fragile

Quietness was hard on his ears at first. It was louder than anything he had ever heard before. But with nothing reminding him of the past, he moved on.

Long gone were the days of self-improvement, pressure from the stakeholders, and unnecessary amounts of ice in his coffee...

He was young, in his late 20s. He learned the language quickly, the villagers accepted him, and the ringing in his ears eventually subsided. All he was left with was some money from the past, enough to make it to an old age, an old Chevy Square Body, and a Honda CB 400 Cafe Racer.

He stayed at one old man's house. He bought food and whatever the man needed in exchange for learning the traditions of the place. Slowly, his collection of notebooks started growing. He wrote down how to build a house, what the "holidays"were, and what clothes he was supposed to wear.

Half a year later he started to build a house on the outskirts of the village. The old man oversaw it, going out of the village for supplies with him. When he wasn't building, he helped around the village.

By the next winter it was finished. He moved out of the old man's house.

Winter was slow. He and other men went out for supplies, children rode in the beds of their trucks, mountains covered in snow were beautiful.

On New Year's Eve he met a woman in the village tavern. Her parents had just now allowed her to work. Two months later he asked her father for permission to marry her.

During summer the two of them and the old man started making a garden in their backyard. His wife was a lot more gentle with the plants than he was.

He drank with her father in the tavern on Saturdays and took his bike out for a ride on Sundays.

His wife gave birth to his son a year later. The old man was delighted. His wife was happy. And he finally knew what family was.

Every other week he discussed the books he read with the old man. It turned out that he had a lot more wisdom in him than what would be expected of a villager. Maybe he also came from the outside... Though they never discussed it.

Two years later the old man died. He left his noodle store to the man.

Years passed... Life in the mountains was tranquil.