Awards

   He sipped a bit of the coffee and burned his tongue right away. It was too hot and he was in a hurry, so nothing different could have happened. He decided to put at least half the pot he had made in a thermos and just take that in the car. It was pitch black outside and the van would pick him up in any minute.

Of course he hadn’t had any sleep at all. He usually went to sleep very late and he had in the auditorium at five in the morning, with didn’t really gave him much time to do anything. He decided to not even try to sleep and shower and get ready at around two of the morning, se he could have breakfast before they came to pick him up at 3:30 AM.

 But as things that shouldn’t happen always find a way of becoming truth, he dozed off for a while and he lost the time to have a proper breakfast, which resulted in him burning his tongue and running around his house like an idiot. The van arrived only minutes afterwards so he just took his thermos with him and went as fast as he could, although the elevator apparently had a problem with that, as it felt it took double the time to get to the ground floor.

  There he finally met the man that drove the van, who he apologized to. The man didn’t even acknowledge that an explained him that he needed to check him for envelops, microphones, cameras and so on. The poor guy that hadn’t slept more than half an hour wasn’t sure he was getting what the driver of the van was telling him. The man attempted to touch him but he just pulled apart in fear.

       - “It’s for security, Mr. Thomas!”

 Somehow, that enunciation woke him up a bit and he decided to stay very still as the man checked his pockets (jacket and pants), felt everything he had to feel and even asked him to take off his shoes. He complied to everything as if he was in a boot camp which made them loose about fifteen minutes of their time, that he had thought to be precious. After checking the shoes and even the socks, the man finally told him to follow him to the van.

 Mr. Thomas sat down in the far back, not wanting to talk at all with that man during the ride. After all, it was a half-hour drive from his house to the headquarters of the services firm where they had to pick up a suitcase that had all the information they needed by five in the morning in the theatre. He knew he wasn’t the only idiot waking up at such time of the day and that made him feel a little better about himself. So when the van started moving towards the highway, he was a bit more awake than before.

 As they travelled through an unusual cold morning in Los Angeles, light still absent, he decided to finally have some coffee and just enjoy the ride. He decided to pay attention to the world and the world revealed itself to him in a way he had never seen. After all, it wasn’t everyday that he woke up at this time of day, when every single person that was up seemed to have a certain thing about them.

 The driver was the first in that list. He was a very tall guy, the kind that when they bend over it looks ridiculous. When he was checking Mr. Thomas’s shoes, his body contorted in the most funny shape ever and the owner of those shoes almost laughs, partially because of the time of day but also because tall people always looked funny in the simplest positions. Besides his height, he had this weird thing where the mustache was the same color of his hair, which was blonde, but the eyebrows were very black. Somehow it looked odd, as if he was a big Mr. Potato Head.

 The next person that drew his attention was a lady on the street. They stopped in a red light for a while and he saw this elderly woman, body curved as it was humanly possible, walking her Chihuahua in the middle of the night. What was curious about the woman was not at all the fact that she was walking her dog at that time, which he knew to be very common among dog owners, but that she was wearing the strangest combination of clothing. She had a large overcoat, the color of flamingos. Under that she had a flowery shirt that looked too big for her, kaki shorts and fluffy sleepers with a baseball cap crowning her head.

 She was a sight to behold and that was only for a couple of minutes, before they got in the highway and he only saw some cars and a couple of dead pigeons that had been killed by crazed drivers or just by people that had not realized that birds wee not the brightest creatures in the universe. When he saw those bodies, he couldn’t stop thinking about the poor man or woman that had to clean that up from the asphalt of the highway as his or her job. That thought made him realize he was a very lucky guy with a very good job and that he had no right to complain about something as silly as waking up early in the morning.

 It seemed that in no time they were in downtown Los Angeles, stopping in almost every stupid traffic light. He saw his watch nervously, telling himself that if he was a couple of minutes late it wouldn’t really be that big of problem as the show began a little later than five. But then he remembered he had to pass the information to the people than made a nice little presentation video for people at home to get what the presenters were saying. He worried again when he thought of this.

 It was right then when they finally got to the skyscraper where the services offices were located. He got out of the van and remembered what they had told him: he had to go the information desk and ask for Tamara Parks. Then, they would direct him to the top floor where Ms. Parks would give him the briefcase with all the information they needed in the theater.

 So he did just that. The man at the information desk was a security guard; obviously the person that tactually worked there had not yet arrived. The man gave him a badge and told him to take the middle elevator and press the button to the top floor. Said elevator took forever to arrive and also to get up there. It seemed to be going for ages. He checked his watch several times and repeated to himself that they were on time and that the theater was not that far away. He realized the elevator had a mirror so he decided to check his suit for stains or anything unusual, his teeth and his face. It was right then the elevator decided to stop and open.

 This startled him but no one was outside waiting. He had to walk to an office and wait there in a waiting room for the woman. But he didn’t have to wait at all. She was there and greeted him with a big smile that he would be unable to do at that time of day. She asked him to follow her to a conference room and there he found the briefcase but also two big guys, with black glasses and earpieces. Somehow, it was funny to see them there, as if they were thing to put in a room like plants or statues.

 Ms. Parks explained they were the security team assigned to join him to the theater to ensure all the information got there safely and that only the people that had to see it saw it and no one else. They checked everything in five minutes and then they were good to go. He left the smiling Parks in the top floor but was joined in the elevator by the two big guys who didn’t smile at all.

 He was a bit relieved when he got to the van and this time the driver decided to speed up as he realized time was running short. The theater was not far away and, with the presence of the two big guys, Mr. Thomas had no opportunity to see the outside world, mainly because he was trapped between those two mountains that were apparently people.

 Exactly at five in the morning, they pulled off outside the theater and there was already someone waiting, telling her they were a bit late which was a lie. Apparently people there were very stressed. The four of them walked, almost jogged, to the theater and there straight to the master room when a lonely woman was waiting for them behind a computer. It was Mr. Thomas job to only look at her work like crazy for the next twenty minutes, helped only by another man.

 When the presentation was done, Thomas’s work was done. The big men would guard the briefcase and   he could just sit in the back of the theater and hear the name of the nominees from there. At that point, he was finally awake and also very excited because he knew he was part of something that meant a lot to many people and that was, somehow, the pinnacle of their efforts and the most coveted prize in the cinema industry.

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.

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.