January in the Basque Country isn’t a particularly friendly month for anyone wanting to walk. You’ve thought it before and today has confirmed it. You look up and see the clouds pushing across the sky. You don’t care. You take out your camera to see what you can find, readjusting your scarf and hat to protect yourself from the cold, and think, ‘Bring it on.’ 

You cross the tracks and try to leave by a side door on the left that is closed for some reason. The door redirects your steps to the other side towards a long iron staircase leading upwards into the unknown. 

You go up, step by step, spotting some freight wagons off to one side. Their bellies full of stone and their metallic skin showing signs of rusty knocks and blows. Automatically, you take a photo, recording it on your camera’s memory card (it’s a semi-professional camera that cost around five hundred euros, sent by your mother to atone for her guilt and to play happy families). The clean air enters your lungs, and you start to feel better as you begin to see the trees and bushes, as you move closer to the sky. 

In your earphones, Catupecu’s ‘Entero o a pedazos’ is playing—‘Whole or in Pieces’—but it’s the acoustic version. It’s as if the guitar, the bass and the violin are taking turns in the boxing ring. When you reach the top of the stairs, you find a main road, with two lanes heading in both directions. Even though it’s Sunday and there’s not many people about, you’re convinced this is the main road; you can go anywhere from here. 

You don’t have a map. No internet connection. You could get a map at the station, but you don’t. You look around. A couple argue next to a stop sign. A boy in a wheelchair strokes a Labrador puppy. A guy wearing headphones rummages through the bins. 

You turn left and just as you start walking, you bump into someone. It’s a young man, in his early twenties, wearing John Lennon glasses. He makes a gesture of apology and carries on his way. The reflective lenses mean you can’t see his eyes, but he smiles as he walks away. 

‘No problem,’ you say, smiling back at him. 

You notice something: you’re happy. A simple happiness. It occurs to you that this is the best bit of the whole trip: a sigh, a curve, a question mark, a detour, a call to adventure. A little further on, the street dips and on the horizon, you see mountains surrounded by green valleys, their summits hidden by clouds and snow. 

You walk. Your head still hurts a little and your stomach is still growling, begging. Hunger’s been a problem ever since you met Lucrecia. You rummage in your pockets and find a couple of chocolate-covered raisins. Nothing else. You look in your wallet. After paying the extra fare, there’s not much left. You smile to yourself. You’re almost like the pauper in Twain’s book.

You lift your eyes and sigh. The street is peaceful, almost deserted. You walk along a few hundred metres. The buildings have red roof tiles, with brick or white-painted walls. There are even some made of granite. Nothing higher than five or six storeys. Irun looks clean and orderly, the few cars that drive past are taking their time, even the wind blows meekly. 

You try to imagine what it would be like to live here. You observe the closed shops: several clothes shops, a sweet shop, a small bookshop, a stationery shop, a language school. You let yourself be carried along by the breeze. You reach an important junction, a broad expanse leading to the town hall. Several roads converge, edged with yellow and white lines. With the terrace in front of the municipal building, the place feels like a wasteland. 

Perhaps in an attempt to fill the space, they’ve put in a merry-go-round, some swinging chairs, a Ferris wheel (a small one at that) and a cart selling hot chocolate and churros that’s closed right now. It makes it feel like a fairground. There’s a giant white rabbit, standing alone, with a bucket of coloured plastic bubble wands to sell. 

You remember when you were little you were scared of these oversized characters. The rabbit’s worn-out costume is coming undone at the seams and you wonder if anybody really believes. Reality filters through the disguise, sneaking in all over. Perhaps when you were little that would have made it even more terrifying. That ragged seam suggesting the person behind the mask doesn’t care enough about keeping up appearances. Like they want to make you think they’re good and kind, but really, deep down, they don’t actually care what you think. As if they know that sooner or later, you’ll find out the truth. 

On the other hand, it’s also true that you don’t know and that nobody knows who is inside that costume. So in a way, it works: it maintains the lie. It could literally be anyone. That’s why you take their picture. And he—or she—unexpectedly poses. 

Nearby is a leftover memory of Christmas: a seven metre-tall pine tree, the coloured lights still hung, but forgotten already; nobody pays any attention to them. They still flicker tastelessly in the bland Sunday light. Behind the tree there’s a red Peugeot flipped on its top, surrounded by yellow police tape. You struggle to imagine how it got like that. Irun doesn’t seem like the sort of place for an accident of that scale. You almost believe accidents couldn’t possibly happen here. But welcome to what lies beneath those first impressions: the dirty wheels point towards the chalk-white sky; a shower of broken glass is sprinkled across the ground; pieces of paper and an empty packet of M&Ms rest on the car’s ceiling. You capture all these details on your camera.

You continue onwards. Your belly growls again. You try to ignore it, wrapping yourself up entirely in your bubble of freedom, a destination-free stroll, purposeless. Your feet tread the wide pavements, your lungs fill with air coming from the leafy borders. You have more than enough time. It’s a relief, liberating. 

The street grows steeper, and the mountains begin to grow taller, or at least that’s how it seems. A few streets further on you reach a square that opens up to your right. The deck chairs wait expectantly, but there’s nobody nearby, everything’s still. Dotted across the grass are a few brown bushes, willows and birches, skeletal, devastated by winter. 

A young couple sits kissing on a bench. A one- or two-year-old grey Weimaraner runs around with its tongue lolling out and ears flapping. The look on its face says it’s the best dog in the world. You stretch out your arms and rest them on the back of a chair. The sun filters through the clouds and honestly, you don’t need much else. Well, you need to satisfy your hunger, but you force yourself to enjoy the moment all the same and bask in the joy of having nothing to do. 

