kind of a pratt). I did all the shite that they didn’t want to do or that their contract won’t allow. The last film I worked on was Hamlet with Mel Gibson. I was a Queen’s guard. Mel’s a nice bloke, good fun. Loves to take the piss. I also worked on A Fish Called Wanda, The Tall Guy… loads. For a few years I was also a minder with a couple of bands. Do you remember Spandau Ballet?”

“I can’t place their music but I know the name. Maybe they weren’t as big in the States. It sounds exciting – why did you stop?”

Neil lit up another cigarette and exhaling slowly, stared at the disappearing smoke before answering.

“I got tired of it. I was watching the news about everything going on over here when the war started and I wanted to do something. That’s just the way I am. Remember when they discovered all those neglected orphanages in Romania? No one else could get in and I made it through with a convoy of supplies. When things blew up here in Yugo, I called the ODA (Overseas Development Agency – a UK relief agency) and they hired me straight off. Years ago I was in the military so they jumped at my experience. And when the British offered to supply the ICRC with armored cars, I applied to be their man here. So now I’m a minder for all of the boring Swiss Delegates in Sarajevo.”

He lit another cigarette. I tipped my espresso cup to my lips in search of a last bit of liquid but only the bitter residue of grounds remained.

“Are you getting cold? Should we move somewhere inside?” He downed his second cup then tossed some crumpled bills on the table and gallantly stepped around to pull my chair back for me. I shivered and tucked my scarf closer around my neck. The sun dropped on the horizon and like that, winter’s cold returned.

As we crossed the square, he took my hand in a gentle, almost tentative grip. I curled my fingers around his massive ones. Matching his long strides as we walked down a cobbled street, I began to feel taller than my 5’ 6” as I kept pace with him.

“Where should we go?”

“How about the bar at the Intercontinental?” He glanced at me coyly as he said the name of my hotel. “You know, the one on the top floor. There’s a nice view of the city from there.”

He was moving fast now. Why not?

“Okay. Should we walk?”

“Let’s grab a taxi.” He ushered me to a line of old Mercedes waiting on a side street.

The hotel bar was empty but for the bartender. We could see all of old Zagreb tinted by the last glow of the day. Neil ordered a whiskey and I asked for a beer.

“I don’t actually drink that much,” he said as the bartender set our drinks in front of us.

That information went into the ‘positive’ column of my mental checklist about him. Most of the men I’d been with loved drinking and in the past, getting drunk became one of our primary activities. Recently, I’d been trying to limit myself rather than become like my mother who fueled decades of bitterness after my father left her, by rarely making it to 5:00 PM before she started to slur.

“I’d like to tell you something,” Neil said, lighting another cigarette. He appeared to have an endless supply of these gold packs tucked away in his jean jacket.

I looked at him expectantly. He drew in a smoky breath followed by a swallow of drink, his eyes on the bottles behind the bar. I wondered if I’d heard him correctly because now he didn’t seem to want to tell me anything. A wave of dread rose from the pit of my stomach. Here goes: he’s probably married. Didn’t he say on the plane yesterday he wasn’t? I shifted back in my chair.

“I didn’t tell you the whole story of why I came here.”

“Oh?” I waited hoping my face looked neutral, like I expected nothing from him although my heart sunk.

“I had this problem … it started after working in the film and music industry,” he paused again.

“What kind of problem?”

“Blow.”

“Excuse me?”

He turned to me and laughed, tension draining out of his face. I didn’t understand.

“Blow what?” I asked.

With a nervous chuckle he leaned over and kissed me on the cheek, drew his chair and body closer to me.

“Charlie. Cocaine. I had a problem with cocaine. I was working with the band when I tried it. One of the guys offered me some and that was it. I got hooked.”
“Oh.” What else to say? What was I to do with this information? I’d always been leery of trying drugs when there were plenty around in college and the restaurant business where I’d logged many hours. And I didn’t understand how people became hooked on, well…anything. That wasn’t my personality.

“I got pretty messed up with it,” he continued. “So about nine months ago I checked into rehab for a month and when I got out, decided to stay clear of the film and music business since charlie is everywhere there. It was bloody hard.” He turned to me with a triumphant smile. “But I’m okay now!”

