Stranger tour

   I had just met him but I didn’t want to walk around a whole new city without someone to tell me what was what. You see, I had arrived in Barcelona only recently and I’m one those people that understands things better when someone else is explaining. I get lost easily when I’m all by myself but I learn rather fast, which has always helped me get through things. Anyhow, I was having my first cup of coffee today and this guy was just really nice and I just asked him if he could show me the city. I know, he could have been a serial killer or something. Actually, it would have been worst if he had just said no but he was very nice and gave me his number, asking me to send him a message at night to see what he could do for me and my request.

 I did write to him from my phone and he answered rather quickly. He explained that he wasn’t from Barcelona either and that he understood how nervous I was for being in a new city so he proposed to go out the following weekend and show me the places that he thought would help me get to know the city. The weekend was only two days away so the wait was very short. He came to my place, where I had recently moved. I offered him a cup of coffee but he said he would rather start right away. He seemed very serious and not in the mood to talk, so I didn’t say a word. We just walked a few blocks until we got to a subway station. There was a map where he explained me where everything was: downtown, Montjuic, the industrial areas, the beaches, the mountains and the bars and discos.

 We entered the station and he bought my ticket, in order to show me how it all worked. That part was fun because I knew how the system worked, I had traveled from the airport in the metro. But I decided not to say anything because he seemed a little bit fed up with the whole concept of explaining all these menial things to an idiot from another country. We sat down side by side in the train but wouldn’t even look at each other. Maybe it was best if I just let him go and be miserable alone, because I didn’t wanted my own weekend to be spoiled. I would just walk around and people would help me. I had noticed people were very nice so maybe that was my real thing. I had no idea when or how I had decided to ask that from a stranger.

 The train stopped and he got out so I did the same. He walked rather fast so it was difficult to keep up with his pace. When we came out of the station, I realized I had been there before: it was the main square of the city called Plaza Cataluña. There were lots and lots of people everywhere but I decided not to be still for too long because my companion had already started walking away. I followed him to the Rambla, trying to get to where he was but it was impossible. After a while, I didn’t see him anymore. Fe up with the attitude, I just stopped and went back to the square. The climate was getting a bit colder.

 About fifteen minutes later, my phone rang. It was a call, not a message or a text. And it was him because I could see the name “Coffee guy” on the screen. I smiled because I didn’t even know his name and decided not to answer. But he tried two more times so I finally decided to pick it up. He asked me where I was and why I hadn’t followed him. I told him he seemed too distracted and too pissed off at something or someone and that I didn’t have time to waste so I thanked him for his help and just hung up. But he called again and asked again where I was. I told him I was at a bar, drinking a beer. He got to the bar and, again, didn’t say a word when he sat down beside me. He didn’t ask anything for himself and I just wasn’t in the mood to ask some stranger what was up with his life.

 Then, he started saying he had had a tough week. Apparently, he had been into a number of interviews for jobs he would have wanted to get but he got none of them. I told him that maybe he had been just awful in the interviews but he replied that he had been relaxed and charming and had answered everything rapidly and kindly. He just didn’t got why they wouldn’t pick him. I didn’t say anything else. I just sipped my beer and looked at all the glasses and things the barman had behind him. The coffee guy then told me to go on with the tour but I told him I had decided not to tour anything with someone whose name I didn’t even know. He then told me his name was Evan and that he needed to walk around or he would keep thinking about the jobs that didn’t happen.

 I just gulped down the beer, closed my jacket and walked outside, not saying a word to him. Evan decided to be nicer and started talking as we walked, explaining the history he knew about the place and his impressions when he had first come to the city. At first, I wasn’t talking at all but he was trying so hard I decided to give in and have a decent Saturday. We walked through the Gothic neighborhood and the historic center, we went by the zoo and Evan promised to take me soon and then we got to the first and most popular beach in the city, la Barceloneta. Not many people were there, possibly because the wind was now colder but some were reading or just playing around in the sand.

 We got back into the city, walking along a big avenue and seeing old buildings. I took pictures with my phone and Evan decided to surprise me by getting into some of the shots. We decided to have lunch in a fast-food place and there I had one of the best moments since I had left my home. He was very kind and shared his frustration for not getting any of the jobs. He told me was still getting a masters degree but that he wanted to be able to earn money and just have a living. He told me he lived some blocks away fro me and that he had thought that by going out with me he could forget his frustration.

