Mars

   Although Mars had always appeared to be empty and lifeless, things were different now. For the last six months, people on Earth knew that if they stared up at the sky, some humans might be doing the same very far from them, on Global 1. That was the name of the fist Martian base in human History and was an object of pride and joy for many humans, specially those in the scientific community who had wanted this dream come true for a long time.

 Many governments had once and again postponed the so-called “colonization” of Mars namely because of budget problems and health issues. But they had never really tried to solve any of those problems. When scientists, the private sector and other countries decided it was time to pay a proper visit to the red planet, solutions were created for every single problem.

 The hardest trip was the one of the first group of people as they would never set a foot on Martian soil but they would organize everything for when others came to get them and replace them both up in the orbital station as in the new base on the ground. At first, only seven men and women orbited Mars for about two years. Occasionally, ships would come in from Earth carrying all kinds of supplies, mainly food and new equipment to help make the base and instruments to investigate the current state of the planet.

 They built everything by remote control, using last generation androids that could be controlled by computer, from the space station, and that could last for many years, even in the harsh conditions on Martian soil. It was fun to program the robots to do different things. Mainly, they acted as construction workers although these workers built their own tools and used them only when they were told to, in specific time frames and according to a long schedule that aimed for the opening of the first Martian module in a two-year time.

 The people on the station would often check that everything was properly done and proceeded with their on-site investigations as scheduled. After the first few months, they stopped automatically looking through the windows of their ship. Mars was beautiful but it was also visibly violent and the sandstorms proved difficult for the construction of their base. Many times a special robot had to be activated to “vacuum” all the sand and dirt that caused any problems to the other machines.

 Two years passes and those humans orbiting Mars were replaced by a new group, one of only five people, every single one from a different country. This was because the organization that was after the construction of the base, had to guarantee that every single contributing country had at least one representation on the base, for a short period of time. You see, they only had permit to stay a year. No astronaut could stay more than that on Mars. It wasn’t because they thought it was dangerous but because they needed to study them to see how their bodies had adapted to another planet.

 Everything was science and investigations and reports. That first group really didn’t have a lot of time to waste on having fun or merely looking at the planet they had come to visit. As they were the first group, they had to verify that everything was in good shape. The robots were great but there was nothing like two human eyes to verify everything was good for a group of people to actually live, permanently, down on the red planet.

 Half of their year, they spent it on the orbiting station and the other half on the newly inaugurated base. They transmitted to Earth the images of their celebration and every single human at that time saw their joy and their expectance for the future. One of the astronauts, a French woman, had been authorized to bring a bottle of the best wine she was able to get before leaving Earth. It was perfect for the occasion.

That day was special, not only for Humanity as a whole but for that little group because they suddenly didn’t feel like just scientist or people on a mission. They actually felt like they were home and were just celebrating someone anniversary or birthday. They had cake, a proper meal, the French wine and chatted for hours and hours. Of course, they did not spoke a word about work.

 After that, they rested nicely for the first time in a long time and the following week, even with the heavy load of work, was just the best they had on Mars. They shared observations about the planet, the messages they got from their families on Earth and the pictures of their old and new homes that a satellite, released by them, had taken recently. It was all perfect and the idea of having more and more people living there, on Mars, was just natural and almost mandatory.

 From then on groups of people would come and go and with the construction of new quarters on the Global 1, more and more people were able to stay there, for longer periods of time. Some of them weren’t even scientist or anything like that. They were just people who needed a fresh start or who had always dreamed of doing something like this. Mainly, they were adventure seekers, dying to get to know everything there was to see and do on Mars.

 With time, they were able to organize walks near the base and, years later, motorcycle rides to a near canyon and back. Of course, humans had to wear special suits but they had become much easier to wear and less constricting. When stable population passed one hundred individuals, investors from Earth decided to expand Global 1 to the first big town on Mars. Construction started ten years after the arrival of the first people on the planet and was expected to be fully completed in fifty years, making room for at least one thousand new Martians.

 Then, the first proper Martian was born. A woman and her husband had arrived a year ago to town and they had loved it so much that they had decided to stay. And apparently their eagerness for this new environment had also had other consequences, such as the birth of Juno, the first human to be a Martian. She was issued a special Martian passport and many journalists interviewed the family for the following years. She was an instant celebrity without even knowing.