“Good for you!” I answered with enthusiasm mostly from my relief that the news was not about the existence of a wife or beloved girlfriend.

“For some reason I wanted to tell you.”

“I’m glad you did,” I said as I peeled the soggy label off my beer bottle.

“I mean I feel like we could have something here. I find you attractive and well, I want to be honest with you from the start.” He swirled the whiskey in his glass.

“I appreciate it.” Rolling my beer label into a ball I tossed it into Neil’s ashtray.

The bar was still empty. Neil torpedoed his cigarette with a sizzle into the damp paper ball in the ashtray and leaned in for a kiss. He tasted like cigarettes and whiskey, neither flavors I liked, but he was a good kisser. I thought of the spacey potheads I’d known over the years – my only close-up experience with drugs. Drunks were my expertise. As Neil’s tongue searched my mouth, a surge of desire swept all the way to my toes. He pulled me closer and breathing felt unnecessary as I lost myself in his warmth.

Sitting back in his chair with a smile, he said with a sigh, “That was nice.”

“Yes.” I felt dizzy.

“So…what are the rooms like here anyway?”

“Really?” I pretended to be shocked.

“Well when you know something is right…” he looked at me expectantly.

“Do we know that?”

“I do.”

“How can you? We haven’t even spent 5 hours together.”

“I just do. I know that you’re the kind of girl I’ve been looking for.”

I looked at him skeptically. What did he mean? A girl who doesn’t know what ‘blow’ is? Is he for real or yet another sweet talker? I wasn’t sure what to make of him.

“I only want to cuddle,” he cajoled, taking my hand.

“All right. Let’s go.” I took my bag off the back of the chair and stood up.

He grinned. “Hey mate! Can we have the check, molim?”

 

My basement has stacks and rolls of moldy drawings, walls are covered with collages framed for past exhibits and peeking out of corners of my small house are dusty wood sculptures carved long ago in Kyoto. For years, I wanted only to make art. But I was never obsessed nor particularly good, and eventually writing became a more compelling creative outlet.

Words take up less physical but still claim psychic space – and it’s time for me clean house. I worked on my memoir for years, religiously waking at the crack of dawn and putting in almost an hour before work every single day, writing and re-writing. Driven perhaps by the desire to understand what happened, to answer my own questions. To remember.

August 25, would have been the 25th anniversary of my wedding in Sarajevo. Neil wanted me to write our story although we both hoped for a different ending. Molly has read and approved. I’ve gotten lazy about trying to flog this in the traditional publishing world and rather than have all this work languish in my Mac, I thought I’d start posting chapters here. A little bit more of letting go. As always, thanks for reading.

Sarajevo – January 1993

The day I met Neil at Sarajevo airport, staccato bursts of gunfire cracked the frigid air but we heard no mortar thunder. Seven years earlier international athletes arrived in droves for the winter Olympics but now only United Nations staff, relief workers and journalists scrambled across the artillery-pitted runways to board planes in and out of the besieged city. Military aircraft lingered long enough for cargo to be unloaded before lifting back into the sky. Sarajevo’s citizens remained trapped for almost four years while us foreigners hitched free rides on humanitarian aid flights for weekend getaways. Incoming, planes were loaded down with supplies but the heaviest weight on flights out of the city was the occasional dead body of an international peacekeeping soldier or civilian. Sharing one such ride with a fallen colleague, I spent the hour-long trip staring at my book, pretending to sleep, looking out the window – anywhere but at the body-box tethered to the center of the plane.

On a late January day, stepping through filthy slush, I followed a wall of sandbags to the airport’s makeshift arrival and departure building. A young blond soldier greeted me from behind a metal desk, spitting tobacco juice over his shoulder before stamping my blue UN passport with the clever “Maybe Airlines” logo. I peered into the waiting room. Frozen clouds of breath and cigarette smoke hung in the air like cartoon bubbles illustrating the cacophony of languages spoken by the two-dozen or so waiting passengers. British accented English of the BBC crowd in the corner drowned out the hum of Italian, French and Spanish occasionally punctuated by shouts from the Norwegian soldiers manning the airport.