I just told him I understood what was happening and that I had gone through the same thing over and over in the past. But finally someone silly enough had hired me and now I was working in that beautiful city. He laughed, saying I didn’t even know if it was beautiful but I told him it was love at first sight. He just laughed and told me that wasn’t totally out of the question and that he wanted me to fall in love harder so he decided to take me to the other beaches after lunch. The wind was very cold and the ocean had turned into a grey puddle but we just stood in a pier and watched the weather happen for at least a half hour.

 During our time there, we didn’t talked very much. I noticed he was sad again, all of a sudden, so I decided to let it go for the moment. We walked towards the nearest subway station and then he started talking to me about how hard it had been for him the first weeks. That was not because of the city but because he had never left his house before and he had a hard time not seeing his mother and father whenever he wanted or not having his sibling to have fun with. He was all alone and he told me he had remembered the feeling as we walked down the pier. He talked to them every day but it was not the same. You always miss family, he said. And I knew he was right.

  After a transfer, I realized we where in a higher neighborhood. He told me that daylight was going to fade soon so he wanted my first tour day to end fantastically. So he just made me walk behind him through some steep streets until we got to a park. It was Park Güell and I had seen it in TV before. I had wanted to visit it and had no idea that’s where Evan was taking me. It was a nice walked inside the premises, taking a lot more pictures and now making Evan pose in some of them. We took very good pictures and he told me there was something else he could do for me. So we went up a road I had not seen before and he took my hand in order not to get lost, because the sun was setting and darkness was starting to settle.

 We finally got to the top where I was able to see the whole city in front of me. I could see downtown, I could see the neighborhood were I was living now and also some other features I hadn’t noticed before. The sunset’s light made it all look even more beautiful. We just stood there for several minutes until I noticed the artificial lights went on and the sun had totally disappeared. Then, as we came down the hill towards the park, I realized I was still holding Evan’s hand but he hadn’t noticed or maybe he didn’t care so we just kept it like that until we go to the subway station. He took me home and then I offered a cup of coffee again. He told me he was exhausted and wanted to rest his head but that maybe he would come for it soon enough.

 He left and I got in and I realize how good that day had been. I slept like a baby and was even more thrilled the next morning, when the doorbell woke me up early in the morning and it was him. He had decided he wanted coffee right then and I had decided I wanted him to come in too. That they, we held hand a lot. But that’s another story.

Crescent Moon Island

   The island was well known for being shaped like a crescent moon but it wasn’t a small island. Its geology was very different from one tip to the other. In the northern tip lived the Sunasi. They were tall with ashen skin and bright eyes. They inhabit the hills around the three volcanoes that had been dormant for about fifty years. The Sunasi were a warrior people, getting pride from their conquests and their killings. They held a larger territory than their neighbors and had sent explorer to many islands to the north. Some were handled as colonies and the Sunasi got to trade with other tribes as they held monopoly over cinnamon and clover, two spices the rest of the world seemed to crave.

 In the other side of the island lived a smaller tribe of very different people. They were called the Bonio but that wasn’t a name that they used to describe themselves. They had no name to call themselves because they did not consider that to be an important thing. They adored the god of the sea and lived of it, fishing daily and having small but efficient sea farms where they would grow a special seaweed that had a nice taste but also oysters, which grew very large. The women would carry on necklaces or on rings the pearls they found in the ocean and the men lived for their women, as they had a very special place for them in their mythology.

 The two peoples of Crescent Moon Island lived in peace. They knew about each other but they had agreed, without ever saying a word, to ignore one another and let them be. Funny enough, sometimes they looked at each other for long distances and the ones that were most interested were the children, as they had no understanding of the world. Any way, tip and tip were close enough to sometimes see people do things on the other side. But it was rare as the Sunasi only hunted in their southern shore and the Bonio never fished in the inner lagoon of the island.

Actually, by the mid-section of the island, there was a small area only populated by animals and palm trees. The Sunasi were closed but something had kept them from conquering more of the island. The Bonio, not interested in growing as a nation, had never had any weird encounters or things happen to then in the palm tree forest. The Sunasi that came back from explorations of that area, said they had seen red eyes float in front of them and that voices had talked to them inside their heads, telling them to go away and never come back.

The Sunasi elders thought this was another deity; one related to the ground that wanted to make sure that no one crossed a certain point of the island. Some had concluded that the gods had put two tribes in the island and had wanted to given them an equal chance at developing as a grand nation. So each one had received half of the island but only the Sunasi were interested in conquering and growing larger. Due to this occurrence, they decided early on to leave their neighbors alone, as they posed no threats.

