We now have the winning story —The Wait, by Daniela Molleda Rodríguez— and the two finalists —Gray Earth, by Anaís Emilia Sandoval Cossio, and Your Job, by Eduardo Isai Villasente Gómez— from our youth short-story contest #StoriesOfTheFuture, awarded 2,000 euros in prizes, organized by Zenda and sponsored by Iberdrola. This literary competition, open to young authors born between the years 2001 and 2013, began on September 8 and concluded on November 8, 2026.
This #StoriesOfYouth competition features a jury composed of writers Juan Gómez-Jurado, Espido Freire, Nando López, Roberto Santiago, and Inma Rubiales.
Next, we reproduce the texts of the first prize winner and of the two second-prize winners.
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WINNER
1
Title: The Wait
Author: Daniela Molleda Rodríguez
Left, right, I twist the wheel to the left again. Left. I park. Number 345, I have arrived. The stillness of the neighborhood unsettles me. A moth-like murmur on the street lamps, a leaf dragging itself along the asphalt. My heels strike the ground, a dog barks in the distance, in a house. One of the hundreds that surround me; white, they are all white. Leo sets the dinner and Maria watches the cartoons. He tells me that everything is fine at work, noting, calculating, one, two, invoices, computer. I don’t pay him much mind, the possibilities of fifteen hundred, new procedures, scanning, calendar and phone. The phone rings. “Yes, mom, the girl is still fine, she’s better from the cold.” Maria coughs and I hear the squeaks of those strange rodents walking on two legs and lurching across the screen. “Sure, sure, mom.” Dinner, homework, classmates, the teacher who sent away the usual troublemaker today. I finally lie down. Leo drifts far from me.
—How is everything at the publishing house?
“Well, you know,” I tell him, encoding, producing AI-generated texts, ten books every hour, sales, a triumph. He rejoices, we share a kiss, one of those end-of-day kisses, barely felt on the skin, and even less so in the soul.
He whispers to me, as if drawing a revolver and pointing it at my face:
—Write.
I hold my breath. Our eyes meet. In the end he yields and surrenders to sleep. With tearful eyes, open, fixed on the darkness, I wait for the next day, I wait for the day after that and the one after this, and I wait…
Left, right, I twist the wheel to the left again. Left. I park. Today efficiency has risen by 6.6685%. Leo does not seem excited by the news. The squeals of the rats on the screens give me a headache. “The girl is better, yes, mom.” I excuse myself to lock myself in my office. I observe the empty, dusty shelves. Leo comes in behind me. I beg him to leave, not to dare say it again. But he does, “Write, write, write, Miriam, I beg you.” He says he needs my poetry for his brain. Numbers, he tells me, climb inside him, tear at his throat, at his eyes, he weeps. He hands me a notebook. “Please.”
I spend the whole night in front of the blank pages that stretch across the room, my hand holding the pen. But nothing, there is nothing. And I wait until suddenly my hand darts out, toys with the pen, lets itself be carried by the rapid rhythm of thoughts that never stop for a moment.
Left, right, I twist the wheel to the left again. Left. I park. I know he has read it because he waits for me at the door. He kisses me, and this time he touch me, and he touches me all at once. “It’s wonderful, it’s been a long time since I felt so alive.” I lock myself in again. And I wait, but I am no longer the person I was last night. That text does not belong to me, and perhaps I will never write another poem. And yet, around four thirty and ten seconds, my hand begins to move, stays like that for a couple of hours until exhaustion, until it dies. And I die.
Today efficiency has grown by 8.9965%, the company is thriving. Leo has logged and registered 13,500 invoices; his boss says he is made for that job, and so happy… Rat squeaks on the screens, dinner, homework, kisses that do not touch the skin, and we are so far away, in a labyrinth of identical houses and dogs barking at the walls. I lock myself in the office and wait; I am no longer the poet of yesterday, and I hope to be reborn. With my eyes open, I wait.
***
FINALISTS
Title: Gray Earth
Author: Anaís Emilia Sandoval Cossio
Gray Earth. Have you ever wondered why it is that way? Lead. Sweat. Blood. All of it combines there. It creates that color you cannot find in nature. The clouds, so thick. Did you think they were part of the movies? In truth, they are the smoke from burning houses. That’s why the nose hurts, the hands crack from carrying rifles, and the wounds become infected.
