*

In the city limits, the truck rattled along past piles of rubble and burned-out buildings. How some of them were still standing seemed physically impossible. Everything was broken. Most of the people the truck passed had guns. A handful were shooting blindly down streets. Everyone else ignored them. Some of the boys in the truck shouted to friends on the street. Smaller children in dusty clothes played soccer, and even some of them had laid their rifles to the side for a while.

What surprised Adem the most was the normalcy. People here were used to this. Guns and rocket launchers were a way of life. They still had to buy, sell, work, and play. They had to laugh, or what the hell else would they do but cry? And they cried a lot. Adem heard wails from blocks away. One growing louder as they passed the aftermath of a mortar attack. Blood seeping into the dust. Bodies barely covered by the fallen tarp. Sandaled dead feet peeking out.

Street vendors. Shelled businesses struggling to keep storefronts open. A lot of smoke and noise. Rifle-fire echoing from all over. And singing. Raw, tone-deaf singing. Adem was surprised. He knew the tune. The words were different, foreign. Still, something familiar finally, after thinking he was more of a stranger here, the homeland, than he was in America. Someone in the truck started singing along. Adem looked up. It was Jibriil. They'd sung together in the high school chorale group, Adem never really on key. But Jibriil had it down pat. A natural. Adem hadn't heard him sing in a couple of years. But he knew this song. Could hardly speak a couple of sentences in Somali without making a mistake, but he knew this song? When had he learned this song?

They twisted through the streets, avoiding rubble from the stone buildings, and crisp, still smoking debris from trucks, military jeeps and vehicles, and small cars. And then they were there. A massive stadium, rising from the ruins.