It was once alive, and quacking

On a cold Sunday morning, in the season where all is expected to die, and everything actually does, while the river carries the grime of the corpses in an unending rain, the streets of the open market fill up with an other kind of grime, a much more unsettling kind of grime, the living grime of man. 

Oh old and young! Disheveled or well-offs! Men or women equally disgraced! You, you my interesting bunch all gather here, dressed in full jackets and wearing your closed faces, to buy so many sorts of produce, dictated by a sort of necessity, of the body or the soul, strong, but not entirely too clear.

Delighted, I was sitting at the nearest café, taking sweet pleasure in selfless observation. The sky was black, the streets filled with semi-dissolved dirt, and although it was nearing seven AM, the darkness made the whole scene seem as though it was taking place in the midst of the night. I had a few things to buy, but nothing that would require immediate action. 

The cold bitter wind, meddled with thin droplets of dirty rain stricking every table of the terrace, did not make the stay very pleasant, and neither did the creaking plastic chairs I was sitting on. The blank page of an article I had to write sat, in front of me, muddied by the rain.

The editor thought it interesting to write about the neighboring little-known villages and put it in the never-read sections of the journal, just beneath the ad about smoking or some new refrigerator. I suppose discerning in me a true talent for writing what no one wants to read, I was chosen and sent there a few days ago. 

I had found nothing to say thus far and was having trouble imagining how I could find anything. 

The people I met were as you would think, that is, completely ordinary, and I was only entertained in a wicked sense of cynicism in their predictable problems and bickering.

I thought of asking a few things, but it appeared my feigned interest was not convincing, or my empathy lacking, for it did not lead to any interesting story about the place.

Then again, so many of our stories were the exact same narrative, only painted a different light. Isn't it ridiculous to write several columns on different villages, when all could very well be summed up with a single line saying "nothing happens here which you don't already know, or at least are somewhat accustomed to." ? Here, It's the same as the in the cities, only much more simple, and thus, much more crass. Beyond my voyeuristic pleasure to just see them live, what could I even tell about these people?

After a while, and for no understandable reason, the buzzing street lights suddenly made me feel somewhat uneasy about my phlegm. The hard orange light, reflecting several times off the street puddles into the faces of the crowd, had begun to highlight only the most prominent features; and the shadows it left filled the same eerie silhouette on each passerby, three great holes in the fancy of a face, wearing the likeness of an always watching gaze.

This promptly wiped the grin off my face. Pursing my lips in light unsettlement, I paid my due to the café and thought it best to get on with my shopping and quickly get back to the cottage.

Getting closer helped loosen the unease, but the distant faces still irked me. I hurried through the fruits and vegetables of my list, a somewhat growing weight on my chest.

As I was paying, the market old lady asked "So, found anything interesting of us, mister reporter?" and the question seemed to resonate with the poorly lit people behind me.

Interesting? I knew what I felt were just the affabulations of a tired mind, but all I could feel from them was terror now. Interesting?

Mumbling something about not having finished my story yet, I left the stand, staring at the ground.

More and more people arrived at the market, and I am certain time continued its usual way, however, the sky never cleared, and only got darker and darker as the amount of people grew. 

I had gotten all except one item. I did not care about their stories anymore, I did not find any relief in their petty arguments. The deafening rumbling of footsteps, the judging chitchat, the complaints of those shadowy people all had created a strange silence in my brain, urging me to get out of the whole situation. A silence standing still, coronated by the ever narrowing perimeter of person I could discern the facial expressions of, up to the crucial point where I could not even make out the person next to me.

One last thing, I thought.

And I navigated the disturbing sea of staring people towards the street butcher. 

There, lighted in cold cold light, the kind you see in fridges and freezers, stood a very large and tired man, full of scars, and in front, his bloody goods behind a wide short glass. 

There, stood corpses of poultry, steaks and other pieces of meat, lighted by that blueish light, separated by plastic imitations of straws and cheaply made plastic flowers and plastic patches of grass. All those cruddy ornaments painting the uncanny picture of corpses growing in harmony within a country-side meadow.

-"Do you have a duck" I said in an hurried manner.

The man stared and, saying nothing, pointed nonchalantly at the side of the stand, with a movement of the chin.

It was then I realized—stupidly, I reckon—but deeply realized, what I had asked for, and what he was pointing at.

It once was alive and quacking, this duck, behind this street butcher's glass.

Its dead eyes and stupid beak lay wrapped in the shadows, and looked on with the usual laissez-faire of the dead things.

Why did I even need a duck?

Not knowing what to do, and completely taken aback by a reality I was normally so used to, I looked several times at the butcher then the duck, frozen in such a sudden fear.

-"It is only natural to eat what is dead", sighed the tired butcher, as he sat the duck down on a filthy scale in front of me.

-"Did you ever hear him quack?" I asked, lividly, watching his handling of the thing.

-"My ears were cut by my father", he responded "It is only natural to eat what is dead, and we ate my ears. I've heard some ducks quack but I didn't hear this one. I have troubles hearing, you see."

Hundreds of the staring creatures lined up before me. Their rumbling grew louder for the time I was taking. The scale seemed so high now, like the peak of some sharp mountain or the throne of a king.

-"D'you feel guilty?" said the duck, its beady eyes suddenly intense, the blue light glimmering through the sharpness of their spheres.

-"d'you feel guilty?" he angrily continued, his beak opening but his body sitting still "or did you just kinda remember?"

I could not believe how dark it was getting. Surely the sun should have come up by now. But no, it didn't. No, the streetlight kept on buzzing and the people were still queuing and more intensely dark and staring, while the duck talked and talked, of tales of cowardice and cruelty. 

-"Did you think your cynicism would help you? Did you think watching them as the butcher watched me would give you that higher standing? 

You're like him ain't you, you've never heard them quack. Your ears were cut off as a child."

I could not reason with the bird nor explain the predicament I was in, and I suppose none of my words could excuse it either. Why was I here if I did not want it? With each passing accusation, I was struck deeper in the filling shadows.

And in this now empty space, the butcher watched on in the corner, with empty eyes, offering nothing of comfort nor judgment.

Thankful for this final blank human page, I understood how much I had received, and how much I had left to pay.

And thus, I offered him my arm to cut up to pieces.

"You took a bit of my breast" I said to the man, "it's not good being greedy".

Then, for the first time, I saw the man smile, a truly warm and inviting smile, difficultly made by stretching his ever-present scars.

-"T'is the way of the world, isn't it?"

And as he said so, the cold cold air seemed a little warmer, and the staring crowd seemed a little closer and I smiled in response, a true smile, as my vision faded in the ever growing darkness.

And I imagine the duck still sat, still sat, on that throne of judgement so high in the endless night, as the dark crowd cheered on or found something else to stare at.

Yeah! My story. I imagine it well like that.