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Post by FicWriter on Jan 25, 2009 3:22:30 GMT 10
Life Goes On
by JD
Warnings: Deals with potentially sensitive subject matter related to the War of Independence.
Notes: These ficlets explore more of Luka's life after the death of his family, and his time in the displaced person's camp following his escape from Vukovar. While I have previously touched on this time in my longer fics Ghosts, Time Heals all Wounds, and For One Life which I co wrote with M. Blais, this story is independant of them. The series was written for the community 10 Hurt Comfort on Live Journal.
Moving Day
He'd been in the camp for more than two weeks, his leg was healing, the infection around the bullet entry and exit points beginning to clear, as was his pneumonia. If only there were medicines that could heal the rest of his wounds so easily. The nurses had begun forcing him to leave the tent, forcing him to get the exercise and fresh air he needed but didn't want. Today was different, today he was being moved away from the watchful eye of the doctors and nurses, his cot was needed for someone in far worse shape.
"Luka, it's time." He heard the woman's voice as he lay on his cot, pretending to sleep, his back to the room. "I know you're awake." It was a means of escape he'd used far too often since his arrival, and while it had worked in those beginning days, the nurses had soon seen through it.
"Do you need help getting up?" Her voice remained close and even without looking he knew she was close enough to move in to assist him if he would allow her to do so.
"I can do it." His tone was cold, he hadn't wanted to be in this place and now he was being moved to somewhere else he had no wish to be. Reaching for the crutches that lay propped at the foot of the cot he forced himself to his feet. When he was sure he had his balance he began the slow walk to the tent's opening.
The camp was never quiet and now that he was being moved out of the medical tent and into one of those designated for single males Luka knew he would find it more difficult to adjust to life within it. At least among the injured he couldn't deny the reason he was there. He didn't think of himself as a single male, and he wondered if in fact he ever would.
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Post by FicWriter on Jan 26, 2009 4:04:17 GMT 10
Life Goes On
by JD
Photographs and Memories
If he had hated being in the medical tent it was nothing compared to being here among those who were alone like he was. The small black and white picture of Jasna and Danijela became his escape, and he would retreat for hours into the world it held. The world that was lost to him. Laying on his side he would stare at their faces, their smiles, and if he concentrated hard enough he could forget that they were gone. The voices in the tent would grow more and more distant until he would cease to hear them completely, and then suddenly he would be back among those at the party where it was taken, back among those he loved. If only he could make it last., but it never did.
"Come on son, you have to get something to eat." He felt the man's touch on his shoulder before he fully registered his words and he flinched, the action yanking him violently out of his thoughts. Yanking him back to the crowded olive green tent that was his world.
"There's only another twenty minutes left for you to get lunch, you should go get something to eat." The man who hovered over him was his father's age if not older and Luka instantly felt bound to maintain the code of respect he would give father, but it wasn't easy.
"I'm not hungry, leave me alone." He tried and failed to keep the bitterness of having been interrupted out of his tone.
"You may not be hungry now, but you will be later, and you need to eat to regain your strength." The man persisted, seemingly unfazed by the younger man's refusal.
"I don't care what you think I need to do, I don't want to eat. Just leave me alone, please." He had turned away from the man as he spoke, unable to look at him for fear that he might see his father's face in the mans.
Truth was he hated leaving the small tent for any reason, because going outside only served to remind him of all he had lost. It wasn't just the physical losses, the fact that everything he had, down to the clothes on his back had belonged to someone else. No, it was the other reminders that going outside brought him. The sounds of husbands and wives carrying on conversations he and Danijela would never again have. The sight of fathers and daughters sitting together, of a son calling to his father across a crowded room. No, it was safer to stay here, within the safety of the small tent and go hungry then face those reminders over and over.
It was hard to know how long the man remained behind him, he was sure that he felt his eyes on his back for a least several minutes. How was he supposed to live like this? At least in Vukovar there had been the hospital to distract him, but here there was nothing, no, not nothing. The small photo found it's way into his hands once more and as he laid it on the cot he traced the images with his finger. If he had only known on that day that this would be all he would have left of them. He sniffed back the tears that began to form with the thought. As he closed his eyes, he could bring the picture of his small son into focus, would there ever be a time when he wouldn't feel guilt at not having anything thing physical to connect them? Would he ever not feel that he had loved Marko any less because he wasn't in the photograph with his mother and sister? There was one greater fear though, and that fear was the one which caught his breath in his chest, what would happen if he closed his eyes one day and Marko wasn't there anymore?
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Post by FicWriter on Jan 27, 2009 4:33:08 GMT 10
Life Goes On
by JD
Rainy Days
The rain had been falling steadily for days, a damp chill hung in the air and scattered puddles pooled on the floor of the tent. Weather like this seemed to suit Luka's mood and where many of the men grumbled about being confined inside he saw it as a relief, for it meant he wouldn't have to defend his decision to do just that.
There was more to it today though and as he lay on his cot he gave in to the hoarse cough that seemed ready to rip his lungs from his chest. He wasn't alone in the battle, the cough was prevalent here, weakened immune systems, combined with spartan living conditions made an ideal breeding ground for it.
"Son, you need to drink something." The old man was at his side again, Luka opened his eyes as he felt a cup being pressed to his lips. "It's tea, take some." The man's tone remained coaxing and even as he wanted to refuse he knew that he couldn't.
"Slow sips," as he issued the warning the man supported Luka's back so that he could drink. "You've got a fever, son." When Luka's response was nothing more then several more of the deep harsh coughs the man frowned.
