YASMINE RANA  |  Sarajevo, from The War Zone Is My Bed

Characters:
DAHLIA:  Thirties writer. Native of Sarajevo
PETER:    Forties American journalist

Setting:
Sarajevo
*The same set as Part One: a dark, sparse, bombed apartment bedroom.

Time:
Winter 1994

Sarajevo

(PETER is sitting up at the foot of the bed, with the only light directed on him, as DAHLIA is asleep.)

PETER
You’re a walking x-ray. That’s how I see you. Though you don’t know it. You think you’re controlled. You think it’s reserve, but it’s there: every thought, every emotion, every tear, every regret, every disappointment . . . in yourself . . . others . . . me, especially me. You stand on a higher moral ground, and you look down on us, me. You show . . . everything. You give . . . everything. You risk . . . everything, for what? Honesty? Directness? Brutal honesty? The final word? What if I’m not here to listen? What if no one’s left to listen? You’re supposed to reveal everything. So where’s your joy?

(LIGHTS UP. DAHLIA awakens.)

PETER
Where’s your joy?

DAHLIA
Why do you ask?

PETER
Because I can’t see it.

DAHLIA
Should you? Is your curiosity about me? Or rather me with you? Are you asking if I were satisfied by you? Couldn’t you have asked me that?

PETER
It was just a question.

DAHLIA
A silly one.

PETER
I didn’t think so. Until you made it more than it was intended.

DAHLIA
You don’t like my thinking?

PETER
It’s your head. You’re too much in it.

DAHLIA
Where else should I be? In yours?

PETER
You’re already in mine.

DAHLIA
You let me in.

PETER
My mistake. (Pause) Don’t do that?

DAHLIA
What?

PETER
Look at me like that.

DAHLIA
Like what?

PETER
Right through me.

DAHLIA
Is that what I’m doing?

PETER
What you always do.

DAHLIA
Is there something you don’t want me to see?

PETER
Too late.

DAHLIA
What time is it?

PETER
Soon.

DAHLIA
That’s not why I asked.

PETER
Was I being egocentric?

DAHLIA (Playful)
When are you not?

PETER
You’re angry?

DAHLIA
Yes.

PETER
Shall I go?

DAHLIA
No. I could be joyful for you. Is that what you had in mind?

PETER
Not for me.

DAHLIA
Thank you for your concern.

PETER
It’s more than concern.

DAHLIA
Then stay.

PETER
I can’t.

DAHLIA
Then take me with you.

PETER
If I were better, I would.

DAHLIA
But you’re not.

PETER
I never was.

DAHLIA
Oh. So the good get better, and the bad get worse, and those in between . . . are the most pathetic.

PETER
Something like that.

DAHLIA
I wonder what page I’ll be on.

PETER
What?

DAHLIA
Of your lovely book . . . your book of stories. Well that’s what you’ve been doing here these past six months, right? That’s what journalists do, right? Report on stories about exciting people like me, caught up in war. In mess. In grime. In filth. In no heat and no hot water. In missing people. In people who were here and now they’re not. In people who become . . . nothing. Become? No. Maybe they were always nothing, so what would it matter, to them. But to you, that would be a different story. You come here to be around people like us. Nothing. So where will I be?

PETER
Not just you.

DAHLIA
Only me! Same stories, different faces. No! The same face. Out there, there aren’t many, but what I see are too many reflections of myself; and that’s not a very good thing.

PETER
That’s not what “this” was about.

DAHLIA
No?

PETER
You’re not making this very pleasant.

DAHLIA
Is that what you want “this” to be? Is that what defined us . . . whatever “us” was? Is “pleasant” what defined “this”? This place? Your reason for being here? Honestly, none of this sounds very pleasant.

PETER
I thought “this” was pleasant.

DAHLIA
I think of pleasant as being peaceful. And “this” was never peaceful.

PETER
I’m excluding what went on outside these four walls.

DAHLIA
You can’t! You have no right to do that! What went on outside doesn’t belong to you! You can’t exclude anything that happened here!

PETER
It’s survival.

DAHLIA
Which you know nothing about.

PETER
Which I learned from you.

DAHLIA
Then you stole from me!

PETER
What are you talking about?

DAHLIA
The stories . . . my stories! You made them yours! You made “this” story your story!

PETER
It’s everyone’s.

DAHLIA
You adopted it! I was born to it!

PETER
I wanted to bring attention . . .

DAHLIA
You wanted to be a hero!

PETER
No. No one wins. I see that now.

DAHLIA (Desperate)
You wanted to become famous!

PETER
I wanted to write the truth! I wanted to bear witness. I wanted people to know!

DAHLIA
Through your words.

