Love is not a crime
© Joel Aguilozi, 2020
I woke up to the gray light of dawn; I had spent a quiet, dreamless night, and I felt like a new man. However, my concerns remained the same as always, the hours of rest did not change anything. I looked out the window.
Iván, in his underwear, shook the carpet in the middle of the park.
He greeted me cordially like every day; I asked him why he shook the carpet so hard, “I washed it yesterday” I told him; I smiled and thought “his obsession hasn’t changed since I met him, he always wants to have everything in order, maybe that’s what sparked part of my love for him”, I still remember the day when I told my father that I had fallen in love… And How can I not remember him, if that was the last day I spent in my house, the last day he spoke to me. He didn’t want to go say goodbye to me. I would have wanted to say goodbye, or simply “I love you old man.”
Why not understand that this was my destiny? He could not forgive me, and it was unfortunate that Iván did not fill that void for now. Sometimes while trying to fall asleep I ask myself, why does discrimination exist? Perhaps no one has the answer, perhaps the nature of human beings is to fear what is different, and put it aside without knowing what it is about, letting themselves be carried away by the canons of an intolerant society.
I got up to have breakfast with Iván. We had already lived together for two years, and in the mornings we used to tell each other the dreams that had invaded our minds while we were sleeping. I, that night, I hadn’t had dreams or nightmares, his smile didn’t calm me like it did every morning, and knowing him, I sensed that he was hiding something.
In a few seconds everything changed in both of our lives – Not long ago I was diagnosed with HIV – he said.
The first thing I thought was the most logical thing in those circumstances… that meant that I also suffered from the disease. It was not the time to make reproaches or look for blame, the only thing I said to him was: – Why did it take you so long to tell me? “I didn’t know how you were going to take it,” was the response. The first week was terrifying, the nightmares came back; Possibly they were trying to tell me that they had already warned me recently. In the middle of the night he woke up next to Iván, drenched in sweat and shaking with fear of what was coming. I remembered that God exists and I fervently asked him not to be true.
The first month passed, and after the studies, I knew that at most we had a few more years to live, but that was when everything changed for me, and for Iván. We decided to accept things as they were, to move on with our lives. We made those last years our most valuable treasure.
Every moment, every day, was full of joy, and without realizing it we discovered how to find happiness despite our great problems. We learned that death is not the end of everything; that happiness is in front of us and sometimes we don’t find it. I had to go through that, to understand that life is made up of moments and it is up to us to illuminate them or leave them in the dark. Today after a long time, I was able to meet my old man again and say “I love you.”