Coffee; yeah, coffee. That’s the thing I miss the most. I used to drink gallons of the stuff back home. Right through the day, from the moment I woke, till just before bed. I used to have it real strong too. And black with lots of sugar. It wasn’t a macho thing or anything. I’m sorta lactose intolerant. The boys out here don’t really understand. But mostly it’s yoghurt now so mostly it’s okay.
Yeah, so it’s the coffee I miss most.
Which probably surprises you. It surprises me sometimes too. But then I never really got on that well with my folks. I’m an only child so it was just me and Mom and Dad. I don’t know, they’re just, they’re just…
Let me put it this way. When I was younger, before they saw the “light”, they were the kind of people who looked at the ground when they were walking. And then afterwards, after all that dunking crap, they’d stride around and they’d be beaming, just like this you know, and they’d look you in the eye and all.
But it was baloney really. If you looked hard enough you could see right through them. There wasn’t anything really going on behind there. You know, I don’t think they even really believed that shit. It was like they’re some sorta computer and they just brought this really, you know, confident program or something and then they just booted themselves up again.
They didn’t change too much with me you know. Like, they didn’t beat me or anything. But, everything else; everything else…
They just changed a lot. And when I say a lot, I mean a lot. Like Mom, before, she used to drink. Not just beer too. She really used to drink. But now, she don’t anymore. Dad too.
And they changed their clothes. I think they must have liked that. They were the kind of people, before, who had real trouble with clothes. They weren’t like some of them. I mean they knew that, I don’t know, style existed and all that, and I reckon they really wanted to look good and all but they always got it wrong, real wrong. Man, they looked stupid. Like, everyday.
I remember this one time Dad came downstairs with Mom and they were excited. They’d obviously made a real effort. It was for some dinner party somewhere or something. But yeah, they’d made this real effort. And Dad, man, Dad was there wearing these jeans. And get this, on the front there was bright green, I mean fucking fluorescent here, bright green suede and on the back he had that real old school, real light stonewashed denim. Man, it looked stupid.
He reckoned he looked good too.
But yeah, after they saw the “light” they switched up, like right away; started wearing the same clothes every single damn day. Khaki slacks, white T, and sneakers for Dad. Khaki shirt, white polo, and pumps for Mom. Must have been a real relief for them.
Yeah, so, like I said, I was never really close to them. And after that, you know, I suppose I didn’t choose their journey, spiritually or religiously or whatever, so I just suppose it was inevitable that we’d drift apart.
The thing that surprised me, wait hold on a minute, do you want a cup of tea?
Yeah?
I’ll put the stove on.
Yeah, so the thing that surprised me was how easy it was to get out here, you know. I never really thought too much about the long run. There was no big plan. I can tell you that for sure.
Shit, I remember touching down on the tarmac and looking out that window and there was just like this sandy sort of, back home they’d call it badlands, sort of scrub and dust stretching away. And then in the distance there were these huts with these mud walls and I thought to myself, I thought to myself, Adam what the fuck have you got yourself into here?
And then I walked out the airplane door and, boom, the heat just hit me hard. I mean back home it gets hot in the summer too. That nasty sticky hot, you know? But this was something else. A kind of dry hot that just…
But it’s not like so unpleasant. It’s not just straight uncomfortable. It’s kind of exciting too. Like you’re thinking - I’ve got to get out of this sun. You know. This sun gonna kill me I stay here too long.
Hey, wait a minute.
Sugar?
No?
It’s pretty good. Not like the coffee back home. But it’s pretty good. It’s hot though. Be careful.
So, yeah, in the airport there were some people waiting for me. They were nice and stuff. One of them spoke a bit of English. I felt real bad at first because he had, like, this really, really thick accent and I couldn’t understand much of what he said. And, also, I didn’t want to have to keep on asking what he said, you know, because that’s kind of rude. Like saying he don’t speak good English to his face.
He was a nice guy and all but, like, he had a gun and I wanted to make a good first impression, you know. And one of his friends never took the finger off of his trigger. And he looked at me the whole time. Kind of blank. Maybe a little curious. No animosity, but I didn’t want to, you know. It was a bit tense really.
Yeah, I spent a long time there. Just learning stuff. It was alright, I suppose. I mean the learning was kinda crap. Like nothing interesting or nothing. Just that kind of rote learning you do at elementary.
But we had a lot of free time. And the guys were cool. We used to tool about town in our pick-ups. The strange thing is that, during downtime, mostly we spoke Russian. Now, I didn’t expect that. It took a while to get up to speed, but the boys helped and I’m more or less there now.
Yeah, and what’s that crazy game called? You know the one that you people are always playing. We played a lot of that too. It’s kind of fun too. What’s it called? Like baseball, you know? Except way more difficult. And longer too. What’s that shit called?
Yeah, that’s right. Cricket, that’s right. I got pretty good towards the end too. I got pretty good at pitching that thing and this one time, towards the end, right before we went to the mountains, I was first pick. I don’t know, I guess I felt proud or something.
Up here though, it got real serious, real quick. But that suited me just fine. It was what I was looking for. And it was most time outdoors kind of stuff. A lot of running around and shit. Sort of boy scout kind of stuff.
I was pretty good because I’d done a lot of that kind of shit before, at home. Hunting with my Uncle. He’s a real gun-nut you know. He actually gave me a key to his case when I turned 13. Can you believe that?
And that was only just after Columbine. But I was a sensible kid. I suppose he just trusted me.