 But then something unexpected happened. The Bonio had small boats to fish every day, all day. They never went to far but one particular day the wind was blowing hard and the ocean seemed angry. The fisherman returned to the island or at least tried to because of the boats had disappeared because of the storm. It had been carried far into the ocean, to the southeast, were they had no idea if there were fish or any other type of food. They were only three men and they were scared. They waited until the night fell and decided to follow the stars back to the island. The weather had changed to a more pleasant one and after some hours hope begun to settle in.

 That was until they saw what they saw. They were probably some one hundred kilometers from their home when they saw the largest fleet of vessels they had ever seen. There were very big and would probably be carrying thousands of people. Counting fast was easy and they counted twenty vessels, apparently anchored in that area. They tried to remain out of their sight but as they did they saw the canons in some boats and the men, bearded, very tall men walking on the ships. The Bonio men decided to use all of their strength with the oars in order to get home fast, and they did by next morning.

 Their wives and children came to hug and kissed them but they needed to speak to the elders first and with the priestess. The temple was a normal hut located farther towards the palm tree forest than any other Bonio house. The elders, two men and a woman, and the priestess, heard what the men had to say, that many ships were very near the island and could be there in less than a few hours. The fishermen urged the wise men to do something, as these explorer or warriors or whatever they were, came prepared with big guns and lots of people.

 The elders and the priestess asked them to leave, as they would consider what they had heard. The priestess began to do a potion that would enable her to see all that happened in the ocean and around it. The elders saw her dance and sing and drink her beverage. She said, in hoarse voice, that the Sunasi had conquered another small island to the northwest but that she saw something bigger. The god of the ocean was angry, as people had begun throwing things in it, polluting it with many things. The god knew these people came from a far away continent and they were seeking riches and land to conquer, as they were warriors but far more advanced than the Sunasi would ever be. And what was worst: they were coming. They didn’t know about the Bonio, the Sunasi or the island but they were coming.

When the elders came out of the temple, leaving the priestess to calm down after channeling all of that information, they decided to reunite all the people by the beach. They were about a hundred and they all heard the horrible news. But they also heard a bold proposal by one of the elders: a messenger should be sent to the Sunasi in order for the island to unite against the common enemy. A man in the crowd volunteered to go and talk to the Sunasi and make them realize what the danger was.

The next day, he traveled to their northern shore and crossed the lagoon by swimming. It wasn’t too long before he made it to the other side, where the sand of the beach was darker. He entered the forest and knew Sunasi warriors would be close enough. And just as he thought that, two bowmen fell from the trees in front of him, another from behind. They pointed at him with angry faces and were ready to shoot. But then he said the god of the ocean had a message and that he needed to speak with their elders. The Sunasi’s main god was the one in the volcanoes but ignoring a message from a god was not wise so they took him to the elders, where he explained the situation.

 The elders decided that the Bonio had a very honorable tribe and that they would let the man go back to his family. Then, something like an explosion came from the palm tree forest. As the main town of the Sunasi was on a hill, they could see the smoke emanating from the forest. It was the invaders who had arrived by bombing the forest, chopping hundreds of palm trees with one shot. That hurt the elders, as they knew that forest was sacred and now it was on fire. The Sunasi rapidly organized and asked the Bonio man to o back to his tribe and ask them to organize to attack the invaders. The idea was for the Bonio to attack by sea and the Sunasi by land. The Bonio were not very sophisticated but they would create a diversion to distract the invaders fleet.

 By the next day, in broad daylight, the first warriors of the Sunasi, arrived at the forest and massacred hundreds of invaders. Some wore armors but they were weak and overconfident. The Bonio then did their part, attacking the vessels with coconuts and harpoons. The also used their fishing nets to trap some of the men and then killed them. They took a couple of boats and then launched an attack with those towards the rest of the fleet.

 The battle was brutal and lasted for several days. The invaders were resilient and seemed to be coming in higher number than any of the men of Crescent Moon Island thought possible. But one by one, carefully and with cunning, the two tribes repelled the attack. Hundred, even thousands of corpses, now floated in the ocean or soiled the sacred forest, which had almost completely disappeared. Now, one could one from one shore to the other and not stumble upon a single palm tree. And then, the Sunasi starting praying as the red eyes and voices had come back. They had forgotten about this detail and they just left for their hills and homes, running away from the mess that the battle had left.

