The Cat I Never Named by Amra Sabic-El-Rayess

Author:Amra Sabic-El-Rayess
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing

CHAPTER 17

After what I have seen, I don’t know if I believe in miracles anymore. But I do believe in the will of people to survive, to fight against impossible odds. The people in Bihać are not trained warriors. Beyond a few policemen, a few Muslim soldiers who fled the army, we are just citizens: shopkeepers, businesspeople, teachers, scientists, students. Yet somehow we have banded together into an army.

The Serbs think they are determined to make a Serb homeland, to kill all of us? Well, they are not half as determined as we are to survive.

Somehow, against all probability, the ragtag fighters of the Fifth Corps inside Bihać have managed to drive back the Serb offensive. They aren’t defeated—nothing close to that—but they have been sent back to their borders with their tails between their legs.

I know that means they are just going to regroup and come back harder, but every day above the ground is a good one. Every day brings hope that the world will finally see and put a stop to this.

But I am bereft without my Maci. The tears dry on our journey home, but the sorrow feels like a rock in the pit of my stomach. She is family. How could we have left her behind?

“We’ll go back for her,” Tata assures me.

“When? Tonight? Tomorrow?”

“No … not so soon as that. But there are good families there, and lots of mice and birds to eat. She’ll find her kittens. She’ll be safe.”

But she doesn’t want to be safe, I think. She wants to be with her family. She must be feeling what I felt when Mama and Tata tried to send me away with my aunt at the start of the war. What does safety matter if you aren’t with the people you love?

My little Maci must be so confused. Does she think we left her on purpose? She’ll search all around the bee farm, sniffing in every corner, stalking through the roses and wildflowers, searching for us. What if she wanders to the front lines and steps on a mine?

Will her heart break when she realizes we’re gone?

I sit on the stoop, staring at the empty street while the others go inside. Just yesterday, Davor was walking down this street, waiting for me to come out and “accidentally” run into him. Now he must think I don’t care about him at all.

My family is safe, and for that I am deeply grateful. But with no Maci and probably no Davor, my world feels empty.

If she were here right now, she’d sense my unhappiness and come to cuddle in my lap. Maci always knows how to cheer me up. Just her soft, warm, calm presence is enough. She’s our good luck charm, the spirit that watches over us. Look how she saved Dino! What if our luck is gone with her?

I see someone coming down the street, a man, tall, with a confident walk. For a moment my spirits lift a bit. Is it Davor?

But no, when he gets closer I see that it is a stranger.

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