Yeah, so I was good at all that stuff early on. The Boss tipped me for the next course. You know, that next level up, specialist stuff. I reckon they wanted me to go back. Help out there, on one of the big jobs. But that wasn’t going to happen. I told him I didn’t want to know.
I just wanted to stay up here. You see, I like the mountains. The air’s pretty thin and sometimes it gets real cold, hell sometimes it gets real hot too, but you get used to all of that.
And man, is it beautiful.
You just take a look through that door.
Yeah, that’s right, just through there.
Look at that man. Look at that. They say they got big sky country up in
But yeah, you gotta get acclimatized. Like, after the camp, but early on you know, I used to have so much trouble. It’s alright if you walking on a level path. I suppose it’s not too bad downhill either.
But when you gotta go uphill? That’s when you’ll be gasping and gasping and gasping, like this you know, but you never get enough air, not early on.
I remember the day I first realized I was good, you know, like I was set, physically or whatever? I guess it was four, five weeks after camp and we hadn’t seen too much going on. It had been kinda quiet and the boys were sort of low, sort of bored.
We were just walking on this path and it was sort of winding round this corner up to this ridge and then, up front, Ram…you met Ram?
No?
Oh, you gotta meet this guy. Best in the business. I mean he’s been doing this shit since ’95.
Anyway, yeah, so Ram put his hand up and we all stopped dead. I crept up, curious like, to where Ram was with a couple other guys and we saw up ahead, maybe 50, 60 meters away was this vehicle and there were maybe four or five guys sort of just standing around it with this one guy bent over the engine. Just working on it I guess.
One of them, this scrawny little kid with glasses, he looked real jumpy like and he kept on going over to the engine, it had its hood up you know, and he’d go over and he’d say something to the guy working on it and then you’d just see this arm kind of flick up from the guy bent over the engine, you know, pushing the kid away. And then he’d walk a few meters away and look up the valley sides, like really scrutinizing, and then he’d go back to the engine again and get pushed away again.
He must have been pissing those guys off. He looked like a real dick. I guess he was just scared.
I can’t remember who fired the rocket. It wasn’t me though. I’m not trying to get off the hook or anything. I’m proud of what I’ve done. But that one day I was too nervous. Maybe I was kind of scared too. Either way I couldn’t hold that damn thing straight.
Ram thought I might hit that dirt just in front and then we’d all have said goodbye just as we said hello. Anyway, someone else took it off me.
And when that thing hit home it went, you know, kaboom!
Just like that. A bit like the movies except real loud and the flash…well, shit, just look out there right now.
You see all that pink and white and red and purple in that sky?
You see all that?
Yeah, and look over there.
Yeah over there, at that ridge.
Yeah, that’s right, the one in that shadow. Just there.
You see that grey and black dirt, just there?
Yeah, that’s right, just there.
Well you just put that all together. You know and bind it up real tight. You know that pink and white and red and purple and grey and black, all together. You know, just bind it all up. Real, real tight until it’s real scrunched up. And then you let that all go and flash out. You know, all at once, real fast like. And then in that moment, that’s what that flash looked like.
Beautiful.
And then everything was quiet for a bit. That vehicle had just slid off that ridge and a few of those guys who’d just been standing around, well, they’d just clean disappeared. There were bits and pieces scattered about. I suppose that must have been them.
I’ll always remember this one guy. He’d been looking through his sight, and when that thing hit home that sight went right in the back of his eye. And he was just lying there, stomach down, that sight like half in his head, aimed at the dirt.
And who did we see lying across this boulder, round the corner?
Yeah, that’s right, that scrawny little kid with the glasses. Except they were broke now. Actually looked like some had got in his eye. Real nasty. He was cut up pretty bad. It was difficult to work out but I reckon his legs had gone.
He was making this gasping sort of noise, real loud, you know. Like this. Like me in the mountains, in the beginning. But he was just trying to breathe anyway he could. His throat had got kind of messed up. I reckon he was trying to say something too. But he couldn’t, you know, get it up to his mouth. It just went out through that hole.
And you know it was just then, I realized I was, you know…when I realized I was breathing just fine, straight acclimatized, you know, when I was looking at him lying there, struggling.
I gotta say, when he saw us, he looked pretty damn hard at me. Like he was pleading, you know. But I didn’t have the guts.
Twenty meters down I heard a shot. I didn’t look back.
I still think about that. Especially at this sort of time, round prayers you know. I’ve done my fair share now but I still get worried.
I worry that I couldn’t kill that scrawny little kid because he was laid out right there, right in front of me. I didn’t feel sorry for him, really. It was just too close.
They say some Canadian guy shot a man up here from two miles. It must have been difficult, you know, what with the wind and all but I reckon that’s the best way to do it. From a long way away. When they look like little moving specks you can forget about all the rest. Like when I used to play video games or something.
Hey, come on, let’s go outside.
Yeah, just out there, come on.
Yeah, now stand just here, and you see that?
Yeah, look at that. Man, isn’t that something? All that light and all that color.
You ever seen anything so beautiful?
But then you look back that side and it’s dark.
You know what I like doing?
I like looking straight up like this. Just to that patch of sky where they both meet.
Just there, can you see it?
No, no, just there.
Yeah, now you’ve got it.
I look up there where all that light and all that dark meet. I look at it and I look at it, straining real hard. And I try to concentrate on one little piece and I forget about everything else.
And when I look up like that, at that piece where they meet, really hard, looking really hard, just right up at it, when I look up at that piece, everything else falls away. And it all mixes up, and I never can work out if it’s lightening or darkening.
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