Perfume within the ice

a short story from a life

The scent arrives.

Leon's favourite bird is the starling. Leon breathes like a bird. Silently. Shallow and rapidly.

The door opens. The brown, comfy shoes are habitually placed on top of the book of hymns, before he swallows a mouthful of coffee and falls down into the couch under the window.

Hands are held palm to palm, finger meets finger. Soft and mark-less. It is his reward to not have hard hands. She would have been the first to hold them. The black, sharp pointed shoes with the worn right shoe tip are complimented by black socks.

No one knows the book is there. He even checked to see it yesterday. The name is hardly visible on the last page, right inside the hard cover, in almost invisible writing. But it´s there.

The migrating grey birds will soon leave above them again. Damn, this year has passed quickly. The stars are blinking above.

There should have been two scents in the room. Hers too. Spring will eventually arrive. Again. He knows.

Perfume is held within the ice.

Lights, check. Engine, check. Gas? Blinkers?

This is exciting. Almost excessively so.

The steering wheel slides and sits like concrete in Leon's white knuckled fists. He feel the eyes are on every move he makes and all the way, from the first moment. It is. It has got to. Checks the extra mirror. It´ s there, all right.

The eyes. What he does is observed, he knows he sees what he is doing. All the way. The gear shift isn't in passive mode today. It wants to be changed often, especially when going uphill.

Why are you changing gears right now, Leon…?

The fjord is right outside the tires, and the sun doesn't shine. Oh my God, his hands are so slippery. Hopefully that doesn't matter. This is working like machinery.

-Explain why you are changing gears in this phase, Leon?

The voice is gone. He clears his throat. His throat is dried out. He tries swallowing.

-err, .. I don't know? Voice almost gone again.

-ok? -Pay attention now, ok?

Speed increases, Leon has got the steering wheel, yet the gas is under other pair of feet.The road turns into a grey and decorated stripe. Yellow and white. Where is what? Nothing is visible around him.

The rear mirror speaks the truth. Always. She is sitting right there.

Where there was slush, there is now summer roads, and just around the bend the winter meets the tyres again. Good to experience this, he hears. -But now can you tell me why you change gears, Leon? Do you see now? Leon sees a grin.

Speed decreases. The breath is back. Is it hot or cold in the air? -Ok, so do you see why you change gears? Leon swallows. Coughs up a yes. More grinning in the passenger seat.

The scent is back.

Slush is back. Steering wheel works solo. Runs the engine and chassis all the way to the edge. All the way into the fjord. In the middle of the sharpest turn. With the steepest and tallest escarpment.

Seagulls see the car roof beneath them, and escape.

Splintering and crackling, wet and blue. Cuts like thousand knives. Why do I change gears?

Thoughts disappear.

In that very moment she is there. The scent spreads. That is how it is. Perfume is held within the ice. The ice has to melt.

You see now? Her voice speaks to him. The ice is melting.