 Juno was one of those who really loved to get around the city and loved even more the feel of the Martian dirt between her toes and fingers. Eventually, a suit had been designed that was only used on the face and around the waist. It would cover all of the body if the person wearing it decided to press a special button on the waist but the people that lived there for a long time had learned not to be a friend of nature. They actually felt Mars was no different than Earth and that nature had found other ways to do things there.

 The young girl grew up to be an environmentalist, opposed to the exploitation of various natural resources found on Mars such as nitrogen, lithium and titanium, all very important for future buildings on Mars and Earth. But Juno had learned the beauty of her homeland and fought the ruling committee of Mars on every turn. Even people on Earth were backing her organization, calling for someone to control what the private sector tried to do off world, due to the lack of clarity of the law.

 But the mining for many resources had already began, in remote areas, and it was fuelling the creation of a new space station around the planet, that would allow humans to take the next step in their cosmic journey: their arrival on the Jovian system. Jupiter was key to travel beyond their system, if that was ever to be attempted and many organizations on Earth were eager to do that and, of course, to get their hands on the massive resources of the Jovian moons.

 Suddenly, many people on Global 1, now called Bellona, were beginning to think about a new adventure, the worlds of possibilities that were about to be opened to them. It wasn’t a surprise that, on Juno’s elderly years, Bellona had seen a flux of emigration like none before. Some stayed and people kept coming from Earth but the new hotspot of their system was Assaracus, a city built for one million people and the new bright star made with the money won on Mars on Earth by the private sector.

 Every newspaper registered Juno’s death, but the news was relegated to the inner pages of every publication. After all, it wasn’t every day that humans discovered they were not quite alone.

A funeral

It’s always hard when someone dies, even if it’s your mother in law. In this case, she was a very special lady. From the moment we met until her death, I felt she didn’t like me. And I’m sure I was right.

She had always resented my hairstyle, then the way I dressed and, specially, my line of work. As it happens, I write for many magazines and newspapers about all of those starlets and music sensations you hear about everywhere. I do those bios about the kids that are beginning, discovered by the Internet somewhere in the middle of the world.

The woman didn’t like that. She thought it was a shallow job, unstable and not enough for her fragile daughter. The reality could not be further away from the truth. Amanda, my wife, wasn’t fragile or dependent of a man. When I met her, she was already working her ass off in a publicity agency and now she had created her own enterprise and was doing really well.

Amanda did not resent my job. She actually found it thrilling, as she was the first person to hear about the newest celebrity gossip. She always saw the most compromising pictures first and enjoyed, even more than I, when I had to meet some star to do an interview for some publication.

We had to travel in order to go to the old woman’s funeral. What was really special about that day was not the event as such. I mean, it was a funeral; they are all pretty similar except for some slight differences. This one’s different aspect was that I met Matthew. I saw him standing behind a tree, watching another funeral.

I saw Amanda talking to her sister and her cousins so I told her I had to go to the bathroom and then I went back to the tree, where I saw the young man staring at all those people in black. As I got near, I realized most of the assistants to that funeral were very clean cut, looking kind of military.

With care, I walked towards the young man and put a hand on his shoulder. He got scared but when he realized he didn’t know me, he pulled me aside and told me, with a sign, to shut up.

He gazed towards the funeral, again, as saw it all. I just stood there, watching with him. There was something really strange about the scene, a young person watching someone’s funeral from afar. Was he maybe a lover or even his murderer? Maybe I should have not gone after him but there I was. Amanda was probably missing me.

The ceremony we were looking at was finished. The guy was in tears, that he cleaned softly.

Who are you?
I write.

He nodded, as if he understood but I did not know what it was that he understood. He then asked for my phone, which I gave him for some reason, and then dialed a number. He saved it in and gave it back to me. He didn’t say anything else; he just left.

I went back to Amanda who asked me where I had been. I told her I would explain later, not really thinking about the lunch we were going to have at her sister’s house. I didn’t really pay attention to anything else that afternoon, nothing other than the number on my phone and the name of the guy.

I had always wanted to do something else with my career. Far from me to give my dead mother in law any reason to be right: I loved my job, it was fun, simple and easy to research. I also took pictures and did interviews. All was great and easy. But there was also a part of me that was a real journalist, interested in things that happened daily.

