It was summer. Hot, quiet, tense like the body of a doe hidden in the grass. The meadows were ripe for mowing, and the distant bells announced the evening calm. Your family talked louder and louder about weddings, about how time had come, how it was a shame to waste your youth. For now, you preferred to stay away – up in the hills, in the shade of the trees, with a basket of herbs and a head full of stories.

Until one evening he came.

A hunter. Not exactly old, but no longer a boy. In his eyes he had that strange mixture of sadness and devotion that only those who have spent many lonely years in the silence of the forest have. He carried a rifle on his shoulder, but he only had a hat in his hands and stood quietly by the fence, as if he didn’t want to disturb you.

“Sorry to disturb you…” he had said then. “There’s supposed to be a haymaking party in the lower meadow by the grove this evening. I know you have a feeling… Could you help me get through it earlier? The deer have laid their young there somewhere. I don’t want them to end up in the mower.”

You agreed. Maybe out of pity. Maybe because of the deer. And maybe because of his eyes.

Together you were silent and walked the entire meadow, step by step, in the early evening light, in the wet grass and the warm breeze. You found two fawns. Sleeping, quiet, smelling of milk and herbs. He carefully took them in his arms, you walked beside him, holding the wicker basket where he had fresh water.

When you had safely carried them to the draw, he stood and looked down into the valley.

“You know…” he said after a while. “I used to live down there with a woman. She killed herself in the winter, the sled went down a ravine. She had a baby in her belly. Since then, I’ve just been walking around here and keeping the silence.”

Silence fell. Only the lark sang again above you.

“You…” he turned to you. “You have something alive in you. I would like… not a woman right away, not right away – just someone who isn’t afraid of silence. Who looks beyond the village.”