Also Mrs. Margaret
Part One: Sarajevo, 1994
The photographer's wife was looking for a place to squat when she saw him through the shell hole. Boy, maybe nine. Kitchen with no roof. Two dolls, pouring air into air.
Martin was somewhere else with his cameras. Always somewhere else.
The boy saw her looking. His knees were wrong—scraped down to yellow.
"Not mine," he said. English, clean. Everyone used to be something.
She climbed through the hole.
"Sister's." Then that gesture everyone did here. Gone, not dead. Different.
Martin showed up, camera ready. Click click. The boy knew to be still. Knew photographs meant you existed to someone, somewhere else where kitchens had roofs.
"What are their names?"
Martin: "Christ, Marie."
Boy held up the blonde doll, one arm gone. "Mrs. Margaret." The dark-haired one, wrapped in electrical tape. "Also Mrs. Margaret."
She laughed. Stupid, laughing here.
"Both?"
"They're married."
"To who?"
"Each other."
Martin started explaining marriage. She stepped on his foot, hard.
The boy went back to his tea party. Hands shaking. Nine was old here.
She said she'd had a doll named Mrs. Margaret once. Lie. She'd had a rabbit, François. That kind of child.
"Where is it?"
"Gave it away."
"Why?"
"Don't know."
Ten minutes later the uncle came. Used to teach Yeats. Saw the dolls. The beating was methodical. Martin's nose got broken trying to stop it. She held the dolls. The boy didn't ask for them back.
The photograph would win prizes. Boy with dolls, concrete, direct stare. What it wouldn't show.
Part Two: Toronto, 2019
Soup burning on the stove when the email came.
I'm the boy from Sarajevo. With the dolls.
Seventy-three, she still knew which boy.
Pediatric surgeon now. Toronto. Twin daughters. Operates on hearts the size of walnuts. I name all their dolls Mrs. Margaret.
Left the soup to blacken.
Phone photo attached. Two girls, same age he'd been. Behind them, him. That stare but tired.
They think it's hilarious, all the dolls married to each other.
Wrote back: I lied. No doll. Had a rabbit named François.
Him: I know.
Then: Also Mrs. Margaret was the brave one. The first Margaret just went along.
Then: Uncle died last year. Still angry about the photo. Said it made Bosnians look weak.
Then: My girls can play with whatever. That's the point.
Martin's photograph on the wall. Everything it caught.
Your sister?
Berlin. Lawyer. Still says dolls can marry whoever.
Documentary wants me next week. War children. Want to recreate the photo. Said no.
The Mrs. Margarets survived.
Laptop shut. Smoke alarm going. Opened windows.
After, scrubbing the burned pot, thought about the uncle. Yeats professor hitting a boy for holding dolls. Martin making prizes from it. The boy, grown, naming everything Mrs. Margaret.
Looked at the photograph. Not looking at camera. Through it. At her.
Even when softness could kill you.
She still had them somewhere. The dolls. In a box marked "Prague."