It’s damp inside here, but since what happened with Fran, I won’t risk sleeping on the earth. The walls sprout spiders and death stains the far ends of the trench.
You remind me of him, black hair, small build. Did you die from the wound in your leg or from hunger? I suppose you won’t answer. Mud smeared on your shirt and pants, you held on until the end; every good man deserves a burial.
Night offers hope, frightens and forgives. It never tells which one it will choose for you. And I don’t want to risk it, but… who were you before? A baker? A father? A son? I’d like to fling myself out of this barrel without my jaw trembling. It would help me save you, if that means picking up a corpse.
A green beam of light comes from a bottle of flaming wine. Like a shooting star, it descends to illuminate our stay. Fire. That word is so versatile. What do you think? Love, passion, écstasy. So human and carnal. Home, sweetness, the harsh logs of the fireplace. Gunshots, explosions, tears. That sparkling bottle can convey all of that… Crash… boom! It lodges into the earth.
The red surrounds me and blinds me.
I cough. I strike. The barrel falls and I crawl over the rocks. Above, a starry sky; below, the burns of hell. I barely reach your arm and I carry you on my back. There! Their steps approach. I run to enter the trench. It’s one, or perhaps three. I zigzag, clinging to the wall. Bang!
Body to the ground. Your face rests at the height of my neck. If you were alive, I would feel the tingle of your breath. Your warmth on mine.
Bang! I spin around, your body spasms and I force myself to keep my eyes open. I aim my pistol. One. Two. Three times.
Blood runs from your left shoulder down to my chest. It’s cold. The fire reminds me of bars. The iron-lamp candles. The fireplace. I embrace you, your cheek, the touch of your beard. I steady your head to lay you down. A cloud of dust rises. I laugh and shield my face with my forearm.
I wait for your laughter, as stupid as it may seem. I look at your pale eyes, dirt trails etching them. I swallow, my throat burning, like sipping cheap wine.
I rise, plant one hand on the ground and reach for your neck with the other, I don’t need to check it. And the silence, even so, weighs heavy.
Under your edge I reach to take the chains. I lift one of your plates, bloodied. Sovereign Republic of the North. I spring back with a jump. A shiver runs through my arms. I take my pistol, my hands tremble. With the gray moon lighting my way, I see your green trousers. The emblem on the thigh. I aim and… my arm buckles like a whip. My left knee betrays me and a pile of stones digs into my shin. I tear away one of your plates stained with blood and return to my camp.
*
Title: Your Job
Author: Eduardo Isai Villasente Gómez
After barotrauma therapies to rearrange my insides, like inflating and deflating a balloon, that condition did not go away; I still carry the diagnosis: a lover of staring at canvases. Watercolors, acrylics, and oil-based paints soften my soul. To see emotions perfectly conveyed in the technique of a dead artist, captured in an old painting, used to excite my whole body… or it did so did.
Previously it was enough to see two or three Baroque paintings a day. Later, when I needed brighter, livelier, more current and modern colors, I got hooked on pop art in screen printing, with garish tones.
But now, with museum ticket prices at ridiculous levels and my cheap broadband connection, I can conjure up my most fanciful fantasies using the multi-technique of writing commands to my computer: just wait for it to process my instructions and then, voilà.
The computer conceives, from its cold, electric and decaying insides, scenes that seem to have a soul, so perfectly made that they look as if painted with an immaculate technique.
Now that my mood is quantified in tokens and my way of describing it is through human-to-computer instructions, I do not need the warmth of a craftsman’s hand trained for years. The fruits of their skill were used as fuel to train the machine’s memory, and their talent now counts for absolutely nothing.
Those who still worry about my health ask me: “What does that have that I don’t?” I tell them that “that” understands me perfectly, without faults, without fatigue or wear, fast and efficient like a bird diving, not like artists with warm blood and a hollow flight.
Those who still worry about being replaced by the machine ask: “What does that have that I don’t?”
The answer: it has your job.