The City of San Yesenya (intro)
#1 of The City of San Yesenya
I sniffed at the air. It was always the first thing I did in the morning. Not sure why. Usually nothing smelled particularly interesting. Most of the time it just smelled like shit. But I did it anyway, I guess because it woke me up, I don't know.
Saturday mornings in San Yesenya were hardly any less of a rat race than any other day of the week. People of all colors, lineages and species shot each other dirty looks as they hurriedly banged shoulders against the oncoming foot traffic, middle fingers going up whenever that jackass (and on rare occasions, yes, it was actually a jackass) in front of you cut you off on the stretch of road that was obviously entitled to you. Yep, living in this city meant having a certain attitude, and that attitude was easily explained as "Fuck everyone else."
Being a newcomer here, I wasn't so accustomed yet. I'd come from a place where the first thing people would ask you is how you were and how hungry you were, and you didn't have to worry about getting to work on time or running out of gas on the way, because the streets were clear as the nose of a kid who'd just picked it clean.
But now I was twenty-two. I'm done, I'm outta here. Time to go live my own life and soak up all of what mom and dad had been telling me about all these years for myself. I wasn't one-hundred percent sure of myself when I made the decision, and mom cried her head off when she heard I was leaving, but that's okay. She still loves me enough to let me go, and I thank her for that.
But, boy was it a change! This place must've been at least twenty times bigger than my old home of Luisito, and probably twenty times meaner, too. The sun didn't shine the same way in San Yesenya. The smog made sure of that. It was almost always an overcast day and it really help set the mood of the dog-eat-dog old city. All along the walls of busy and abandoned buildings alike, the homeless sat passing their days, some of them with a gimmick or two to squeeze some change out of the passing working men, perhaps a tune to whistle out of a harmonica, or a song to sing in a voice many would attribute to the old age of blues. As I walked along the filthy old sidewalk leading away from my apartment in the not so developed neighborhoods of San Yesenya, soaking up every little thing I witnessed, my mind seemed to freeze. It was a little too much for a small town boy to grasp. So much concrete, so much steel, so much flesh and fur. The sky was choked here. Looking up, one could only gaze and see the blue sky in the shape of a cross at a four-way intersection. To me, it was sad. To some, it was life.
I suppose it'd become my life, too.
I stopped walking, to lean against a pole on the sidewalk. Looking up, I noticed it was a bus stop, and looking to the left of me, a few shady creatures sat on a stone bench, waiting to be ferried off to whatever places they might need to visit. The people on the bench seemed tainted and lost like many other folks in the city. On the far left of the bench sat a wolf. At least, it looked like a wolf. He'd let his fur grow so hideously scruffy and wore a dark hood over his head that I had to guess he was a lupine from his build. At first I thought he was wearing a parka, but I realized it was merely the forest of hair he had growing out of his head at all angles, protruding from the edges of his hood to form a fine lining around it. Next to him sat an old rabbit. A very, very old rabbit in fact. His gray visage was adorned with countless wrinkles likely brought about by the stresses the city could throw at you, and yet, he seemed at peace. His face neither frowned, nor smiled, and his eyes looked straight on ahead, as if he were dead set on a goal. I couldn't tell for the life of me what was on that old rabbit's mind. And finally, a red fox who just wouldn't sit still. His leg bounced restlessly on the concrete ground, and his orange striped muzzle darted about left and right as if he expected to see God following him, or something else spectacular like that. Unlike the other two taboo fellows that shared his bench, this fox was sharply-dressed, clad in a fine black suit and a tie that made the the fox seem witty and cultured at first glance. Looking over the three guys on the bench and their blatant differences I began to realize this city had a little bit of everything. Finally, their bus arrived, and the three fellows piled into it, the busy fox speed walked in first, seeming in a hurry, followed by the scruffy ne'er do well looking wolf, and the grizzled old rabbit trudging up the steps into the bus with a bit of difficulty.
After the bus took off, I took off with it. There was plenty for the eye to soak up in this place. Always a sign to read, a colorful billboard, an entertaining hobo mumbling something to himself or a couple of fags flamboyantly dressed and holding hands as they tiptoed their fairy asses down the street. Signs everywhere read in many different languages and shops were littered all along the sidewalks selling everything from trashy trinkets to succulent cuisine. I grew tired already, and I'd only been out a few hundred yards from my apartment. I guess I just wasn't used to all this civilization, everything seemed to zoom by independent of everything else, like clockwork, it simply never stopped, and just watching it made even me tired.
Sure enough, I checked my watch, which read 3:14 PM. I'd only been out for ten minutes, but that was enough for me. I needed time to adjust. I turned and began to trudge back to my modest apartment that I wasn't quite comfortable calling home yet, passing by tons of folks whose faces I dared not even attempt to memorize the way I did back in Luisito. I knew I'd never remember any of them here. The place was just too damn big. Back in Luisito you could count on seeing a face more than once and exchanging a friendly greeting, but here it was futile. So many faces came and went that none of them were special anymore, and that was the first day I felt myself adjusting to city life. No one would love me here. No one would treat me special like they did back home. Everyone that passed by was just a drone and had their own problems. It only took a couple hundred yards of walking through San Yesenya to realize that.
Finally I reached the tall apartment complex that I'd be living in for... well, who knows how long? I told myself I'd travel the world, now. I earned it. I had a degree in law that I worked my hands to the bone writing essays and speeches for, and now I was going to enjoy life as best I could. A short elevator ride brought me to the fourteenth floor of the building, to room my room of 806. Hastily forcing the door open with my key, my foot didn't as much step into the room rather than it sort of fell weakly. I tossed my key onto my desk and laid myself out in my bed...
My first order of business the next morning would be to go out and make some friends. Easier said than done in an unfriendly city like this...