A towering man with an ascot knotted around his neck stepped out of the shadows and walked in my direction. I’d seen him earlier in the week smoking cigarettes in a hallway in the abandoned factory where I’d been at a meeting taking notes for my boss, Victor. We nodded at each other as I hurried out to the next appointment. “There’s a handsome guy,” Victor whispered, elbowing me, as if I hadn’t noticed. Now that handsome guy was sauntering towards me like he was at a cocktail party. He flashed a grin of straight white teeth and offered me his hand, “Hello! Neil Hamilton. Didn’t I see you a few days ago? You’re with the UN, right?”

I put my frozen fingers in his warm grip and he held onto them until I reluctantly pulled them away.

“Yes, I remember you from the other day. I’m Tricia with Civil Affairs UNPROFOR – based in Kiseljak. Are you’re with the ICRC? I know you were at that meeting at the Coca Cola factory in Hadzici.”

“So you remember me!” He winked and sounded pleased. Surely he knew he was memorable. He was gorgeous.

“Are you with the ICRC?”

“Yes. I was brought on as the transportation and security guy. Part of the package with the British Red Cross. The Brits donated an armored Land Rover that I drive for the Swiss. And I do – I drive them mad!” He laughed at his own joke. “You’re on your way to Zagreb too?”

“Well, unfortunately I couldn’t find any flights to the Bahamas from here.”

Why did I have to be a wise ass? To make up for it, I gave him what I hoped was a fetching smile as I ran my hands through my helmet-flattened hair, trying to fluff it back to life.

“Ah, wouldn’t that be lovely! A beach!” He leaned in towards me. “Anything special planned for the weekend?”

“Not really. Good food and lots of hot baths. I just need to get out of here for a bit.”

“You’re bloody right. I’m dying for a good soak and decent nosh. I’m based at the Holiday Inn here and the food is awful. How is it in Kiseljak?”

“The Danish Battalion runs the place so there’s good bread and lots of herring. I’ve had worse. You should come try it.”

“Is that an invitation?”

We were definitely flirting. I needed this.

January had been an endless routine of hopeless days. Speeding through ravaged villages in our armored car, I took copious notes for Victor as he negotiated with men who later ended up convicted of war crimes at The Hague. Meetings were held in a haze of cigarette smoke and usually in unheated schools and defunct factories like the one where I’d met Neil. Afterwards, Victor and I went back to our sandbagged office and drafted reports we faxed to UN headquarters in Zagreb, that sometimes were used to draw up agreements they warring sides mostly ignored. At first, I imagined we were making progress towards peace and found the work compelling. But nights I returned alone to my freezing flat that often had neither electricity nor water. As the war escalated, I began to feel like I was being swallowed up into the abyss of darkness and evil around me.

That morning in the airport, leaning against the frozen cinderblock wall, I shivered with a sense of possibility. Maybe this guy was the man of my dreams. In any case, he seemed a damn good prospect for the weekend.

“UNPROFOR flight is leaving. Please, make your way to the plane!” the soldier called from behind his desk, “Be quick!”

The Antonuv engine roared on the runway ready to lift straight up and out of range of bullets and mortars. Strapping on my blue helmet, I scurried through the tunnel of sandbags, sure Neil was behind me. Heart pounding, sweat trickling down my back in spite of the cold, I sprinted the open stretch of tarmac, imagining a drunken soldier about to take a pot shot at me. I jogged up the ramp to the plane, the metal rattling with each step. Setting my pack onto  webbed bench, I pulled off my helmet, shook out my brown hair and turned expectantly and immediately felt foolish. He wasn’t there. I peered out at the runway beyond the plane’s tail where he stood talking to two ruddy-faced men out on the open tarmac. Finally, they shook hands and Neil strolled to the plane.

“Sorry about that,” he said, leaning close to my ear so I could hear him over the noise of the engine. “They’re mates I haven’t seen in ages. I was an ODA convoy leader for a few months before taking the ICRC job and they were my drivers. Great lads. We had some laughs.”

The bellowing engine grew even louder. He reached into a breast pocket and pulled out a pack of Benson and Hedges, offering me one.

“No thanks!” I grimaced.

“Right, it’s a shit habit but I can’t quit now. Do you mind?” Without waiting for an answer, he shook the cigarettes, pulling one out with his teeth.

