Sndbox Summer Camp Writing - Task 2: I am Costel
A short introductory note is in order. Some years ago I traveled a lot with taxis. Inevitably I knew a lot of taxi drivers. I had countless discussions, ranging in quality from football-arena like vernacular to educated dialogues about politics, art, books, music, etc. I had a taxi driver named Costel, a Romanian taxi driver, which I used on a regular basis. He has two kids and a wife. And below is his story, written from figments of my imagination and from my discussions with him. In a way, under the microscope, we all are Costel somehow.
I am Costel
Not his actual car. But it is a Red Logan. Photograph was taken in my strolls around the city. Full resolution image here.
Costel had been sitting in the same place for two hours, still as a corpse, just like the taxi he was driving. His car was a red Dacia Logan and you could tell by its smell that it was brand new. It was Costel’s pride and joy. He had named it “The Red Fury” and could not stop looking at it painting a vivid picture in his head of all the urban adventures he would share with Fury. Exactly like a knightly tournament champion riding on his strong and sturdy horse. Costel sat still. Just like his taxi. Same place. Since two hours. About one hundred meters away from the airport exit, near the international flights' gate. He could hear Boeing engines piercing the clouds and would flinch whenever he dozed off. With every whizz of the aircraft engine his hopes would be lifted, his thoughts would flow towards his potential customer and the conversation which would ensue. He would watch the smartly dressed people emerge through the gate and leave in the shinier taxis. His hopes would crash like a glass into a thousand shards, his mind would be filled with violent images brewing from his anger within. Then he would apologize while staring at the Dacia sign embellishing the cheap, plastic steering wheel and then adjusting his rearview mirror. His gaze was a like gentle, caring touch. Small signs of trembling one could have noticed in Costel’s hands. His physique was on par with his main activity, which involved sitting in a car seat all day long. Elongated nose and dark brown eyes with a mustache masquerading an upper lip birth defect.
Costel had two children. He could have had no wife, but he did. After 45 years old, nothing becomes all you own, and all you own becomes nothing. It’s like we become part of the same mollusk-like organism, with thousands of legs, arms, tentacles, suckers. “If you don’t build your own house by the time you’re 40...” Costel would often surprise himself falling prey to such daydreaming, where he would either criticize or encourage himself and told himself everything would be OK. Most of the times, however, he would fantasize about running far away, driving an expensive car, a beautiful, young woman by his side. “So shallow, so cheap” Costel’s mum (a senile, old communist Latin teacher) would have said. “Facta, non verba!”. “Up yours!” Costel would add.
The evening was about to fall. Shadows grew longer and longer. The CD hanging from the rearview mirror – an ever-present accessory, reminiscent of the first ever Balkan taxi driver – struggled in the reflexions of a dying sun. Costel had dark circles under his eyes, he had always had them. He had been lacking sleep for a while, he woke up at 2-3 am at night and stayed alert in some sort of clenching anxiety, as if preparing for a fight. Costel had dark circles under his eyes, he had had them for many years. When he argued with this wife, he would go outside for a smoke. He would calm down and climb the stairs to go back in. Golgotha. “How can I be such a fool? I have two children who love me, I must see the bright side to all this!” The foul smell of the same landing, the stench of the same dumping area ground, the canine grotesque of the same stray dog pack, the crack in the living room wall, the wallpaper peeling off the wall, the dripping water in the kitchen sink, the washing machine noise, his old wrinkled hands, her wrinkled neck, her saggy, soft, amorphous, mucilaginous breasts. Her thighs, her thighs. “Oh Fuck it!” one could find Costel at the bar across the street, after his work hours, discussing politics with the usual drunkards. The night was falling.
“.......?”
