Naomi exited the station and looked around in horror. What the fuck? What was this? She had expected to see loads of people upon arrival, but definitely not this. There had been no concrete signal when she had descended the train, but now, surfacing the street, it all came to her like an explosion of color. The booming music assaulted her ears, and the sight of herds of people swarming the trafficless pavement stunned and filled her with confusion.

A group of girls dressed as police officers -all but one, who was wearing a prisoner costume, complete with a plastic ball and chain- passed before her and snickered at her dumbfounded expression. The "prisoner" even sneered something at her, which of course she was not able to understand. And then, as a definitive answer to her questions, Naomi saw it: a giant rainbow flag, carried by more than fifty people.

"Fuck," she muttered, shaking her head in disbelief. Of all the days, of all the weekends, why did she have to choose precisely this one to visit Madrid? Bloody July 6! She had imagined a quiet retreat visiting some museums and stuffing herself with the local gastronomy, but this… this looked like a very bizarre jungle, and Naomi, as the unlikely explorer, could only bit her lower lip and delve into it.

There were so many people in drag and in costume surrounding her that she felt like the odd one out and didn't know where to stand. Everybody wanted to take a picture with this or that flamboyant person, and she always seemed to be in somebody's way. Finally, she just kept still and let the other people zigzag around her, some bumping against her shoulders, others simply sliding by. They were all sweating profusely -even those who were only wearing a thong-, as the heat was quite unbearable, and she resolved to buy some beer from one of the peddlers who were running around with beer cans stuffed in their rucksacks and shopping carts.

As she downed the reasonably cool drink, Naomi noticed a short girl with a very large camera, who seemed to be gesturing at her, or at someone behind her. Naomi pushed her sunglasses back to the bridge of her nose, from where the sweat kept making them slip, and decided not to pay attention to the girl, because surely she wasn't trying to communicate with her.

"Hey! Hola! Hola?"

Since it certainly wasn't the only voice yelling stuff in Spanish, it was very easy to ignore, but Naomi turned around anyway, only to confirm that the short girl was indeed talking to her. in fact, she was starting to approach her.

"Hola," the girl repeated.

"Uh… Hola," Naomi murmured, knowing that her knowledge of Spanish almost began and ended with that greeting.

"Tú…" the girl pointed at Naomi and then dropped her shoulders and her head, making snoring noises before becoming animated again. "No duermas! Baila! Fiesta!"

Naomi could only raise her eyebrows. "What? I'm sorry, I don't speak Spanish."

"Fucking hell, thank God!" the girl exclaimed, in perfect English. "I was trying to tell you to do something, move, dance! This is supposed to be a party and you're falling asleep on your feet! You're actually spoiling my pictures."

"Jesus! Just go take your pictures somewhere else, then! This street's fucking enormous."

"Okay, okay, I'm sorry. I was only trying to cheer you up."

"What? Why do you care? I just got here, and I didn't even know they were celebrating Pride today."

"Really? Since Wednesday, actually," the girl managed to pull off a surprised expression while snapping a photo of a group of men dressed as football players, only shirtless. "Aren't you happy to be here, though?"

"Yeah…" I kind of am," Naomi said, smiling for the first time. She had to admit that the girl's enthusiasm was contagious, if only because it appeared to be unbreakable. Many others would have left her alone by now, she was sure, but not this girl. "Do you work in a newspaper or a magazine or something?"

"Not yet. I hope I will, though, soon. What's your name?"

"Naomi."

"Naomi, I'm Emily."

They shook hands, and then Emily promptly asked her if she felt like accompanying her to take some pictures of the march. Having nothing better to do anyway, Naomi accepted, not without wondering what could come out of the peculiar encounter.

Emily guided her to a spot where they could more or less see the march and also have some breathing space, which wasn't short of miraculous. People had apparently come from all over Europe, to say the least, and were dancing and chanting with zest. There seemed to be a sort of marching band every ten meters, playing a strange, drum-based tribal music, whose rhythm was being directed by different people blowing whistles. It was loud, and it was visceral, and it was starting to mix with the additional beers she had been drinking. The resulting sensation was a very pleasant intoxication.

She had started to sway her hips to the music without even being aware of it, and joining in the cheering whenever a new group of demonstrators approached. Emily, on her part, was capable of doing that on top of snapping pictures of everything under the sky.

"Oh my God! Look!"

Following the direction of Emily's finger, Naomi saw a large vehicle carrying dozens of men in several states of nakedness, all wearing red horns and devil tails. The caravan seemed to belong to some kind of nightclub, judging by the leather and the music bursting out of the sound system. Every single person around them started whooping, whistling and clapping, and Naomi laughed and turned to Emily, who was doing the same. She wasn't laughing because the sight was funny to her, but simply out of joy, because everybody was having such a great time and nobody gave a fuck about how everybody else looked, wore -or didn't wear- or who they happened to embrace.

The next vehicle looked more like a cattle truck, except that it was transporting women, a truckload of women dressed as erotic girl scouts. They were wearing dark green uniforms with bright yellow handkerchiefs tied around their necks, and their skirts and shorts were just a breath away from being classified as underwear.

"Jesus!" Naomi breathed out.

"They're great."

"Yeah? Yeah, I mean, if you're into that kind of thing."

The girl grinned at her for a moment before turning to the nearest streetlamp and climbing it to get a better view, and started taking pictures. Naomi, who was a bit taller, observed the women in the truck, who noticed the cute, young girl hugging the lamppost with her legs almost instantly. They began to either yell at her in Spanish or pose, or try to reach her with their water pistols.

Emily seemed to be having the time of her life. Laughing her head off, she looked down at Naomi. "Oh my God! They're crazy! Come up here!"

There was just no way. She crossed her arms over her breast and shook her head with determination. "I can see perfectly from here, thanks."

"Nonsense!" Hanging the camera from her neck, Emily circled the lamppost with her right arm and stretched out her left, downwards, towards Naomi. "Come on!"

"For fuck's sake," she muttered, securing her backpack on her shoulders before clasping Emily's hand.

She climbed up the lamppost, resting her feet on the small ledge where Emily was resting hers, and managed to find a sense of balance by grabbing the lamppost with one hand and one of the straps of Emily's backpack with the other. However, before she even had time to assess this new and unexpected situation, there were a series of shrieks and whistles loud enough to be heard over the deafening music. The girls in the truck were reacting to her appearance as if their football team had just scored.

She was aware of how close they were, that she was practically hugging Emily from behind, that the lamplight was the only thing preventing it, and it felt funny because she knew nothing about this girl, and was sharing the beginning of her supposedly solitary trip with her.