21
Wind came. The sun disappeared behind dark clouds, and two raindrops hit the wind shield. The drops were so big, that almost the whole screen got wet. Tschick drove faster, tall trees were shattering in the wind, and suddenly, a gust almost had our car upside-down. Tschick turned to a road between two fields. The piano solo went intense, and after a kilometer, the road stopped in the middle of the field.
“I’m not going back.” Tschick said, and went straight forward without braking. The crops were against our doors and smashed on the screen. Tschick let the car run carelessly in the field and gave a lot of gas. The motor went on slowly, and the bonnet started to split this golden sea into two. Though the Lada itself was making weird noises, he eventually managed it without too much of an effort. But orientating was hard, you couldn’t really look over the crops. No horizon. A third raindrop hit us. The field went slightly uphill. We drove small curves and stumbled upon a gap, which we ourselves made a minute ago. I suggested Tschick try to write our names, so others could read it from a helicopter or later on Google Earth. We already lost track by the vertical stroke of the T. We just drove around, stumbled upon one hill after another, and when we were somewhat higher, the field suddenly came to an end. Tschick braked at the last second. With the back half still in the corn field and the front half already out, we observed the landscape. A herd of cows were before us, and it was simply green, with groups of trees, narrow streets and endless hills and hills and mountains and forests. The clouds were drifting away at the horizon. You could see sheet lightning over a small church, but it was dead silent. The fourth raindrop came. Tschick had the motor on, and I took Clayderman out.
We only looked for a couple of minutes. Small, bright clouds went under the dark ones and came to us.
“Independence Day.” Tschick said.
We grabbed bread, cola and jam out, and as we were trying to set up a picnic in our car, it went pitch dark. It was only early afternoon, but it’s dark like in the night. Shortly after, I saw a cow get pushed back like in a meadow. I was shocked at first, but Tschick saw it too. Every other cow turned its ass to the wind, but they just flipped over. And then the wind went away, as suddenly as how it came. Nothing happened for a minute, you couldn’t even read the writing on the cola bottle. Then a bucket of water was poured on our wind shield, and it came down like a wall.
For hours. It was bustling and lightning went crazy. When the rain finally stopped at the evening and we climbed out of the car, the whole field was flat, and the lawn in front of us turned into a catastrophe. It was impossible to drive on, so we decided to stay. And so, we spent our first night on the hill, in our car, on our seats. It wasn’t that comfortable, but we didn’t have much to work with, considering the mess outside.