The weather soft, peaceful. On the horizon gigantic windmills, their white blades send annoying sun pieces in my eyes and mirrors. The car goes on without any noise. I open the window to smoke a cigarette. I left my job early, I would go to the village. A relative had died.
Friday is beautiful. Even on that metallic and mechanical factory, it is beautiful. The weekend seems promising, away from the irons. Low iron stocks, low natural resources. Now we are utilizing the underground resources satellite maps to mine it. Damn it. I noticed how he looked at me today, something he wanted to say. They will cut my pay, if not lay me off permanently.
Careful with that axe, Eugene. Is the axe made of iron too? Steel maybe? Metal anyway. Some scrap on the edge of the road. Cemetery? Nothing on the other side, a piece of a poor cliff. Will there be resources on it? Water or iron resources? Both needed.
At least the seats are soft, not made of iron. The springs are made of iron. It’s quiet, too quiet. Just a distant donkey bray. Donkey? There is no donkey around. Not a living being in fact. Apart from the insects and worms under the earth, of course. Endless nibbles and bites, hidden, invisible. Where is this donkey? I throw my cigarette, close the window. Still, I can hear the bray, even more.
I stop at the chippings alongside the asphalted road. Guitars and drums, percussions. They are magical. Magic is supposed to be relaxing, not disturbing. Anyway, the world would have been much poorer with these sounds of this band. My world at least. Endless loops of these songs in the irons of this car.
I will find out where this bray is coming from. I step out to see better in the field with low bushes. Some donkey is hiding over there? The donkeys stay always on their feet, as I remember. His voice fades out when I get away from the car, his words are incomprehensible. Then it is near the car, or in the car. I draw near. The trunk? Empty. Inside the car empty, no donkey in the car. The hood? It’s here. Strange. A donkey head connected in the middle of the cables and irons. Damn it, that’s what I needed, as if it wasn’t enough. What in the hell does a donkey head braying in here? From the clotted blood of the cut off head, come out veins and wires that connect to the battery and the motor. I check them, I can’t take them off. The car seems to be supplied from the head of this poor animal. Disgusting.
I will find a mechanic as soon as I get to the village and I will remove the long-eared head from the hood. I can’t bear his bray. He looks me in the eye and brays. I don’t know what he wants to say to me. Maybe he just shouts as an unintelligent being, words that can’t communicate a thing. Fuck, as if it wasn’t enough! I don’t know if this cut off head has stuck here somehow, or they have manufactured the car this way. The company car, I never bothered to open the hood before. Anyway, I better continue driving. To finish with the dead relative over there and to come back. Work on Monday. But I can’t bear his bray all along the way. I open the glove compartment, a piece of rag for the glasses. I take it, wad it, ram it down the donkey’s throat. He doesn’t make a sound anymore. I slap him slightly in his ice-cold muzzle to understand if his voice can still be heard. He brays choking, as if suffering, I can barely hear him now. I’ll close the hood, turn up the music, won’t hear him at all. I close the hood, open the door to get inside. Some people on the field along the road are approaching. They are many, holding a coffin in their shoulders. They approach, Indians. With feathers and leaves and skins and colors. A strange song accompanies them. They smoke long pipes, the smoke cloud over their heads holds up the coffin. What is inside that coffin? Another Indian? The Chief, some unlucky innocent child? An animal? Maybe the donkey. Just his body, surely. Shall I tell them that I have the head, they can take it if they want to. No, I don’t know if the car would still work after that, it’s even the company car. It doesn’t matter what’s in the coffin, anyway. Whatever it is, it is now dead, gone forever among the worms and the irons and the undergrounds.
What do Indians do here? I had never seen them before. In fact, I haven’t been here since I was a young child, in this village road, between this poor seeming cliff and this field with low bushes and windmills that send sun pieces in your eyes. I didn’t know you could hear a donkey head braying in your hood, I didn’t know there were Indians here, burying in old rituals Chiefs, children or animals without heads. I get into the car and continue driving. I am late. To go to the burial and to come back. Work on Monday.