 But the Bonio were not affected and it was them who cleaned up, who put the invaders corpses in their remaining boats and burned them. They prayed for their souls and returned to their villages. The day after the battle had ended, a Bonio woman swam across the lagoon and left a gift for the Sunasi: a sculpture of the god of the volcanoes made with the armor of an invader.

 Their alliance had been sealed and Crescent Moon Island would grow stronger and prouder of their might and will to survive.

Thoughts by the water

   The beach was almost empty but that did not matter. I stood there for a long time, looking at the ocean and just thinking and thinking about everything: my family, what I was doing there, the chances of meeting someone to fall in love with, job opportunities and so many other things I can’t even remember. After a while, I sat down on one of the many steps of the stairs that lead people from the park to the beach and just sat there for at least an hour. During that time, the climate change from bad to worst and I could see a storm forming over the ocean, not very far. It looked awful but I didn’t care. Or maybe I did but wasn’t afraid, I don’t remember which one it was.

 After a long time there, I decided to walk the few blocks that separated myself from the metro station. And during that time, maybe ten minutes, I kept thinking about all of that again. At some point, after validating my ticket in the station, I found myself being bored out of my mind by my own thoughts. Why was I so melancholic or depressed or whatever it was? It wasn’t unheard of for me to be like that but it was never that deep, that strange either. When the train came, I sat down on a chair by the window and just looked out the window to the darkness outside and the passing stations.

 That weird state almost made me lose my station but I “woke up” just in the right moment to descend the train and almost run up the stairs. By then, I just wanted to get home and to my bed. I walked some more blocks and almost didn’t realize it was already raining and thunders could be heard in the far distance. But somehow, I didn’t really care. Normally, I would have been shaken by the sound of thunder but this time it was as if nothing was happening. The journey in the elevator towards the top floor seemed eternal but when I got to my door I felt kind of a warmth feeling, maybe from finally being in a place I called home, where I could be safe and in peace.

 It was an odd thing to think because I could be safe in many other places but there I was feeling like I just had saved myself from the apocalypse or something like that. I actually felt relieved to get off my coat and walk into my room, where my bed seemed to be waiting for my arrival. I just let my body fall on the bed and I closed my eyes, trying to avoid thinking about anything. I was successful in my attempt to do so because I fell asleep quite fast, something I wasn’t usually able to do at that time of day. I only slept for three hours but it was enough to feel recharged and less pessimistic and emotional.

 It was already night when I sat in the bed and took off my clothes. The general heating system of the building had been lit up and the climate had changed to a more cozy one that at the time of my arrival. I stayed just in briefs for a moment until I realized I lived alone and anyone looking at my windows would be a person freezing in the outside. I actually walked towards the window and almost missed the street below as the rain, and the mist that came with it, had invaded the city, making only things that were incredibly close visible. I caressed my arms and then walked out to the kitchen. MY apartment was small: bedroom, living room with kitchen on a side and a bathroom. But it was more than enough for just me.

 I heated up microwave lasagna I had left and, as it was cooking, I grabbed myself a beer from the refrigerator. I probably gulped down half of the can’s content before I started eating but I guess that was because I was dry from three hours of sleep. I had no TV so I took the lasagna and the beer to my room. There I turned on my laptop and looked for something fun to watch. I smiled and even laughed while eating so my trick to get back on the bright side of life worked, as it often did. I thought of those moments down at the beach, but couldn’t really explain them. I had just stay there to think and nothing more.

 It is true that my life is not the most exciting one in the world but I thinking so much about it was useless and pointless. I had a small job that paid badly and I was trying to look for a better one but for now nothing had come up. Somehow people saw my resume and said “no” because I have no experience. But how could I have any experience if I’ve never even been hired, not from the age of eighteen when I started looking for work. Not my fault in any case but here we are. I had to tell myself that, eventually, something would come up and I could be improving my life in that aspect. I didn’t want to be dependent from my parents forever.

 I love them and I missed them. For a moment there, eating lasagna, drinking beer and watching a silly show online, I was reminded of them again and this time a couple of tears went down my cheeks, one on each side. I really missed them a lot and there where not near, not near at all. They lived across the ocean and we hadn’t been able to talk for a few days because of damage to their Internet network or something. It had been painful because every couple of days I chatted with them put the camera on and tell them about my day and they would tell me about theirs and so one. Maybe that was to blame for how I felt but maybe it was just a part of a bigger thing.

