Feathers of quail

It's a long way from Ierapetra to John o' Groats, the tide is low, the land is bared, the land is separation. My car is at the shop, the handbrake is torn apart again. It must be the fourth time. Now I know I'm never seeing it again. A pity I can't remember anything from the last time other than the handbrake in my hand like a useless limp rod. I don't have any luggage, all I need is in my pockets. What a relentless sunshine in the dead of winter!

I need to find someone to drive me. I won't get any more chances after sunset, nobody dares pick up hitchhikers at night in these deserted villages. The townhall provides shelter from the wind, I'll stand here patiently, two, five hours, all day, however long it takes, everyone who drives through the village drives by the townhall anyway. I'm parched, my lips feel as if I've been eating crisps for my day's pay, I stretch them and they burst like sausage skin. 

A rotten ZAZ 966 stops before me just as I'm licking the blood off my lips. The car was white once, but at some point the color turned into an oatmeal kind of hue, like the weathered linen that's met the bleach one time too many in the big cauldrons in the hospital basements.

Inside the ZAZ sits an ancient man, almost as wrecked as his little car. He's wearing a knitted sweater, it was also probably white once, now it's just old. The man speaks Norwegian; I understand him, that's no surprise, I spent two years working in Norway, so far so good, things are making sense.

"I'll take you where you need to be, but you'll have to pay me in quails."

I caress the wad of tenners in my pocket almost sensually, it might as well have been my dick.

"You don't want money, then?"

"I'm not interested in money."

I shrug in acceptance, it's the same to me either way. He gets out of the car, produces a dirty rifle from the trunk, places the greasy sling around my neck, hands me two boxes of ammo, the finest pellets, ideal for shooting quail. God knows how old the ammo is, the brands have long disappeared from the boxes, now plainly shit brown with a thin green stripe.

I sit comfortably in the co-drivers seat, rest the rifle on the sill, the window on my side is rolled down and the handle is stuck. The old man starts the car again and off we go.

"To John o' Groats" I say, "as fast as you can."

"Why the hurry?"

"If I miss this card, I lose the entire game."

"Death will take everything you have. It doesn't matter what you do."

"Death is dealing, old man. Take me there on time and I might stand a chance."

"Look around for quails. As soon as we start cruising north, there'll be fog so dense, you won't even dream of seeing the birds with the eyes you were given. God help you with those eyes, boy."

At night the hunting ceases: respite. I sleep in the spacious seat, my head swaying from side to side with each turn. The ZAZ is hollow like an empty shell, whatever insulation it had has deteriorated to the point of evaporation. It's as if we're on foot, I can hear the tiniest grit on the veins of the road. The permanently open window helps too. There is no shelter from the cold, and fuck me if it isn't cold. I'm not sure I have all my toes anymore, but I don't dare check, I don't want to know, whatever's happening in the woolen socks is none of my business.

The old man drives tirelessly. We drink sweet tea with buttermilk from a keg on the back seat. We eat salty hardtack. We piss in a whisky bottle. As far as shitting goes, we're doing none of that: the menu is strategically selected to keep you constipated. The old man smokes some fat cigars that smell of candied orange. He chews the tip for a while, then eats it, then lights the cigar and smokes for hours.

"Mind if I take a puff?"

"Sure. When pigs fly."

During the day I hunt. I shoot carefully, taking my time to think, track the birds and aim. My forehead resembles crumbled paper from the strain. The quails drop magically by the road, right on the shoulder. I open the door just enough for my arm to fit, the old man slows down and I pick the game in motion.

And then there's my handiwork: cleaning the quail of the pellets. It's not an easy task. It's messy and impractical in the small car. To be honest, the thought of removing the pellets hadn't even crossed my mind, until the old man said snarkily:

"What are you staring at your knees for? Grab a bird and get rid of the pellets. I want nothing burdening them."

No complaints, the old man is doing me a favor. Five thousand kilometers. Plus the handiwork keeps me occupied.