Some long-legged ducks waddle about on the grass not far from you. Their feathers grey on their backs and white on their chests. They waddle around and then some unexpectedly take flight. The Weimaraner follows them, wagging its tail until it’s not too far from one of the ducks just behind you. Then it crouches down. 

For a moment, the world stops moving, followed by a rapid chase. The dog stretches its muzzle towards the bird. Feathers fly and the bird is trapped in the dog’s jaws, wings half open. It looks like a game, but the open beak with the tongue hanging out in desperation is a mute call for help. 

The dog doesn’t release its prisoner, but doesn’t know what to do with it either. It’s not hungry, like you; it’s just that instinct broke through the comforts of domestic life. So it drops the bird on the ground, smells it, and picks it up again. For a dog, killing is returning home. To what it really is. Now the dog carries the bird towards the couple. The owner stands up to tell the dog to drop it. The dog obeys and the duck remains where it is on the ground, a shapeless mass. 

The Weimaraner’s looking at the bird and wagging its tail while the owner—who’s no more than twenty years old—tells the dog off. On the ground, the wings barely move, only the feathers flutter in the breeze. The duck twitches, face up. It doesn’t have long left. And what time is left will be agony. The couple doesn’t know what to do. They glance around, clip on the leash and move away quickly, while the beak stays open, gasping for air. 

You approach the bird, thinking about killing it to alleviate its suffering, but you don’t know how. You can’t see any stones and you can’t bring yourself to tread on it. You couldn’t, even if you wanted to. And you don’t want to. You crouch down a little, watching death close-up with a volatile and indefinable sadness. Should you take a picture of this? And then you hear the voice, speaking with a Spanish accent. 

‘Once a hunter, always a hunter, eh?’ 

It’s a girl. She’s on your left, a little further behind you. You didn’t see her arrive; you didn’t even hear her. You can’t sense her. Even now as you look at her from below, she looks like a painting: her silhouette outlined against a tree and the sky. The branches form a crown, the cloud a frozen explosion. Dyed black hair, large eyes, black too. Pink lips, pale, barely distinguishable against her skin. A slender face, a broad forehead. You take in the details as if you’re tasting them. The girl smiles. Now you’re standing up, the sweet smell of her perfume hits you and almost knocks you out. You understand how the sailors felt when they heard the sirens’ songs. 

‘What?’ you ask. 

‘Weimaraners were hunting dogs,’ she explains, like a simple fact of nature. ‘That’s what they were bred for.’ 

‘I didn’t know that.’ 

‘Well, now you do. They’re a mixture. Their roots go back to Africa, or Asia. Apparently, they’re great for hunting in forests. Or marshland. Or at least they used to be. I guess they probably always will be.’ 

‘Oh,’ you say. 

‘Sorry, I didn’t mean to bother you.’ 

‘No, no. You’re not bothering me.’ 

She looks at you with deep, dark eyes, probably trying to locate your accent. Or so you imagine. She seems curious and in no hurry to move on. You can’t work out her age—she could be the same age as you, she could be older or even a little younger. No, older. Definitely older. Early twenties. You keep the conversation going; you don’t want to be rude. 

‘I don’t know much about Weimaraners.’ 

‘I don’t know much either, really. My brother’s a vet, all I know is what he’s told me. All the different breeds have their own backgrounds, you know. Even if those little doggies look super friendly, to their prey they’re still absolute monsters. But people love their pets. Whatever they do, they’ll always think they’re angels.’

You nod thoughtfully. 

‘I have a cousin called Ezequiel,’ you say, surprising yourself at this memory. ‘He never liked dogs until his mom brought home a boxer pup. One day, he had no choice but to take the dog out and tons of girls approached him just to talk about his dog. Or to pet it. Ever since then, he’s always taken it out.’ 

Her lips stretch to a smile. Compact white teeth appear underneath. 

‘What was the dog called?’ she asks you. 

‘Arnold. As in Schwarzenegger.’ 

The smile stretches wider. 

‘And did he complain?’ she asks. 

‘What about?’ 

‘That he was being taken out for walks just to attract the girls?’ 

‘No, not so far anyway. I guess he’s happy.’ 

‘I can imagine.’ 

Suddenly, you catch her looking at you. You try to hold her gaze, and once again you wonder how to keep the conversation going. You hate how inexperienced you are at all this. 

‘What about you? Didn’t you ever have a dog to take out on the pull?’ she asks you. 

She seems interested in chatting with you. You’re surprised. And pleased. And in the middle of it all, you find the phrase ‘on the pull’ funny. It makes you think of someone being dragged along by the dog. You can’t imagine how that would help make you attractive to girls.

‘No,’ you smile. ‘I don’t have a dog. I never had one. But I once heard on TV about some study in England that said people who own dogs are healthier, happier and live longer. Maybe that’s why, because they take you out to walk and meet people.’ 

‘The English carry out a lot of ridiculous studies. The other day I read they were doing one to find out why girls like pink.’ 

‘What was the conclusion?’ 

‘Well apparently, women used to go out to pick fruit and they must have had a particular sense for knowing when the fruit was ripe. As the ripe fruit tended to be red, girls now like pink.’ 

‘And is it true?’ 

‘Well, I don’t like pink, I can tell you that much. Right, well…’ The girl sighs. ‘Okay, have a lovely day.’

You did something wrong, you think to yourself. Your stomach suddenly starts to hurt as you see she’s now disappearing, just as easily as she arrived. 

‘Thanks. You too,’ you reply. 

She turns, smiling as she leaves. You have a better view of her now, you can watch her at your leisure. Slim, tightfitting clothing, gloves, scarf around her throat. 

‘I hope so,’ she responds, and leaves. On the ground, the duck is dead.

Translated by Claire Storey

HopeRoad, 2023