by Hannah Hoare
The van winds up the hill swinging round one broad S-bend after another and Perran’s stomach lurches at every one. It’s partly motion-sickness, but it’s nerves too. He’s been doing this for more than a year but his intestines still get tangled before a flight. The radio plays some American pop music which he doesn’t recognise, and anyway the lyrics are drowned out by the hubbub of conversation. He never joins in with the banter but prefers to sit quietly and focus, running through the take-off in his head. He calls to mind the feeling: the moment the wing rises and stretches above him; the moment he feels the pressure of the wind through his brake-lines; the run, always awkward with a passenger, and then that breathtaking moment when he steps into air. He always pedals his legs a few times. The others laugh at him but sometimes the wind is tricking you and you dip back down and need to push off the mountain again. If you’re not ready… well, he’s seen many pilots bump down on their backsides and mess up a take-off like that.
It takes twenty-seven minutes to get to the top and by the time the van comes to a halt Perran’s butterflies have settled. He steps out of the warm, plasticky fug and breathes in the cool scent of salt and cedar. Cloud hangs on the mountain’s shoulders, but it will lift soon enough. Perran lights a cigarette and walks to a broad, concreted patch of slope. Plenty of room, though it’ll soon be crowded. There are always dozens of people elbowing for space at take-off, mostly tandem pilots, like him, with jittery clients. Paragliding is big business here; a twenty-minute flight over the bay is a once-in-a-lifetime thing for most people, something to tick off the bucket list. He still can’t quite believe he gets to do it as a job. He always thought he’d work with his father, driving an airport taxi, ferrying tourists into town. He rode along with Baba now and again when he was a small boy and the memory still causes him to glow with pleasure. He’d wave maniacally at aeroplanes roaring upwards, never dreaming he would one day look down on the world himself. He’d listen crumple-browed to incomprehensible foreigners who never spoke a word of Turkish and usually over-tipped Baba because they didn’t have a clue how much the lira was worth. In between trips, while they waited for the next flight to arrive, there were endless games of okey and glasses of sweet tea at the café behind the taxi rank. The men smoked black tobacco and moaned about the price of petrol, and the waiter slipped Perran an extra sugar lump. Baba still drives his taxi, and bores every passenger with a sales pitch. “Best thing to do in Turkey,” he says. “Very excellent, very beautiful. Ask for Perran, my son.” He taps his chest proudly. “My son. Flies like…” He pauses. “What is your favourite bird?”
Swallow, they might say, or blue jay. Or eagle.
“My son, flies like eagle”.
“Let’s have a smoke, Perran.” It’s Temel, bumming a fag as usual. Perran tosses him the packet and his lighter. He’s known Temel since they were at school; he’s a couple of years older and it was he who taught Perran to fly, and got him this job. “Flying is good for your soul,” he used to say, “but also for your head. It’s about decision-making. Do you want to sit on your arse your whole life and grow a belly like your father’s, or do you want to use your brain?”. Temel can have as many cigarettes as he likes. They smoke in silence. The hill slopes steeply away below them, the concrete take-off quickly giving way to scree, then boulders. To their right a huge spur juts out. It’s mostly hidden by cloud now, but Perran knows every contour. When the time comes, he’ll fly out well clear and turn to pass it, and a few seconds later he’ll be able to see the bay. He remembers the first time he saw it from the air. A huge horseshoe gouged out of the coastline, a perfect inlet. He was so high that the wide, curved beach whose gritty sand was always spattered with leather-skinned sun-bathers looked empty and pristine. A different planet. And beyond… that was what was so enthralling: the stretch of the ocean seemed infinite, a luminous stripe of reflected sunlight pulling him towards the horizon. But then Temel was there, carving a tight three-sixty around him and waving towards the beach. When they landed a few minutes later Temel was shaking with anger and fear. “Are you crazy Perran? There are no thermals over the ocean. Once you go too far, you’ll never make it back to land. And if your wing goes in it’ll fill with water and drag you under. You want to die? Fly out to sea.”
The metallic growl of a van door sliding open snaps him back to the present. Ozan is here with the clients. Eager, excitable, babbling tourists. Perran braces himself. He speaks pretty good English but he has a thick accent which foreigners find hard to understand, especially if English isn’t their first language. Talking is tiring. Today the clients are Japanese; seventeen of them, boys and girls. They look like teenagers but they could be in their twenties. A holiday after finishing university perhaps. Ozan starts allocating each of them a pilot. Temel clocks the prettiest girls and cajoles Ozan to pair him up with a beauty. “Give me that tall one with the pigtails and I’ll make sure she comes back for more.”
It’s the same every trip. Sometimes it works and Ozan seems to take pleasure in handing over a stunner to the twinkling Temel, right under the nose of her queasy-looking fiancé. But often Ozan’s got a beetle up his backside and is in no mood to be playful. Today is one of those days. Temel gets the chubbiest of the Japanese boys, easily ten kilos heavier than any of the others. Perran winces as Temel rolls his eyes dramatically. It’s so rude. But the boy doesn’t seem to notice. He beams and makes Temel pose for a selfie. Ozan approaches Perran, propelling a slender girl who looks as though she’d rather be at home with a book than preparing to fly off a Turkish mountain.
