To Spain, to see Rodrigo, about the car, he might've had the spare part, he didn't, he shrugged, so we went to other place, who did, and negotiated some kind of tax-free cash-only pick-it-up-later deal. Back in France for lunch. Girls sit on folding chairs under the motorway bridges and at the truck stops. The border is unmanned, except for when it isn't.
A few days of rain and the river went turbo. Brown and deafening and slurping the footbridge. New thin waterfalls came out to join it and washed rocks into the road. Helmets were considered. Trees went missing.
After that the wind, snapping branches and bullying phone poles and leaving chestnut mess.
A walnut fell on me, in its fat green jacket, right between my shoulderblades. I looked round thinking there must be a maniac throwing apples and laughing, then I realised I was collecting walnuts, during walnut season, from under a walnut tree.
Back to Spain, for the part. It's surprising how much Spanish they speak. Vishnu did most of the talking, and also all the rest of the talking. I nodded and furrowed my brow and drove round the scrapyard, past the sunken vans and the conefaced three-legged creosote dog, and they loaded the part in the back and the car went considerably slower.
In reception waiting for the woman to get off the phone so we could pay, Vishnu went outside for a piss, directly under the camera that was linked to the screen I was looking at.
We paid and went back to France.