Walking the Ruins

A ball game and joggers

In the gentle sun of midmorning, I sit in my usual hiding place near the village. A fragrant scent of baking bread wafts over from the houses, and I feel my mouth water. I could kill for a piece of bread with butter and honey.

Three days have passed since my arrival at the village. I have spent most of them observing the comings and goings of the people here.

Four kids are playing ball in an alley.

The ball looks like a bag made of pieces of cloth stitched together and filled with something soft. They throw it at each other, following some intricate but utterly incomprehensible rules. And all the while, they are eerily silent. Where I, as a kid, would have laughed or screamed, they remain quiet. Only sometimes they talk, obviously discussing when it is allowed to drop the ball and when not. But they don't discuss this like children do. They don't fight, and they don't shout. They remind me of the dopeheads that were sometimes hanging out at the train station when I returned from school, in that other life. Their postures are relaxed, lacking energy, like wilted vegetables.

The kids' behavior mirrors that of the adults. Just like their children, they are quiet, at ease, and I hardly ever saw anyone laughing. There were never any signs of quarrel. I do wonder what they are smoking over there.

The adults spend most of their time on the fields, which are, from my hiding place, located on the other side of the village. I've never been an expert in that kind of work, but they seem to pull weeds and to loosen the soil most of the time. They also keep a couple of sheep and cows on a few meadows surrounded by wooden fences, tending to them. I've never seen any villagers stray beyond the fields yet.

The number of people in the village seems to be between thirty and fifty.

The children's play is interrupted when three men approach the village from the bunker.

On the days past, they visited the place once each day, in the morning.

As usual, the blond general is one of them. The two other men are carrying large, empty baskets.

They are welcomed by four villagers, two women and two men. One of the men is the guy with the long hair. They exchange a few words. I am too far away to hear anything.

The general's pals hand the baskets to the two women, who take them away to the storage house. They disappear inside. Shortly later, they return, the baskets now full. I see vegetables and apples. The general's pals take them.

The whole meeting takes no more than a few minutes. After some final words, the men from the bunker turn and start their way towards the mountains. The villagers watch them and their food disappear. They show no outward signs of emotion.

I leave my hiding place and follow the general's troupe, as usual staying hidden behind the dense growth along the forest's edge.

As I approach the bunker's entrance, I see that the door is open. Three pale bunker dwellers are standing outside, welcoming the arrivals. The two men with the baskets enter, while the general stops and talks to the others.

I have seen similar scenes the previous days. Bunker people standing outside, as if getting some fresh air.

Sometimes, the wind carries a few words to where I hide, and I understand some of them. To my great relief, they seem to speak English, even though some of it sounds strange.

A young woman steps out of the bunker, followed by two men and another woman. They seem to be about my age, or slightly older. I have never seen them before. They greet those who are already outside.

The first one of the women has short, dark hair. She carries something around her chest. It takes me a moment to realize that it is a kind of holster carrying a pistol or some other small firearm.

It's not the first time that I have seen the bunker people with a weapon, but it was usually the general who had it.

The woman with the pistol stands with the general and another youth, a man with a mustache. The mustache says something, and they laugh.

The second woman's hair is also dark, but it is longer, reaching her shoulders. She talks to the other young man, a guy with curly hair. She gesticulates and shakes her head in agitation. He places his hand on her shoulder, maybe trying to calm her down.

After a short while, the young people wave the others goodbye, and the woman with the short hair and the pistol starts jogging along a path that runs parallel to the rock face into the forest where I hide. The three others follow her.

I don't move, trying to blend in with the greenery around me as they pass while entering the forest only a few steps away from me.

Here's an opportunity to learn more about these people. I wait a few seconds, and then I follow.

I reach the path, which traverses the slope horizontally at a constant height. Watching for signs of the joggers, I start running along it, ready to hide in the undergrowth if necessary.