"Last ride, boy. I'm retiring. But we were going the same direction anyway. I myself am going home."

"Where to?"

"Fodderty."

"You aren't taking me all the way, then?"

"I'm taking you to Fodderty. I'm having you over for dinner."

"No, that won't work. I don't have time for that."

"Keep an eye for quail. Leave the planning to me. I'm not an amateur."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"I've made this drive before. From Ierapetra to John o' Groats. We didn't make it then. Arrived too late. See, I needed sleep. Now we'll make it easy, in very good time, even. One wastes a lot of time sleeping."

"Sleeping is nice."

"Only if you're afraid of the world."

The tea keg is buried under a mountain of quails. The back of the car is completely packed with game. I'm out of ammo. The fog is impenetrable. The sleet is needles in my arm, I'm leaning towards the old man, trying to avoid it as much as I can. We got some decent weather for the greatest part of the trip. But now it's all lead-like darkness and this unbearable cold.

"We're almost there."

"Is this enough quails?"

"Yes."

The ZAZ is huffing like a fat asthmatic kid on the gravel road. Rolling hills under a soft blanket of dark moss. A gray stone brick cottage appears in the horizon. Of course it's the old man's home. The old man himself, the ZAZ, the keg, the rifle -they all belong organically to the gray stone brick cottage.

When he turns off the engine, the ZAZ lets a deep sigh and starts steaming. In the yard, under a sturdy canopy, there's an unexpected meeting: my father, my mother, my good friend Bertie, my wife, the old man's wife and I. They have already set the table, a really long narrow table with about twenty chairs by each side, a bright white tablecloth on, it looks foreign, hell, they've brought it all the way from Tzavros, I have seen it before, I'm certain.

The old man disappears in the kitchen to deal with the cooking. The others are drinking dark beer from a keg identical to the one we have in the car. I unload the quails, piling them on the ground right by the table. This takes a couple of hours, a tedious project, hundreds of small dead birds. I had no idea I had shot that many, now at the sight of the genocide my temples break into a sweat. 

Drenched and with my knees like jelly from the prolonged immobilization and the strict fast of the recent days, I finally sit by the table, absolutely exhausted. The old man shows up with the food, perfectly timed, choreographed even, carrying powsowdie in a tin bucket and sheep's heads cooked in their own blood. We help ourselves, my father breaks the bread, dark beer is flowing from the keg, strong beer that doesn't foam, flat like home, we're hungry, we're thirsty, soon we're tipsy, loud, laughing, not long until I'm drunk, so quick to forget.

The old man remembers though. Time is after me and the old man remembers. He takes the plates away and returns to brush the crumbs off the impeccable tablecloth. Then the following happens:

The old man stands next to me, the brush in one hand.

"Here we are. It was my last ride. Good luck, boy. God help you with those eyes you got." he says. He puts the brush abruptly on the table with a bang, grabs his chest in pain, turns blue, turns black, his eyes roll backwards, only their whites visible. Then he drops dead to the ground. The very moment of his passing, the quails open their eyes one by one, a sudden gust, wings start flapping, a flock, a cloud, the old man's soul, they fly south.

From within the shadow of the flock, the figure I was after all along emerges, a dark statue, a swarm of iron filings, the only thing standing out ten ashen fingers, I extend my arm, provocatively rosy before the haggard creature, I touch each and every phalanx, one by one, patiently, diligently. It smells like flesh, living, warm flesh in the dead of winter, and a soap I never knew before, my nails under the nails of the creature, such clean nails. I approach, I see the outline of a chest, a well-ironed shirt from the same fabric as the tablecloth they brought from Tzavros, so blindingly white. I place my good ear on the good chest, close my eyes and hark: the heart, the creature's heart, this heart is not beating like a fleshy heart. This heart is a lute of glass.

The creature turns me around so that my back touches the radiant body, nests me in a tender embrace and whispers in my ear:

"Welcome."

And then we both shatter to thousands of quails.

We sink into the sky as if it was sea on a summer night, leaving no trace but a few feathers of quail.