We had read the Perseides were going to shower the skies that night and thus decided to find a place out of the city's light pollution to watch the precious St Laurent's tears.
We - me, the professor from Paris and Sarajevo - met at the Opera house at midnight on the dot and were to drive some 20 minutes to Kalmthout natural park.
Maybe the meteorites confused the notions of time and space, or maybe we were too busy telling funny stories and trying to name the movies matching with the famous film themes we were listening to, anyway, somehow, we got a bit lost in various diversions and entered Kalmthout only an hour later. The streets were empty as in a dead city and the tune that just came up was "Twisted nerve" whistling...spooky!
We drove around Creepytown in search for a person that could show us the way, and it seemed completely deserted, until we finally found the only opened bar with a woman and two men standing outside. We stopped and kindly asked for the way to the natural park. Was it for the time of the night? was it for us? was it for them? they looked at us three as if we were ugly aliens and first answered with another question : "WHAT are you going to do there?"
The three of us thought of saying the same thing... that we were going to dispose of a dead body there...but they didn't look like people with much humor, so we innocently said we were going to watch meteorites (isn't that obvious???!) so they seemed satisfied and indicated us the right direction, but kept on looking at us as if we were insane - or highly suspicious.
We finally arrived on site, parked the car, took out the blanket, the Cava bottle, the glasses that Sarajevo had brought (that girl is always prepared for everything) and headed to the forest entrance. Trees on the left, trees on the right, a small path in front and darkness all around. Sarajevo had also a good light on her front head (the one she used as the Slugexterminator, but that's another story) so we had no problem at all and stepped on the path. We didn't even walk three meters when we heard a crack in the obscurity. We stopped dead and switched off the light, our three pair of eyes peering into the blackness. A light flashed for a second in front of us. We flashed back. Flash again. Made two steps forward and three steps back as we saw two shades quickly approaching. Even the professor had lost her assurance as she whispered: "des militaires!" Sarajevo only repeated "des militaires?!".We were tempted to run away but eventually held our position strong. Two men passed us swiftly, hardly looking at us, equipped with crossbows. We turned round and watched them walk out of the forest. WTF? We should have asked them how far was the first clearing. Brave as ever, Sarajevo ran behind them saying "hello! Sorry!" and it seemed they were walking even faster as she was chasing them. She managed to catch up with them and they even answered that we had to walk 5 mn to the first open space. And right after that they jumped in their car and hurtled off on full speed.
What the hell were these two guys doing with crossbows in the forest? Were they the only ones? why did they look so scared of us? After all, we, three normal girls, were only carrying a bag with a bottle of Cava and glasses in a forest at 1 am...Were they hunters? what were they hunting? rabbits? in the middle of the night? Were we about to be the accidental rabbits of some weird hunters if we went in?
We decided to stay where we were, arguing the cloudy sky had just cleared up above our heads and going further would not help us. We were not scared at all, no no no.
So we opened the bottle, laid on the ground and were rewarded for all that effort and all these little fears. Every now and then we tripple-echoed an enthusiastic "OH! did you see it too?!" when the stars were crossing the night sky in clear bright rays, magical.
The night was cold though, so at some point we agreed on leaving right after seeing all three a last shooting star. I needed to pee though so I walked away and I just heard: "No way, keep on looking up while you pee so that you don't miss it, or just pretend you've seen it too if we shout!"
It was too late though, already half past three and the clouds were slowly taking hold of the starry heaven again.
Too bad, for if Saint Laurent was watching us that night, I'm quite sure he must have been laughing to tears.
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