As always when she felt her vital emptiness, she sat down, and immediately lay down on the sofa, and put on her favourite trash television. A group of young and old, busy, and varied people, in branded clothes that fashion stores probably gave them to get free publicity, repeated daily the anodyne, scandalous themes of their celebrity list with no cultural relevance for the country. But it was their voices, their themes, their liberal and reactionary ideologies on a personal and social level that attracted her. Understanding the discourse of celebrities in elegant TV sets demanded a minimum of mental effort. They played being close characters seeming to be below the national average in order to attract all social classes.
That day, for the tenth day in a row, they repeated the imprisonment of a famous imported sportsman, for having evaded from the Treasury everything his whitening lawyer had recommended. The pregnancy, childbirth and subsequent divorce of the daughter of a national singer, who had found a money-spinner vein advertising all her social events, which she had to renew every three months at the latest, to ensure the contents of the gossip magazines that populated the waiting rooms in paid medical consultations, could not be missed either.
The phone rang again. It was her niece from the village.
- Aunt! How are you?
- Hello Belén. All right. What about you?
- Everybody's fine. Surprise! I'm going to go pass Pilar hlidays with you. My parents allow me this year. Good!
It was an unexpected proposition that for a moment made her think that her single friends had been smarter than her.
- I'll be there tonight around 9:00. You can pick me up at the station, right?
- Sure, honey. Tell me the exact time - Eva replied, mumbling her discontent and thinking that her sister was using her again without even calling her in advance. Perhaps she had thought that if she asked Eva, she would make an excuse, as she had done in previous years.
So she was going to be a godmother-cook. It wasn't very exciting, not really.
- I arrive at a quarter to 9:00, aunty. On the bus. Wait for me with your car at the top gate of the Intermodal and I'll go upstairs. A kiss. A kiss - and she hung up.
She got up lazily and went to see her refrigerator, where there was no too much food to eat, so as not to indulge in pleasures, especially sausage and cheese, to which she was addicted. She found that the new news meant that the next day she would have to use the shopping cart and fill it up because sometimes her niece would bring several people more to her aunt's house for lunch.
At 8.30 a.m. she was walking slowly along the sidewalk next to the street entrance to the station. She would even have liked to have had a cigarette when she saw so many adults smoking while they waited like her to pick up the next generation. That day the usual collection space was crowded because at 10 a.m. it was going to be the opening parade of fiestas with their floats, puppets and giants, which nobody wanted to miss.
- Aunt! - The emotional voice of Belén, whom I had not seen in a few months, dominated the crowd. Pulling her little suitcase cart she swept over her and filled her with kisses. Her niece was a sweet, tall, well-built niece, with an optimism that radiated everything.
- Didn't you want me to come? Well, I'm here now! Let's go to your home! Come quickly, we have to get to the opening speech!
The aunt began to blame her sister for the holiday "gift" she had given her. It was evident that Belén's energy far exceeded her own possibilities. It made her feel even older, accustomed to the tranquillity and relaxation that allowed her to live a sedentary life reduced to small spaces, mainly an office chair and a computer screen in front of her, both at work and at home, with only a temporary stay in the kitchen and living room before going to bed.
- Belén, calm down! We have to go home. You have to make your bed, sort out your clothes, have some dinner....
- No, I'll do it later. I'm dating today to see the opening speech from the beginning. You'll come, won't you?
- If you've already dated someone I'm not necessary, am I?
- Come on, aunt, it's holidays.
- Who are you meeting?
- We'll meet the whole village crew at the town hall gate.
- What are you talking about? It'll be impossible. You won't even find each other.
- Aunt, don't be old-fashioned, there are mobiles!
- If you want, I'll go with you until you find them, but then I'll come home.
- What a spoilsport you are! I don't need you for that, I'm 16 years old and I know the way. So what are you going to do?
- Me? - I had a busy day today. I want to rest. I'm sure I’ll watch the opening parade better than you do on TV.
- On TV? You're so bland.
- I prefer it this way. When you see that tow truck coming by with the camera, you wave at me, okay?
- Sure, and I'll also say hello to my parents who will surely be seeing it too.
- And how late do they let you out?
- Time? Come on, aunt. There is no time in the Pilares. Give me the key, and when you get tired of TV pain, go to bed, I'll be home myself.
- Are you sure your mother didn't set a time for you?
- No, she didn't tell me anything. Call her if you want.
Not much time had passed since her niece's exciting lift home. Now Eva was on the sofa, drinking a smelly mint infusion as she watched the human marabout swirling in front of the city hall. Music, gigantic floats, spectacular mobile artefacts, the heavy giants moving with the characteristic hieraticism, due to their difficulty to transport them, music, shouts, beeps, sounds of vuvucelles, the famous football trumpets that had become fashionable after the World Cup in South Africa a few years ago, applause, screams... in short, it was the annual massification of fun for the Aragonese tribe.
When she got tired of seeing the thousands of heads moving together, which for her was obviously nothing new, she thought do some zapping.
News... no. Movie... no. Gossip... no, no...
When unexpectedly appeared on the screen a computer screen with a dating chat, Eva sat up, her back well resting on the back of the sofa. It was a well-informed documentary about the latest trends in the virtual relationship that the Internet allowed. According to the voice-over, it was an upward trend and one that foresaw a promising future that would change social relations. Pure fantasy? A fleeting taste for novelty?
Then she remembered her office partner. From the beginning Mesalina stood out over her fellow colleagues in decision, sharp tongue, often charged with procacity. Eva had never really managed to establish a cordial relationship with her as she should have done as a neighbour. In her few brief conversations she had always felt intimidated, unfeeling. Mesalina's eyes were telling her without words that she was a tasteless shy. And Eva had to avoid looking at her and focus on her work in order to survive in that unbreathable air.
But she had known for some time that her neighbour was stealing time from the administration. She tried during a part of her shift to chat in silence with more and more contacts of unknown places. Once she had had to
