SYNOPSIS
(EXTENDED VERSION)
Back to: Part 2
Part 3
I Can't Say It
Central protagonist: Pablo
As the weeks of autumn start rolling in, Pablo comes back to his normal workout routine. Unlike the outside heat that recedes, the ardor of his feeling increases. He becomes yet more reticent and isolated, making his parents increasingly concerned. Although they've been supportive throughout his life, he's certain that they will be devastated learning the truth about his feelings for another man. His thinking is further distorted by long-ingrained Christian beliefs: still seeing homosexuality as a sin, he decides that he needs to go to church, confess it, and thus obtain God's forgiveness. He realizes that letting his darkest secret out, even to a priest, will make him experience enormous shame — but believes that after going through it, the "test" will be over and God will "cleanse his soul" from this "deviant obsession". With his increasing publicity as an athlete, he decides to drive away from Barcelona, to a small town where his family lived in his early years, and find a random church here.
He makes it to the town through a torrential downpour, and amidst such weather he turns out to be the only visitor in the dimly lit parish. He steps into the confessional booth, and at this point all hell (or paradise) breaks loose. He talks to a priest through the grating, hoping to remain anonymous. Deeply ashamed, he's at a loss for words. When he finally says the truth out loud, he's taken aback by the confessor's reaction to it. Instead of recognizing the sin in his feeling and absolving it, the priest asks him whether the man he's in love with loves him back. Stupefied, Pablo says that it never occurred to him to tell Andrew about his feeling, and the priest's voice then asks when he's going to have the courage to do that. Still taken aback, Pablo commits to do it the next week. The unseen priest behind the grating calls him by the name and says it's not line with God's commandments to put off saying life's most important truths for tomorrows. Becoming aware that his identity somehow got revealed, Pablo demands the priest how he knows his name, but the voice now gives no response. He gets out of the confession booth and pulls the curtain off the priest's compartment, only to find out that no one's there. He rushes away from the empty church. As he drives away, he can't help thinking that the voice that spoke to him was from heaven.
The next day, he decides to follow that voice. Now he makes up a story that God's plan is that confessing his feelings to Andrew and facing his rejection, which he's got no doubt will be the case, is the right and definitive way to put an end to his "abnormal" feeling. Exposing his truth in an email or a telephone call doesn't do justice to the tremendous vulnerability involved, so he calls Andrew and asks him to come to Barcelona as soon as possible. He awkwardly says that he needs urgent help with a matter he can only reveal to him in person. Andrew cannot make sense of it, but their emotional connection allows him to hear that Pablo's is in real trouble. He still holds a valid visa, so after a small hesitation, he promises to arrive within a week.
During the days of excruciating waiting, Pablo finds himself in a sheer emotional hell, trying and failing to steel himself for the conversation to come. A week later, picking Andrew up at the airport, he looks gloomy and taciturn, shunning to meet Andrew's eyes, afraid that his own can immediately reveal what he's feeling. Dropping Andrew at his hotel, he arranges to meet up with him and have the meaningful talk the next evening.
Andrew spends the next morning and afternoon alone. Wandering in the streets of the city and savoring every bit of Barcelona's spirit, he's again overwhelmed by the feeling of true belonging. In the meantime, Pablo is kicking the ball around the field, but his thoughts drift far away from his body movements, perfectly coordinated and automated over the years. He struggles to pick the right words for the tough conversation and script the ways it can go depending on Andrew's reaction, but no amount of thinking makes him feel any less vulnerable. In late evening, the two meet near the Magic Fountain of Montjuïc, and despite Andrew's plans, Pablo refuses to discuss his matter over a restaurant meal. Instead, Pablo insists that they go for a walk in the Montjuïc park, and leads him to a remote spot that he calls Escappo.
When they find themselves face-to-face there, Pablo explains his struggle. He starts by saying that he's desperately in love and that, in contrast to his previous relationships, this love feels overwhelming both physically and emotionally — but at the same time inconceivable, impossible, and unnatural. He says there's no way it can be reciprocated, so he's feeling trapped. When Andrew tries to find out who he is in love with, Pablo dodges the question a few times with the phrase "I can't say it". Eventually, when Pablo tells him the truth, Andrew is gobsmacked.
On the surface, he acts like it's the last thing he expected to hear. But on the inside, he realizes that the essence of his feelings for Pablo is the same. Right now, he's nowhere near ready to reckon with it. He watches Pablo break down, unable to say anything else. Following the truth growing from his heart and reciprocating Pablo's vulnerable bid means turning his own life upside down. Now and here, he only says that he's sorry for being unable to help him and walks away through the thickets of the park. His delight about the city is no longer here — because he understands the apparently life-shattering truth about the nature of their connection with Pablo. Before leaving Barcelona, he spends the entire next day in the bed of his hotel room, switching between Spanish TV channels. They all speak the language he once fell in love with, but now he's asking himself if that love is a madness, just like his growing feeling for Pablo, and Pablo's professed feeling for him, is a pathology.
Next: Part 4