 I finished my lasagna and my beer so I went to the kitchen to throw it all to the garbage bin and to take another beer from the refrigerator. I took two steps away from the kitchen but turned back and took another beer can because I knew I wanted to be at least a little drunk to sleep. After many years of getting to know myself, I realized that when I was drunk I never had awful nightmares, not even nice little dreams filled with hope and joy. I just didn’t have any or didn’t remember. Whatever it was, it was fine with me and hat was what I needed on that rainy day: to stop thinking and just sleep. I opened of the cans and started drinking when I heard a silly music playing. When it stopped, I realized it was my cellphone.

 I looked for it in my pants, which had been lying on the floor, and checked the missed calls list. Shit… To add more fun to the party that was that day, my ex-boyfriend had called, probably because I always forgot about that stupid watch he had once left in my house and now he tormented me with it. When we broke up, I took everything that was his from my apartment and just left it in his doorstep, without even ringing at his door to say “Hi” or anything of the sort. I just wanted to get it over with and move one. But apparently I had missed that stupid watch, which was able to avoid my cleaning by being stuck behind one of my bed’s “legs”. Now I had it but I had no urge to give it to him. If he wanted, and I had already told him this, he had to come for it.

 You would think that a person that you find having sex with someone else would be at least a little bit ashamed of he’s behavior but no, he wasn’t like that. He didn’t care at all about those “little” things and was just obsessed about that ugly watch. I had never been very lucky with men but that time I really missed it by a long shot. He was a handsome guy, true, but that should have alerted me. He was too close to the ideal men, in body at least, and those kind of men had never even been close to me so there was my red flag and I didn’t even care to see it.

 Anyway, I still thought about it. Not about him because I realized I had never really cared about him as a person, nor as a lover to be honest. But we had a good thing going on about how we spent time together and that was something very nice to have. But those six months were over and now I was in my briefs drinking beer and watching cartoons. Of course, I still wanted to find a person to actually care for, someone I could hug and kiss whenever I wanted and for that person to want to do that with me too, someone to comfort me in a day like that one and for me to hug tight whenever he felt weird or sad. But who knows if that will ever come my way.

 I think it’s better not to torture oneself with what could have been. That’s one more of those useless things. I decided to stop think and just drank the third can of beer like a professional, almost without breathing and just gulping it down as if my life depended on it. I turned off all the lights and just looked to the window, where the rain was still falling heavy on the street and all over the city. It was a nice thought to think that many people near me and maybe further away were having a similar moment, just looking out through the window before falling asleep. It was comforting somehow.

 I closed my eyes and, before I fell asleep for another eight hours, I thought of the men I would like to have in my arms, the job I would be proud of, my family and how their hugs felt and a future where nothing mattered, only my true happiness.

After

Stepping on the sand, feeling it beneath our feet, it was different. We had been walking along the road for such a long time that we had forgotten what it felt not wearing any shoes, any clothing except underwear.

We were six people, three women and three men, and we had been wandering the country for almost a month. We had begun walking because all the cities had been destroyed, devastated by war. Bombings and attack troops and orbital bombardment. All done because of many wanting the same: rule over the world.

But the world couldn’t be ruled, not by only one person. So all the war had caused a violent reaction from nature. Pests and natural disasters had stopped the fighting and violence. So much was the catastrophe that the war had to be finished, as there were no more troops to hold an invasion, an attack or even to support a small settlement.

Our group had seen thousand of bodies on the roads, mostly of soldiers and other men of war but also from people that had flee the crisis too soon or too late.

I, for one, had stayed in the lowest part of my building, waiting for all the sound from above to stop. I had a radio, a mobile phone and a small portable television but they stopped working after the first month. I also had rations of food and batteries, a lamp and even a sleeping bag. I had been prepared.

Family? None, at least not in this city. They were far away and there was no way of knowing if they were alive or not. All transmissions had died slowly: TV stations, radio stations, satellite feed, everything stopped at some point.

So when I came out, the city were I had lived in for the last five years, was in silence, deserted almost completely. I found a few people on my way out of it and we formed this group. I had told them I needed to go to my family’s city and see if they were dead or alive, as the doubt was eating me up.