But when I took those chances, they would always be denied to me. So I kept to my celebs and music sensations of the moment. Until now.

The next day, I decided to call Matthew and meet him in a coffee shop. He told me he preferred it that way as crowded places made him more comfortable, less suspicious of anything. From our phone conversation, which was short, I noticed he was still sad. To be honest, I was scared he wouldn’t even show up.

But he did. It was difficult to start talking. We just asked for some coffee and stared, as if it was a date of sorts. I had experience with interviews but he seemed so sad and exhausted, that I had no idea how to start, so I just went for the only thing I knew about him.

What were you doing in the cemetery?

He started crying in silence and then he told me his reason to be watching a funeral. As it happens, it was not some unknown person’s funeral. They were burying a man that day, a man with whom he had lived the last five years.

He then asked what I thought about homosexuality and their rights and so on.  I felt the interview had changed its course but though it was better to answer, as it would make him trust me. So I told him I had no trouble with gay people. I told him about these two older ladies that lived in my building. They were very nice people, feeding my dog cookies every time we crossed them in the park.

He smiled with my silly anecdote, so I understood he was ok with me interviewing him. I asked him then to tell me more about the man that had died; he was besides his life partner.

He corrected me there: the man was not his “partner” but his husband. And his name was Paul. They had been married in Massachusetts, in a small affair than only involved his some friends, no family member for either side though. I asked him if the families opposed and he smiled again but this time it was a sarcastic way to say, “of course they didn’t”. Although his parents knew and were not firmly opposed, they didn’t really care. They didn’t speak that frequently so there was no reason for him to know if they were ok with it.

Paul’s family, on the other side, were more extreme and had no problem calling them every so often to insult them or recite some extract of the Bible. They had to change their phone number several times in order to stop the insults for a while.

I asked more about their life together and then he went back to his real smile, the one that felt authentic and heartfelt. He told me they had met in a party given by a common friend. They just met there and, initially, did not like each other. Matt confessed he thought Paul was too full of himself, attracting attention to him much too often.

But then they kept seeing each other in other parties and on the street, as they discovered they were practically neighbors. So, with time, they began really knowing each other. After five months or so, they formally began dating. Drying his tears, he told me it was the best time in his life. They did everything together but not in the senses of being annoying or intense but really like friends who happened to be in love.

Many people stopped talking to them, as they didn’t knew their friends were gay. They got new ones and stronger ties bounded them with old acquaintances. It was the day they moved in together when the harassing and insulting began. But they moved on together and started to live life like the couple they would become years later.

In a trip to China, Paul proposed to him, with a ring with a special message for him. Having being in a military school, Paul knew all about codes and signs so the engraving could only be read by someone knowing about the codes and he taught Matt how to read it. They married six months later, in a private ceremony, after which they traveled to Iceland for their honeymoon. It was just the best moment in both their lives.

Only two years after their marriage, Paul had a surfing accident. He was with friends as Matt had been unable to join them because of his work. He was the first person to get to the hospital but was asked to leave when family members started to arrive. They yelled at him and he wouldn’t do anything. Finally a nurse told him that it was best if he left. She promised to call him if something happened.

That wasn’t the case. It was only through the call of one of the guy’s that had been surfing with Paul that he learned of his death. He was devastated but was prevented to go to the hospital. The family was already doing the paperwork to do take the body so there was no need to go and fight endlessly. He was theirs now, in flesh at least.

Matt told he that had happened a week ago. He had not been invited to the funeral or the wake, and had no infiltrate the cemetery without anyone noticing him. He was planning to go back soon. When I heard this, I told him I could drive him. It was not likely that any family members would be there so it was the perfect time.

So later that afternoon we were standing in front of Paul’s grave and Matthew just kneeled and cried. He didn’t say anything, just cried and touched the tombstone. I put a hand on his shoulder and squeezed it as his story had touched me deeply.

I thought of Amanda, the woman I loved. What if someone had tried to stop me from being with her? What if her mother had forbidden our relationship? She hated me but she let her daughter do what she wanted and, ultimately, she was happy for her.

So when I got home, I started writing an article about Matt and Paul. I was sure it would be of everyone’s interest because; don’t we always say love is always first? That love always conquers and is the goal in our lives? I was sure that was the case and when I kissed Amanda that night; I got sure she realized how happy she made me.