“No, but I don’t think you’re supposed to smoke on the plane.” I yelled, pointing to the international signs and Cyrillic letters that I surmised meant “no smoking” in Russian. He shrugged and lit up, motioning towards the cabin, “The Ruskie’s don’t care. Look at them up there puffing away.” Sure enough, cigarettes hung from the lips of the crew standing in the cockpit. Neil turned to me. “Are you married?”

I leaned back in mock surprise. “My! You get right to the point don’t you? All right then – no, are you?”

“Well, there’s no time to waste, is there?” He smiled. “I’m not married either. I was once – as a kid – barely eighteen. I have two beautiful, grown girls in England. I also lived with a bird up until about six months ago. It’s over now. She wanted to get married but I knew she wasn’t the one.”

Did he give me a meaningful look? I turned away to fuss with my backpack so he wouldn’t see me blush.

We looked out the same window, his face inches from mine. Thick eyebrows grew out in straight tufts over his hazel eyes lending a dash of seriousness to his gaze. He shifted closer and a scent of tobacco and cologne filled the shrinking space between us. The plane lifted off the runway and over the destroyed homes, blackened-walls of caved-in kitchens once full of warmth, bedrooms with love, now brimming with frozen snow. Our heads nearly touched as we watched the battered city disappear behind the clouds. How easily we get to leave the suffering behind, I thought with a pang of guilt. I stole a look at Neil’s handsome face as he peered out at the wreckage as if searching for something.

During the hour long flight, Neil told me jokes, did goofy magic tricks with a rag he found under his seat and probably would have done handstands to keep me laughing. By the time the plane landed, my cheeks ached from smiling and we’d agreed to rendezvous the following day. I couldn’t remember when I felt so hopeful about a date.

Nine months earlier I’d departed New York City with a broken heart, anxious to get far away from the man I loved who married another woman. From my position as a Public Information Assistant at UN headquarters, I applied to UN Peacekeeping Operations and was accepted to UNPROFOR – the mission in former Yugoslavia. As June temperatures cranked up, I felt glad to escape the heat and the subway’s relentless press of sweating humanity. And the mission took me far from reminders of my lost love.

It worked. The change of scenery and abundance of swaggering young soldiers from around the world not to mention my front seat to the woes of war, quickly put the pain of my failed romance into perspective. For the first few months I buried myself in work. But three seasons had passed and the harsh winter felt like it would never end. I longed for a little action not to mention some warmth during the frigid nights. Of course, I wanted more than a fling; I yearned for a bona-fide, monogamous relationship. For many years I’d been happy enough with my bohemian life, including almost 4 years of living in Kyoto, Japan. But baby longing changed everything. I wanted children. Preferably with a soul mate – if such a thing existed. But time was running out and I could not ignore the urgency of my diminishing fertility.

Yet I wasn’t ready to shut the door on adventure. I still wanted an interesting life. I imagined myself on a European street stepping out of my sun-filled flat for good coffee and bread, baby strapped against my heart. Peacekeeping Operations seemed as good place as any to connect with a man to fill in the blanks to make this dream come true. A war-zone may not be the first place most women would look to start a family but I thought it made sense for my fantasy future. Besides, the pool of men had to be better than the shark waters of NYC where I’d been swimming for the past four years.

I enjoyed flirtations with soldiers from the ranks of British and Danish battalions but imagining them sharing tales of conquest with their troop was enough for me to keep my distance. UN’s Kiseljak headquarters, a 70s style hotel designed to accommodate 200 guests now packed with over 600 soldiers, was too much of a fishbowl to mess around in. This handsome British man staying at the Holiday Inn in Sarajevo a half-hour drive away held promise.

My little old house is not air conditioned and this weekend was very hot. We have window units but they’re ugly and I don’t like the noise. Molly installed one in her room so if I get miserable, I can go in there and cool off. But I’m okay with heat most of the time and am content with the breeze of a ceiling and window fan. Besides, these scorchers make feel like I have permission to slow down. Yesterday I spent the whole day reading – something I never allow myself.

These hot days make me a more enthusiastic morning person. I always wake pretty early but rarely get up and into the world beyond a walk down the street with Rufus. But one day last week I was out early enough to take him for a longer walk along the river before work. I met the early morning scullers – few women my age and two men instead of the usual group of private school kids I see goofing around in the evenings. One of the osprey I’ve been watching since they moved onto the big industrial machine in the gravel pit, dove into the river and scored a fish. I stood and watched him deliver the flopping creature to the nest and then call to his family that breakfast was ready.