PETER
It didn’t matter who was telling this story! But someone had to, and no one was. So I did. But I never took from you. You spoke freely.

DAHLIA
So that’s the definition.

PETER
No, but that’s what you wanted to hear. It was more than your story.

DAHLIA
What was it Peter, that made you want to fuck me?

PETER
Don’t do this.

DAHLIA
No. You’re leaving, and this is my chance to know. Was it your loneliness? Your fear? My story? Was it me or my story, or our story? Or this war? Is it this war you actually wanted to fuck?

PETER
What are you getting out of this?

DAHLIA
Not as much as you did.

PETER
I met you, first, and then your story.

DAHLIA
How much was your book deal?

PETER
People back home started talking about people like you. Empathizing with people like you.

DAHLIA
Thanks to you.

PETER
Thanks to someone.

DAHLIA
Feel better?

PETER
No.

DAHLIA
Did you think your words would ease anything?

PETER
Attention was given.

DAHLIA
After the fact.

PETER
It was better than never.

DAHLIA
That’s easy for you to say.

PETER
There’s nothing else I can.

DAHLIA
Strange for a journalist.

PETER
I don’t have words for this moment.

DAHLIA
Back to stupid, silly words.

PETER
You’re a writer.

DAHLIA
Was.

PETER
You still are.

DAHLIA
I stopped.

PETER
You shouldn’t have.

DAHLIA
There was no point in continuing.

PETER
I don’t believe you. I know you value words. You know what they can lead to. You know they can serve as the catalyst for something greater, greater than what’s happening at the moment. I see through you, and I know you think differently.

DAHLIA
Words over people.

PETER
I value you.

DAHLIA
You use me. And I let you.

PETER
I’ll miss you.

DAHLIA
How can you miss something you never had?

PETER
I had you.

DAHLIA
In a place very far away, where no one knows you, where you have no past or future, where every action and every word can be attributed to war, something out of your control. We’re false, you and I. You can do what you wish, because it isn’t real.

PETER
It was to me.

DAHLIA
It “was” because you always knew it would be “was” and not “is” and not “will be.” It “was” is easier than it “is.” We’re not “is.”

PETER
Why did you stop writing?

DAHLIA
I let you write for me.

PETER
You should have written your stories.

DAHLIA
I couldn’t.

PETER
Maybe later?

DAHLIA
Maybe never.

PETER
Too close? Too much credence if you actually document them? Give them a voice? Would that have made it true for you?

DAHLIA
I never denied what was happening to this place.

PETER
To others, not to yourself.

DAHLIA
I am “others.”

PETER
You’re the writer, though you deny it. You can’t help it. You’re like me. An observer on the outside, looking in. You never really considered yourself as one of them. Them being the powerless, the victims. You? A victim? I don’t think so.

DAHLIA
Take your stories and enjoy what they bring to you. Don’t worry. Guilt-free. You have my permission.

PETER
It would have been someone else.

DAHLIA
But it wouldn’t have been you.

PETER
And you would have been with him, whoever he may have been. Because you would have been his voice. And that would have given you a little bit of what you were, before this . . . mess, and that would have been enough. And you would have been standing here, on this day, having the same conversation with him, rather than with me. You said it yourself. Same story. Same faces. We’re one, here. If it weren’t I, it would have been someone else.

DAHLIA
As I would have been someone else.

PETER
I don’t know. But I don’t think so.

DAHLIA
So you could be the just one.

PETER
It’s because of her. Her plus me. Plus this. Plus what I’m leaving you to. Plus this absence . . . plus this nothing.

DAHLIA
Her? Why don’t you give “her” her name, so we could baptize this fucking moment!

PETER
And you?

DAHLIA
Me what?

PETER
What would you do if you had any power? Any real power? Where would you go? You ask if it were you or your story. I could ask you the same question. Was it me, or the thought of getting on that plane with me today? Remember, we’re not powerless people, you or I, in this scenario. What would your answer be; with your brutal honesty . . . directness. You tell me, was it me, or your being with someone like me, an observer looking in, who isn’t really a part of this stinking convoluted mess!

DAHLIA
We’re inseparable from what we are and where we come from. You’ve just proven that.

PETER
So I have my answer.

DAHLIA
It was a senseless question.

PETER
Why?

DAHLIA
Because you asked me here, at this time. Everything encompassing this moment is senseless.

PETER
This is not senseless.

DAHLIA
Look at yourself. You came, you observed, you wrote, and now you leave. How can I think of this as anything but senseless?

PETER
Why even let me in?

DAHLIA
I hoped for more. There.

PETER
But you knew . . . about . . . her . . . my situation . . .

DAHLIA
Your situation? No. Not really. Not until this moment.