“This is Perran. My best pilot. Just for you.” It’s Ozan’s standard patter; he’s said it to every other client this morning, about every other pilot.
“Hello,” says Perran.
“Hi.”
“First time paragliding?”
The girl smiles politely but looks blank.
“First time fly?” He points at the sky.
She twigs, and nods.
“Don’t be nervous.” Perran speaks slowly. “You’ll love it. Ozan is right, I am the best pilot. My father says I fly like a bird.”
She smiles again, more broadly. “Yes. Bird.” She flaps her arms.
A breeze tickles around them; the cloud is disintegrating into wisps. The girl’s smile fades, and she shivers. She’s wearing a t-shirt the same sharp blue as the sky, with a pair of cat’s eyes and some whiskers on it. And a tiny pair of yellow shorts.
“Here…” Perran reaches into his bag and pulls out a black sweatshirt. “Put this on.”
It won’t make much difference. Why Ozan doesn’t make sure people dress better for this is anyone’s guess. It’s sweltering down in the bay where the hills stand guard on three sides, cutting off the wind and bouncing heat back down to the beach. But up here, six thousand feet above the shops and bars and ice-cream stalls, the breeze is cold. And when they take off and push out over the turquoise water it’ll be freezing. The sweatshirt reaches almost to her knees.
“Okay, let’s get you clipped in.” He helps her into the harness, slipping straps over her narrow shoulders, and fastening clips at her chest and legs. He pulls them tight and checks them. “Don’t touch these,” he says. “Very important. Only me.”
“You,” she says. “Best pilot. Bird.” She’s smiling again.
He grins. She’s very sweet. And behind that goofy pair of Hello Kitty glasses her eyes are dark and earnest.
There’s a cheer. The first pilot takes off, his red-and-blue-striped wing fluttering as it fills with air and surges off the mountain. The passenger squeals with delight and mock terror, and her friends wave and take photos with their phones. Another brightly-coloured wing pops up, then sails off the hill to another chorus of encouraging shouts.
“See,” says Perran. “Easy. Come on.” He finds a clear spot and rolls out his wing –corn-cob yellow vivid against the dusty ground. A network of thin lines runs neatly to two fat karabiners on his harness. He shrugs on the rig, snapping buckles and tugging at each one, double-checking they’re fast. Then he clips the girl’s harness in front of his own, pinning her to him. Once airborne she’ll sit comfortably between his knees, but on the ground they’re clumsy and embarrassed by the closeness. Her hair smells of coconuts. “Ready? When I say run, you run. Okay?”
“Ouch,” she says, fiddling with straps digging into her thighs.
“I know,” says Perran, “but it will be fine once we’re in the air. You’ll sit in the harness and the straps won’t bite anymore.” Out of the corner of his eye, Perran can see the chubby boy coming towards them with a tiny video camera. “Okay, here we go. Your friend is filming. Smile for the camera.” He tugs at his lines and deftly spreads the wing across the ground. It catches the breeze and begins to inflate. He loves this moment. His wing is suddenly alive; no longer an inanimate bundle of cloth, but a breathing being. It quivers impatiently. “Yes, here we go my friend,” he murmurs.
He lifts the risers and the wing arcs joyfully into the air. Perran tries to run. The girl does not run. She sits. Perran takes a few steps down the slope, and staggers. Even her small frame is too much dead weight. He pulls the brake-lines and the wing collapses around them, disappointed. The girl looks confused.
“Sorry, but I can’t take off if you sit down. You have to run until we are in the air. Understand? Keep running. Don’t sit till I say. Don’t worry, we can have another go. Go back to the top and I’ll bring the wing.” Perran releases her harness from his, and points back up the slope. Temel comes to help gather up the glider, once more inert and unwieldy.
“Come on Perran. No time to fluff today, the wind’s picking up.” If it gets too windy to fly Ozan will have to give refunds, and Ozan hates giving refunds. And if you fluff your launch twice, he’ll dock your wages. They carry the wing to the top of the take-off, and Perran hitches the girl’s harness to his again.
“Okay. Better luck this time. But keep running, yes?” He cycles two fingers in front of her face.
She smiles and nods, and blushes slightly. “Yes, run. Okay.”
Perran takes a deep breath and lifts the wing above their heads once more. He feels the pressure, and runs. And this time the girl runs too. A few steps are all it takes and their feet are off the ground. Perran lifts one knee to nudge the girl gently back into her seat. And in that instant, everything changes.