The route was a long one so we headed first to a gas station and took several maps to help us get to our destination. We also got a little cart to put all our things in and we would take turns pulling it but in the first week we were lucky enough to find farm animals, cattle and so on. So we borrowed a donkey from one of them and he has proven to be our most prized possession. 

In the group, we all have the same responsibilities and duties with each other. There’s no one that rules over others or someone that gets to do nothing. We all do, we all pull, we all feed Burrito (our donkey) and we all get food and explore the places we walk into.

The good thing is that no one ever complained or tried to be more than the others. We just got along and, to be honest, we try to speak as sparsely as we can. Sometimes there are heat waves, and fighting or talking too much during them would be fatal. We just way under a large shadow and be sure to have plenty of water.

It does seem like some things are running out, like water. We normally find gas stations or supermarkets with bottles that are still good but the natural sources seem to be running out. Just a few days ago, we saw a gigantic patch of mud on the ground. None of us had traveled the region before, but it was obvious a large lake had been there.

We ate anything that would not need frying or real cooking of any kind. We had matches and a portable cooking thingy, but the first ones ran out fast and the other worked on gas, which was not really that easy to find, so we would rather grab all the jerky we could get, ham, cheese, and so on.

Not milk, never, as it had all gone bad already. Most places we entered had that foul smell of milk gone bad. But we rapidly learned how to stand it and soon we ignored it altogether.

We traveled mainly by the roads. Not directly on them, as the heat made it annoying, but on one side, walking on grass or dirt. There were small rural roads and freeways of many lanes. But these days they all looked deserted, except for the many cars left stranded a little bit everywhere.

The tough part was when we started heading up a mountain. We had to do that to go down the other side and from there it was practically a slope towards the ocean.

The mountain was really hard for Burrito and for us. I personally feared more for the animal than for us. We had fed him well with the few fresh vegetables we had found on our way but it never seemed enough for such a creature. On the way up, he was nevertheless relentless. It was like he didn’t feel the annoying angle on which we had to walk.

There was neither snow nor nothing that cinematic, only a lot of chilly wind, trying to topple us with its strength. But after a single afternoon, we made it to the other side. Unfortunately, we had to camp up there. This time, Burrito wasn’t that strong.

We buried his body, first thing in the morning. We all cried and said a few words. A guy on the group had a Bible (he was the religious type), so he said a prayer for the animal. We owed him a lot.

Now it was us who had to pull the cart again but this time it was harder. The weather had gone significantly worse: heavy rain for three straight days and that damn wind that never stopped blowing. Not even when we got to sea level, did the weather stopped.

This moment proved to be a test for all of us. It was then we really had to meet each other, when we learned about each other and why we were doing what we were doing. It wasn’t like before, when we wouldn’t speak or even breath too loudly. Maybe it was the rain, but that had changed.

Now, during dinners, we would share stories about our past. The unspoken rule was that only one could tell his or her story per night, but the person could decide for how long they wanted to speak. At first, the stories went on for as much as fifteen minutes but, with time, we got to a story spanning several hours, during which we would eat something and enter our sleeping bags.

The road after the mountain was difficult, very rough to the legs and arms. The person pulling the cart always had the worst part, as it was too hard to do it on rocks that would move when passing on them. It was sometimes dangerous and, many times, it pulled out all the feelings people were hiding.

But that didn’t split the group; it actually made us much stronger, like a family. We were learning to live together but we knew we stood no chance if we were to take on this new world by ourselves. Without saying much, I believe love started growing among us, the kind of love you have for sisters and brothers.

Rations were getting smaller. For some reason, these roads had nowhere to find food or canned goods or nothing. For a good week, we fed very poorly, and it was starting to show. Some of us had yellowish, greenish tint on our faces, as if we were in a constant urge to vomit.

So when we finally got to the city, everyone acquired new strength. The possibilities to find food were a lot higher here than anywhere else. And we did, yes we did. We ate like pigs our first night there. We actually ate pig: a lot of preserved ham and canned beans still good. And there was water and, in a hotel, we had found an ice room still working for some reason. We played like children in there, freezing but happy.

The next day, was the day we went to the beach. And it was then, when we first felt we were alive, that we were reminded of our humanity and that our time here was not done yet.

Some walked the beach hand by hand. Others, like me, just stood there with sand up their ankles, watching the ocean. The waves, coming and going.

And there I cried again, the first time since Burrito had died, the second time since… Since I didn’t know when. I was alive but the word was dying and we all knew it.