This morning Rufus got me up at the usual 5:30 hour with a bark from Molly’s air conditioned room. I took him for only a short walk, anxious to get to my plot in the community garden before the sun got too high. It’s a 5 minute drive on the highway with no traffic. Usually there are other gardeners either in the lower or top level plots but at that hour it was only me. The sun had yet to rise above the tree line. Perfect for weeding, fertilizing and harvesting the lettuce, the leaves breaking off with satisfying snaps. The crazy rains of last week followed by the heat were great for my plants. So gratifying after trying to do this at home for years with not enough light and too many greedy creatures.

My bag loaded with lettuce, a few peppers and exactly 3 cherry tomatoes, I drove to the beach to suss out whether I wanted to load up the kayak and get a paddle in before the Sunday crowds descended. No. Instead, I walked the almost empty length of it encountering other walkers – every single one greeting me warmly as if to welcome me to their morning parade all beating the heat and the crowds. And I thought (not for the first time) I should get up and do this every morning!

As I headed to the pier, a few fisherman were leaving. I asked one man pulling a cart loaded with his fishing gear behind him if he got breakfast. Just one, he said. And we wished each other a good day. I walked to Shady Beach (it is that and it’s called that) where you can rent a table. $5 for residents, $25 for non-residents. Some were already claimed with paper tablecloths weighed down by chafing dishes stacked and ready for what incredible food, I wondered. From past experience I conjured up the good food smells, sounds of music and laughter that would fill this space within a few hours.

Chairs in a circle set up for a party or maybe a religious service. I didn’t stick around to find out. I took the shady path back rather than walk along the beach and across the stretch of grass, there was a group of 5 older men talking loudly in Italian as they made their way along the sand, the joy of their friendship echoing across. I passed the volleyball court where a group cheered and jeered each other in an East Asian language I didn’t recognize. It wasn’t even 8 o’clock yet – how had they managed to muster the bodies and energy at this hour?

One man with a metal detector paced along a grassy knoll near the parking lot, searching for treasure. Further down the beach, another man was one bin ahead of the garbage truck behind him, dove in and rifled through for cans and bottles, lugging his black plastic bag.

I adore my rich and varied city on this early Sunday summer morning.

I haven’t been able to stop thinking about something I saw about a week ago on BBC News. On a hill in Japan there is a  white telephone booth where the grieving go to call their deceased loved ones. The phone is located in northeastern Japan near to where thousands of souls were lost in the 2011 tsunami. Lives, whole villages, were wiped out in that nightmare wave. The booth is white and looks to be on a hill in the middle of nowhere and the phone connects to nowhere and nothing except the hearts of the grieving.

You can watch it for yourself here  but grab a tissue first. It’s a brilliant, poetic idea. A universal, non-denominational but literal space and ritual for the grieving. For those of us without a clear faith or physical grave to visit, it’s a beautiful notion.

I’ve been thinking about who I would call, what would I say? Of course, I sometimes ‘talk’ to those who I loved who died – mostly Rob and Neil – usually when I see something around the house or yard that sparks a memory of them. It’s not all sweet words, I assure you but I am heartened that my memories become more loving with the passage of time. But neither left unintentionally, gently and they both left some lingering havoc behind.

I am writing this on Father’s Day and Instagram and Facebook is filled with images of both living and gone dads captioned with proclamations of love and appreciation. I hate to be a spoiled sport since I was lucky enough to get this sweet treatment from my daughter on Mother’s Day and loved it, but these holidays can be hard for many of us with problematic relationships. I hit the jackpot on that – especially with the departed men in my life beginning with my father. Yes, obvious connections there and endless opportunities for the couch.

So what would I say into the telephone on the hill? I have questions. I don’t think I’d be like that dear, sad man calling his lost son, lovingly speaking speaking into the receiver. I imagine myself uncharacteristically quiet on the end of that phone line, waiting, listening and hoping for explanations, maybe apologies. And there would be silence or maybe the sound of the wind. Still, I’d try it.