She slips. Perran’s butterflies come crashing back. Not fluttering but pounding their wings in panic, thumping against his insides. She’s not clipped in. She should be snuggly secured in front of him, but instead she has slipped down almost to his ankles, her legs dangling in nothingness. One arm is caught over the front strap of the harness, her elbow bent awkwardly, her hand gripping so hard her knuckles are turning white. He grabs for her but she’s out of his reach and in trying he just yanks the controls. The glider veers wildly towards the craggy, limestone spur. He’s never been so close to it – pale and pockmarked, every rock poised to shatter bones. Instinctively Perran turns his body away, shifting his weight and steering the glider out to the valley. He flails his legs, trying to loop them round her, trying to grip her somehow, anyhow. But he can’t get purchase and all he does is kick her. She starts to cry. Perran wants to cry too. He should speak; reassure her that this often happens, that he’ll have it sorted in a jiffy. But he can’t form the words. How is she not clipped in? He checked. He always checks. Did he? Their second take-off, did he check again? The straps were pinching her; it would be the most natural thing in the world to undo them as she walked up the hill. Did he not check? He forces the thought away. Temel’s voice is loud in his head. “Paragliding is all about making decisions. Use your brain.” Use your brain, Perran. Think. It will take at least ten minutes to fly out and spiral down to the beach… can she hold on that long? Probably not. Her fingers are going blue. He swivels his head, craning to see in every direction, searching for somewhere to land. The mountainside is a hundred feet below, giddyingly steep and chaotically strewn with rocks. And then he sees it. The ocean. That glimpse of the bay he always loves. Of course. He must try and make it out over the ocean. How long will it take? Six minutes maybe? Five? It’ll be a hell of a drop but landing in water is surely better than hitting the ground. His heart lifts. He’s got a plan; it’s going to be okay. If she can just hold on.
She can’t. She makes no sound at all as she falls. All Perran can hear is the blood in his own ears. He can see no clawing hands or wild eyes; just a baggy, black sweatshirt billowing slightly over a pair of thin, pale legs. For a delirious moment he thinks it’s slowing her fall like a parachute. But then it sags as it hits the ground and the legs flip up, cartoon-like, and swing to one side, pulling the sweatshirt after them. The bundle tumbles once, twice, and abruptly stops against a boulder the size of a washing machine. The legs stick out at odd angles.
Perran circles above. He tries to remember his last moment of happiness. The surge of dopamine as his feet danced off the surface of the earth. But try as he might to crystalise that split second of joy, to cast it in amber like a mosquito suspended for eternity in a dollop of golden sap, he cannot hold the memory clear of the horror that came next. The shocking jolt as the girl slipped, and scrabbled, and whimpered. Never will he have one without the other.
So many lives have just been cracked apart. He thinks of Temel, standing on the mountain, watching his protégé, his friend, do the unthinkable. Did he see the girl drop? Perran hopes not. He can’t bear to share such a shameful, sordid thing with anyone. But of course people saw. He thinks of the chubby boy with his video camera. He’ll have more than seen, and he’ll carry his terrible souvenir home to the girl’s family. Perran never even asked her name. He thinks of his father. He remembers how nervous he was telling Baba about his job as a paraglider pilot. He’d braced himself for that disappointed frown, the one he used to get when he’d dropped a grade at school or kicked a football through a neighbour’s window. The other boys got the belt but Baba never did that. Just frowned and smoothed his big moustache, and shook his head. Sometimes Perran thought he’d have preferred a beating. But when he broke the news that he wouldn’t need the second-hand taxi Baba had saved up for because he’d got a job flying tourists off the mountain Baba didn’t frown; he threw his arms around his son and gave him a hug that squeezed the air out of his lungs. Then he kissed his cheeks and said he was so proud. “My son, flying like a bird… who would think? Who would think.” Perran knows he can never again hold his father’s gaze. He looks out to the horizon. There’s no trace of the morning’s cloud and it’s impossible to tell where the sky stops and the water begins. He leans to the left, curling his glider around to face the ocean, and starts flying out to sea.
****
A year to the day later, a taxi rounds a bend and the young couple in the back get their first view of the bay. The water is every bit as blue as the brochure and out of the perfect, cloudless sky bright paraglider wings zigzag their way to the beach.
“Oh my god Jules, we gotta have a go at that. It’s gotta be so awesome to see the world like a bird!”
“You know my favourite bird?” says the driver.
“I’m sorry?”
“Albatross.”
“Uh-huh,” says the girl, crossing her eyes at her boyfriend, who whistles softly and taps his temple.
“Albatross can fly forever. Never comes to land.”
“Um… I’m not sure…” The girl catches sight of the driver’s face in the rear-view mirror, and reads such sorrow in it that the smile is wiped from her own.
“Albatross flies for joy and finds all he needs up there. He sees the world below and knows he cannot be happy down here. Albatross flies forever. My son,” the taxi driver says, laying his hand on his chest, “flies like albatross.”
Hannah Hoare is a television producer specialising in natural history filmmaking. She began writing fiction her mid-forties and her short stories have been published online by Molotov Cocktail, FlashBack Fiction and The Cabinet of Heed. She lives in the chalk downs of Wiltshire, in southern England