"Maybe you need to see the doctors, make sure you don't need some medicine, it sounds pretty bad." He tried to coax a few more sips into the younger man before giving up and easing him back down on his cot.
"No..." Luka shook his head in refusal only to have to turn away as another round of coughs tore through him. By the time they eased he was exhausted and the last thing he wanted was to continue arguing with the man.
"No, just sleep." His eyes closed before the final word was finished, time would tell if they would be enough.
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Post by FicWriter on Jan 28, 2009 4:58:59 GMT 10
Life Goes On
by JD
Fear
How long could he hold his breath? How long could he pray that they wouldn't find him, that his fate wouldn't become the same as those he'd left behind at the hospital, or those gunned down in the streets as they tried to escape to safety? Squeezing his eyes closed he buried his face in the crook of his arm to shield it from the falling dust and gravel, and to muffle any coughs that might break through.
The wait for the men searching the building around him to leave seemed to take forever and it was equally terrifying. Would the wallboard that concealed him from the Serbian soldiers be strong enough to support their weight of them as they walked back and forth conducting their search? Would the next step one them took disturb the board that hid the small opening that separated life from death for him?
He could smell the smoke from their cigarettes, he could feel them burn at his throat with each breath he took. Is that how he would die then? Would he suffocate as their smoke and the dust from their footsteps stole away what little air his hiding place offered him? Had he made it this far only to die from lack of air before he could make his escape?
The crack of an isolated gunshot sent the men into gales of laughter and he was forced to swallow back his own bile as they joked of someone's death as if it meant nothing. Then, suddenly, from nowhere a hand had his shoulder and he realized he'd somehow given himself away, his fate would soon be that of those from the hospital, his life was over.
"Luka, shhh...quiet, it's just a dream...shhh..." The words came quietly in Croatian close to his ear, as he slowly came awake in the darkness.
"It's okay son, you're safe, it was just a dream." Sitting up on his cot Luka gulped for air as the old man whose cot sat next to his rubbed his hand over his back. The remnants of the dream were still lingering, but as the man continued to offer reassurance, they began to recede, and for tonight, the fear had been defeated.
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Post by FicWriter on Jan 29, 2009 20:40:33 GMT 10
Life Goes On
by JD
Escaping the Loneliness
He hated leaving the tent but there were times too when he could stand it's confinement no more, when it felt like the green canvas was closing in on him and the only way he could stop it was by leaving it. Slipping the photo of Danijela and Jasna into his pocket, Luka reached for the crutches.
It was an isolation of his own making, he knew that, it wasn't that others in the tent hadn't tried to include him in their conversations. It wasn't that they hadn't offered to include them in their games of cards or chess, or that they hadn't invited him to join them for meals. How many times could he have expected them to continue accepting his refusal before they stopped asking completely? If only Danijela could see him for who he was now. What would she think of how much he had changed, of how different he was from the man she had fallen in love with, from the man she had married?
That his thoughts had drifted to his late wife did not surprise him, she was a constant companion to his loneliness, a reminder of the life he no longer had. In truth though there were far too many things here that brought forth those reminders, it was why he hated leaving the tent. Why he hated listening to the conversations of those here as well as outside. On most days he could escape the reminders through sleep or with memories of what his life had been before Vukovar, but not today. Today nothing had worked and the feelings of loss were threatening to tear him apart and all he knew was that he had to get away from the reminders.
The rain that had fallen on the camp for the past several days had finally moved on, leaving behind mud, puddles of water, and soggy tents filled with people working to dry out what meager belongings they had left to them before the next series of showers arrived. The camp itself was divided into sections, rows of canvas which housed single men, single women, and those with children, and families, it was the last that he found the most difficult to move through, and which unfortunately seemed to always prove unavoidable.
It was never easy moving along the camp's rutted paths on crutches but with them now muddy it required even more of his attention, but it also slowed his pace. As he neared the area on the approach to the family tents it was unavoidable that the conversations within and around them would reach his ears.
"Tata!" He heard the call of the small girl almost as soon as he entered the walkway between the tents and it tore into him in a way he hadn't thought possible. "Tata!" Her cry was repeated, and then answered by the booming voice of a man who could only be her father. He didn't dare look for the two, knowing that it would only deepen the sense of loss, the sense of loneliness he was feeling.
He'd tried to explain what this was like to some of the doctors when they'd asked him about it, but, how could he expect others to understand something which he still couldn't fully understand himself? How did he tell someone that it felt like whole pieces of who he was were missing? That nothing he could do, nothing that anyone else could say, and nothing they could do would ever be able to replace them? How do you tell someone that even in a room full of people you feel totally alone because the very people who make you complete are no longer with you? How do you tell someone that your reason for living is no longer there?
Never could he have believed that one word could have caused so much pain, more pain even then the bullet that had ripped through his leg had caused. More pain then the sound of hearing a child calling for their father and wanting to answer, but knowing you can't. He'd thought that nothing could be worse than the grief he'd felt at losing his wife and children until he had come here, he'd been so wrong.
And then he is past those tents and until the next time he can, if he is lucky, push most of those feelings into the darker places of his thoughts. It's not easy though and some days are worse than others. On those days he feels more alone than at any other time, and then there are days like this one when he can't. Days where everything reminds him of something he no longer has,of someone he no longer is. These are the days he escapes to the pathways.
Maybe this is how he would spend the rest of his life. The very thought was enough to make him quicken his pace and cause him to stumble as the crutches slipped in the mud, forcing him to scramble for footing to keep self upright. And then he is somehow back where he started and at least for today he can put the thoughts aside as fatigue wins over. It takes all his remaining strength to make his way back inside. Back to the cot that at least for now, he called home.
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