Conc

Gravel was spurting outwards from the partially deflated tyres of the vehicle I was piloting, as we ate up miles of mountain passes in a terrifying fashion. The scenery was beautiful, sheer cliffs in hues of yellow, orange and red, the sky, a few shades lighter than cobalt blue, absent of any clouds whatsoever. Despite there being an obvious heat hanging locally, provided by the dominant sun, the wind gushing in from the windows either side seemed to entirely negate this, still, I was uneasy and couldn’t begin to appreciate the surroundings in which I was situated.

I’m not sure exactly how I ended up in this position, the driver’s seat of a sprinter van; my identification of such a vehicle owing to the Mercedes Benz emblem scratched and slightly dulled, but still shining, from the middle of the wheel I was steering. Like I said, I wasn’t sure how or why, but I had the distinct feeling that I was escaping from strange men with guns, or maybe that was just a movie I had watched once about an escape from the mountains of Ecuador, I just didn’t know. Regardless, I was scared; both of navigating the very dry dusty roads in long wheel-base with my clunky gear changes and the very fact my usually inexplicably accurate memory, was failing me. Sitting beside me on the seldom used cloth bench seat was a girl holding a slightly frosty expression, her name, Jessica.

Petite with chocolate brown hair, tied up presumably to keep it out of the way, bits were dripping down where she had tied it hastily, she possessed deep hazelnut eyes, the kind that when looked into, would kind of take hold of you for a second. Sunglasses, now with added mountain-dust sheen, hanging from a white tank top which showcased sun kissed arms. Her plain tan shorts, two sea-shell bracelets’ (one on either wrist) and worn sandals finished out her outfit. Probably not the most suitable for the task of escaping gun-toting men, but come to think of it, I didn’t fare much better in the clothing stakes. I wore a blue button-up shirt and jeans, naturally faded, which had crudely been hacked in half, about half way up. It seems I had then rolled them up a bit further, so my knobbly knees jutted out below the rolled section and the obvious, to me, hacking was obscured from view. I had on my feet black doc-martin style boots, laced up awfully, but no socks, definitely no socks, this meant my feet were sweating hideously, probably contributing to the noticeable clunks in gear change; I’d certainly have regretted this decision of wear, if I remembered making it that is. In the back, Jess reported, as she leant over the board separating the cabin from the load bearing area, we had two bicycles, 3 large drums of what we gathered was fuel, a bucket of lemons and a bucket of rice.

I had no idea where we were going and neither did Jess, her memory was just as hazy not that it was ever exceptional, we figured that we should just probably keep going, stopping only occasionally to refuel. It was quite the difficult task despite our abundance of fuel, eventually managing to somehow pour fuel from a drum into a jerry-can and then into the tank through a leaky red funnel found beneath the bench seat. After this ordeal the ice on her face was beginning to thaw and rather than continue to question what the hell was actually going on, we opted to just proceed with what we thought we must do. It could have been a matter of our lives and this was something I certainly wasn’t going to risk, for me or for her.

After a few days of lemons and uncooked rice, we reached a small hotel of sorts, I mean, it may not have been your usual check in-check out affair, but at least we managed to come to an agreement with the owners; A room for the night and a deliciously hot meal, I had no idea if it would be delicious by traditional standards but our standards were currently low, in return we would give up a couple sacks of our lemons and rice. That night I remember having my first really nice moment with Jess. Our room was small, among the things crammed into it; a tiny 14” television and VCR, resting on a rickety wooden table; beside the TV an odd assortment of VHS tapes seeming to span every language but English; lastly and perhaps most noticeably, in the middle of the tired single bed a blue paper-back book of French girls’ names. I didn’t take much stock of this despite it stealing my initial attention, quickly swinging my head back towards Jess who was inspecting the selection of tapes. After much deliberation and perhaps some slight bickering, we settled for some strange Italian film I couldn’t recall the name of even if I tried.

Some time passed and it seemed my unlikely companion wasn’t able to bear the Italian dialogue, clearly quite agitated she rose to her feet and began swinging open the doors to each of the few cupboards in the room she had not previously explored, to her delight and my more subdued surprise, she had found a small fridge hidden inside one of the cupboards, it held only enough space for two tiny shelves; even so, inside on the upper shelf was a small slice of chocolate cake on an immaculate glass dish, I acted as if I wasn’t overly interested in her discovery, I’d let her have this one. I didn’t know how long we’d be together and despite her quirks I wanted to keep her as content as I could, things would be easier that way. After these thoughts passed she then sat back down next to me, cross-legged, grinning ear-to-ear; I was lying on my front propped up by my elbows pretending to be engrossed in the film; what came next is what surprised me. She began forcing her fork through the cake until a piece of that precious slice came loose and rested on the fork, then without prompt, held it slightly awkwardly out to me and stumbled over the words, “Would you like some cake, Archer?”

I’ve never been sure what it was about that moment, but I will never forget it, it’s the moment I might have fallen for her.