Waiting for His Steps, Ch. 2

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II

We met one ordinary June evening on our way to the summer religious camp.

My mother used to send me to such places almost every year, believing it would be the best way to prevent spoiling her innocent, beloved son. That very year everything went another way, though. I experienced something I had barely known before… Something I would have probably never felt if I had not met Marquez, the boy who once gave me wings to fly.

I still remember sitting in the coach full of other guys going to the camp too, either because of their parents’ will or their own initiative. They were all around my age, 15, but totally different than me at this age, I suppose. Some of them were chatting loudly, some were singing and laughing all the time. They all seemed to be very happy and joyful, whereas the only thing I could feel at the moment was a mixture of sorrow and gloom. ‘Why are they so fucking happy?’ I asked myself looking out of the window.

The view was really astonishing; all around me there were fields of wheat stretching up to the bleak line of the horizon. The sun was falling down, touching the earth with its warm light. I felt the beautiful scent of the wind dancing among the leaves of grass, the scent that had something miraculous in itself… Though I could not define it, I felt that it made me feel restful. I did not feel like talking to someone, I just wanted to look and contemplate it as long as I could.

Time went very fast, hour after hour. Soon, everything outside turned dark and according to the agenda we had to stop to have some break. The driver parked our coach on a Mc Donald’s lot and everyone exploded outside to get some fast foods there. Everyone, except for me, of course. I pretended to sleep, even though I knew I was not going to say ‘goodbye’ to the reality and take a plunge into sweet dreams yet.

There is always something good in pretending. Every day we pretend something just to achieve a particular goal. We pretend to be nice for those we actually hate; We sometimes pretend to be tough for those we love just to make sure if they still feel the same way. Finally, some pretend not to be gay even if they are able to fall in love only with a man of the same sex. It is all ridiculous. It is all senseless.

For a short time there was only me inside the coach. It might sound a bit awkward but I really enjoyed the silence that filled up the place. Intimacy and solitude really hit the spot. I put my hands inside the backpack to find a notebook. It was an ordinary, thin note pad with some stains on the green, leather cover. It had been where I kept various sketches of mine. Yes, I was good at drawing sketches; many of them presented places where I brought up or visited once in the past. Despite the fact they were drawn with a simple pencil they looked pretty amazing. I had never been brave enough to show them in public, though.

Out of the sudden, I heard somebody entered the bus…

There was a boy standing by ones of the first rows of seats in the vehicle. Though it was quite dark in there, I could see his posture, illuminated by the dim light of the street lamp. He looked around my age, seemingly taller and slender. He wore dark blue shorts and white Nike T-shirt that contrasted with his pale, southern complexion. He had short dark hair and dark eyes. His skin looked smooth, tanned by summer sun. He seemed to be a typical and ordinary boy, but, ironically, from the very first moment I had felt he had something that nobody else possessed.

The boy was searching for something inside his backpack. He pretended not to look at me at all; actually, I was not sure if he’d noticed me in the darkness of the night. A few seconds passed and he started to whistle a song I didn’t recognize at first. It was one of the old well-known melodies that everybody know but only few can guess the name of its artist. But the song had no importance at that moment. I focused my attention on the boy staying there a few meters from me. He put out a mobile phone and dialed a number…

‘Hello, this is Marquez,’ he said politely in Spanish. ‘May I speak with Tobias, please?’. A few seconds passed and he said nothing. ‘Si, estoy un amigo de tu hijo, señora’. A short pause again. ‘Si, pero…’ the boy started explaining something again with a disappointed look on his face. ‘I am not gonna stop loving him alone, whether you want it or - ’ he shouted angrily and flung the phone onto the floor. Then he sat on a chair and hid his head in his hands. He started crying quietly and whispered some words that no one except for him could understand.

At first I had no idea how to react. Was it right to emerge out of nowhere and make fool of myself? ‘No,’ I thought, ‘I’d prove myself an eavesdropper.’ But staying quiet and pretending that nothing happened wasn’t a good solution either. He was totally dejected and evidently needed some help. ‘Why then should I not give it to him?’ ‘Hi,’ I said, acting confident. When he noticed me, he stood up at once and washed away the tears. His eyes were red from crying. For the first few seconds he said nothing; He looked depressed and embarrassed because of the whole situation. But there was something more in the way he looked, so helpless and weak, something that I could not define. ‘Is everything alright?’ I asked the boy once again. He raised his head and looked at me with his black, sorrowful eyes. ‘I didn’t know someone is here,’ he answered quickly. ‘No, it’s alright. I was sleeping and your voice woke me up,’ I tried to explain myself. ‘I’m sorry for that,’ he said. ‘I am OK, it’s just… just nothing.’ Another short pause. I figured he didn’t feel like carrying on our conversation, so I decided to get back to my seat and stop doing a fool of myself. ‘So, I’ll be right there if you need some help or…’ I pointed the place at the back of the vehicle and grinned. I was about to go when something unexpected happened. ‘Wait!’ he stopped me. ‘It’s not what you think, really…’ ‘What do you mean by that?’ I asked, confidentially. ‘I’m not a fag,’ he replied, embarrassed. ‘Just do me a favor and don’t tell them what’s happened here, OK?’ I nodded. Actually, I wasn’t sure what to think about the whole incident. It was pretty obvious that Tobias, the boy he had asked about while talking on the phone, must have been his… boyfriend? ‘I’m not a fag,’ I evoked his words. ‘But is it true?’ ‘I’ll keep it in secret,’ I said to the boy and smiled. ‘But I don’t really know what you are afraid of, anyway. Guys cry at times. Only some animals don’t. Or they do, but secretly, so that nobody can see them.’

Marquez did not respond. He was standing by his seat with his head down, illuminated by the mere light of a nearby street lamp. I saw he was embarrassed and he couldn’t pronounce a word. ‘Let’s - let’s pretend nothing happened here,’ he mumbled after a minute and moved his head up for a little while so I could see his eyes. They were full of tears.

***

We did not have to wait a very long time for our next meeting to come. Though at first we tried to avoid each other and simply forget about the whole incident as fast as we could, it was extremely difficult for me to stop thinking about Marquez just

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