Free You Only Get One Life by Brigitte Nielsen

a callous joke – six cans between 40. They would have been better to give us nothing. I’d like to say that it was rationed depending on need, but the truth was that 40 desperate hostages climbed over each other to get to the warm drinks. I had no chance. I became convinced that I was going to die in here. How can we survive? We’re not even helping each other , I thought. You hope that when you find yourself in an emergency that you behave with dignity and bravery, but you never know what you’re going to dobeforehand. When someone’s got a gun to your head, you react instinctively. There’s something deep inside you which tells you what to do and you can plan.
    But this was another time when I could swear that I had a guardian spirit watching over me. A fierce orange glow lightened the room and more smoke drifted through the windows. A young girl next to me seemed to make up her mind. ‘Fire,’ she said. ‘We’re going.’ She pulled open the door. There was no discussion, no more waiting in fear as cans of drink were discarded on the floor. Let’s run , we all thought. Everyone got to their feet and without looking to see who might be waiting, we pushed through the main door.
    Less than two hours had passed since we read the fax confirming help was on its way. It was too dark and confusing to see exactly what was going on but I could tell from the explosions where the battle for the airport was being fought. We were caught in the middle and our group scattered in panic as each of us chose whichever direction seemed most likely to lead to safety.
    I focused on three figures I could just about make out who looked as if they were in uniform, pulling Nickie along with me. Another one of our group kept up until he dropped to the ground right next to us: he’d been shot. And the thing that haunts me to this day is that Nickie and I kept going – we didn’t stop for him, we ran. I don’t know what happened to him but I think he probably didn’t make it.
    The two of us soon reached the men who were indeed from the military. They had commandeered an ambulance and knocked out its windows. We lay on the floor and they took us at high speed to a hospital on the other side of the island.The men were heavily armed. Nowhere was safe at this point and they didn’t know where the invading force was.
    The hospital had nothing to treat us for shock and we ended up with coffee – probably not what our nervous systems needed but we were grateful for any liquids by then. We sat quietly and watched as patients were wheeled in, among them a local boy who couldn’t have been more than eight. He had a gaping hole in his stomach. It still wasn’t safe for us to be so close to the fighting and as soon as we were up to it, we were moved to a hotel in a secure area.
    The American counsel and assorted dignitaries were already there. They’d been transferred from their quarters in time. My first thought was for my parents. I begged the US authorities to let them know I was okay. We learned that the airport was badly damaged, phone lines were out and a 24-hour lockdown had been imposed. The 12 mercenaries had been killed, but none of us were allowed to move from the hotel.
    I was still very scared and shocked and would jump when anyone so much as knocked over a glass. It seemed as if we were hiding in our accommodation forever, though it was probably less than a week before the curfew was relaxed. At last we could go back to our photoshoot and get on with the job.
    But when we returned, the photographer was furious.
    ‘Where have you fucking been?’ he shouted. ‘This campaign is costing us a fortune and you never got in touch once to say what was going on!’ Miserably I thought to myself that this was almost worse than what I’d been through. If I’d been older I’d like to think I’d have slappedhim back much harder. As it was I started to explain, stumbling over my words, but he didn’t let me finish. They knew all about