PETER
I can’t give more.

DAHLIA
You don’t want to.

PETER
What’s standing before you . . . is a coward. I wrote about events that I was never engaged in, not really engaged in. I wrote from my window, looking down, onto the street. I documented people’s trauma, not my own; though I wanted it to be my own . . . a bit of justification as I defend what I’ve been doing for the past six months. One foot is already out your door. Not as a reflection on you, but on me. I don’t want to see you again. I don’t want to speak to you again. I don’t want to hear your voice. I don’t want to smell you again, or feel your body again. If we were to speak, and the connection would return, and I’d lose my inhibitions and imagine myself being with you. But I’m not strong or brave enough to follow my instincts. So I settle for what I have.

DAHLIA
You’re brave enough to admit you’re a coward.

PETER
If I had to be you, I wouldn’t have survived.

DAHLIA
You don’t know that.

PETER
I do.

DAHLIA
You run away from everything and everyone. What are you afraid of?

PETER
Nothing.

DAHLIA
Then stay.

PETER
I can’t.

DAHLIA
Are you running from me?

PETER
Not from . . . to.

DAHLIA
To hot water and heat. To mine-less land. To familiarity. To home. To her?

PETER
To something that may frighten me.

DAHLIA
This doesn’t frighten you?

PETER
Oddly, no.

DAHLIA
Why do you want to be frightened?

PETER
I don’t. I just want to feel something. I want to find something that will wake me up.

DAHLIA
You’re not awake?

PETER
No. I’m hoping I will be. That’s why I have to go. I feel un-alive. Not quite dead, just not alive.

DAHLIA
Is that your own reflection after being with me?

PETER
I can’t be with you, because I don’t want to hurt you. I’m afraid it’ll be contagious . . . this sleep, this being “un-alive.” You’re just coming back now, back to yourself.

DAHLIA
For me? Am I to feel grateful? Is that what’s left? After everything? Thank you?

PETER
I’ll miss you.

DAHLIA (Angry)
Miss me?

PETER
Yes. I’ll miss you, because I think one feels without more than with. Without, though intangible, obscure, is very real. Someone’s absence is the greater punishment. Accept this and appreciate this, because that’s all I can do. “I miss you” acknowledges that I’m without you. You’re missing . . . you’re missed.

DAHLIA (Calmly)
Thank you.

PETER
Come on! Hit me! Throw something at me! Throw me out! Make me . . .

DAHLIA
Feel something?

PETER
Yes.

DAHLIA
I can’t do that for you. Or else, I would have already. You feel me. I know you feel me. Because I feel it. You’re very much alive. But you choose not to be. Perhaps you were hoping that this place would be your ending. Perhaps you wish you had never met me, had never felt me. You’re trying now . . . trying to say “this” never was. That’s worse than your leaving, or your wishing to leave . . . or your denying your being alive. Is it easier for you to think of me as an intangible, obscure object? No, then. I don’t accept your enclosure. I’m not missing because I’m standing right here, before you. Honor my presence. Honor us.

PETER
How?

DAHLIA
Here’s your opportunity. I’ll hand it to you. Take your chance now. Take the risk . . . and see with me. See not just for me, but for you. Stay here, and continue our stories. Write about us after the guests have gone home from the funeral. What do the ones left behind do then? That’s when it’ll get interesting. Will we learn from mistakes? Will we trust? Will we be so desperate that we’ll trust the wrong people, because the right ones have left? We’re not finished . . . you . . . me . . . the people outside these four walls. Your book shouldn’t end here.

PETER
You’re right. I think you should continue where I left off.

DAHLIA
Why?

PETER
I promised I’d go back.

DAHLIA
What if you had died? You would have broken your promise, wouldn’t you?

PETER
I didn’t die.

(Pause)

DAHLIA
You just did. (Pause) To me.

(PETER takes his duffel bag, placed near the table, looks at DAHLIA, and heads toward the door. He opens the door and stops. DAHLIA speaks.)

DAHLIA (Cont’d)
The joy was before you. Not before the war, but before you. But you didn’t want to see it. You only wanted the sad . . . for your stories. Yes there was sadness, tremendous sadness and loss! You liked me . . . as the sad one. It gave you some purpose for being here. Yes, there was great sadness, but also joy, or hope that there may be joy again. How could I stand here before you without that element of hope! But that wouldn’t have worked for you. I wouldn’t have worked for you. But thank you. For now, it was successful in the end. For us and for you. For now, your efforts are named . . . heroic. Yes, there was joy. There is joy, even now, even at this very moment. I feel it. It’s coming back to me. Perhaps that’s something I could write about once you go through that door.

(PETER waits, then exits.)

End of Part Two