Costel woke up from a long dream full of adventures and events. It was so long that he had forgotten where he came from and where he was heading for. He saw her eyes through the windshield. Her wide, clear, green eyes. Then her hand on his car’s hood. Her luggage at her feet, next to her sandals. And again her hand, her hand on the hood. Bracelets sliding down her forearm. Her red fingernails. Red just like his Logan. “We all have the same mother” Her hair falling down on her hypnotizing shoulders. She looked like the sketch of a fashion model, drawn by a talented hand on an A4 size sheet of paper. He quickly opened the door for her, he was obviously nervous. He hit her luggage. “Damn it, you stupid motherfucker!” She smiled and leaned to pick it up. He leaned at the same time as her. They hit their heads. He felt like he wanted to bite off his own arm, rip off his face and throw it to the dogs. She took a step back, rubbing her forehead. He apologized “I am so terribly sorry, are you OK? Let me check up on you... Here rub the spot so that you don’t get a bruise” She smiled. “C’est rien” she said.
“We’ll go this way, it’s way faster...oh, sorry, we here is short...yes? – Costel mumbled in his very basic English. Blocks of flats and office buildings, larger roundabouts, the acoustics of a big city, a red Dacia Logan. He remembered the little girl in “Schindler’s List”. We all have the same needs, the same demons. It all leaked down the car windows and the metallic paint. She lit up a cigarette. Shortly after, she asked, in an annoying innocence, if she could… Costel, may I?
“Costel, viens ici”
“Sure, sure, no problem...please smoke” Costel answered, a sharp smile on his face, watching her in the rearview mirror as her lips folded the cigarette filter and her velvet cheekbones contoured in a murmur “Costel, viens ici” “Shut up, shut up, you motherfucking idiot”. It was so hot. His sweaty forehead and his shirt with sweat-stained underarms. Her hand on his shoulder. His sweaty shirt. Her red nails.
“We are picking up someone else at this address...” she said and handed him a paper note scribbled in capital letters. She was close. He could still her hand on his shoulder. “You should have changed your shirt, you idiot! You knew you’d sweat like a pig! You moron!” Costel stopped the car, turned towards her, smiled and waved to her in a sign meaning that would only take a short while. He opened the trunk, pulled a clean shirt from a bag stuffed somewhere near the safety tire, wiped his underarm using the old shirt and quickly got dressed. He was struggling to remember if his wife had ever touched his shoulder. He really wanted to remember a touch from his wife, anything that could compete against the touch of her hand on his shoulder. Anything to make him say: “Been there, done that, this is just like chewing gum losing its taste. The brain just needs a short while to forget the flavor...” But that didn’t happen. He couldn’t remember anything like that, or he didn’t want to. It was so hot. Signs of heels penetrating the asphalt, cozy air-conditioned restaurants in the expensive neighborhood and worn-out commuters waiting for the bus in an overcrowded station. Street smells, erect buildings in mirror windows, lots of cars and the radio playing summer hits: “Chica bomb”.
“Je m’appelle Marie” she introduced herself and reached out to him from the backseat. Who, me? Who the fuck am I? I am Costel, the taxi driver. The family guy. I have two kids and a wife. I could not have had a wife, but I do. Marie and Costel.
“Erm, Costel....my name is Costel...I am Costel” Take her, Costel, take her far away. You don’t need a convertible, you just need some guts, Costel. Be brave, Costel. “Viens ici, Costel”.
“You whore!”
“I beg your pardon?!”
“Oh not you, sorry, I speak with me...in my mind...sorry” Costel mumbled and grabbed the steering wheel furiously, grinding his teeth, and then turned towards her smiling. He careered sharply, almost hit a parked car. “What am I, if not human?” I am Costel.
Ideas came swirling out from the sewer drains, while Costel thought of dead rats. Costel used to kill cats as a child. As a grown-up, he would blame his entourage for that. But he still asked himself from time to time if he used to kill those cats because the flocking behavior dictated him to do so or because he simply enjoyed it. Costel had been in the army. So there was nothing wrong with him. He was only 45. Forty-five years old. He thought of writing his age in letters on his children’s monthly allowance request. He once did that by mistake. Her small head and her big eyes would have matched the size of his palms. And no lock of hair would have been left aside. He would have eaten her alive. Within him, with him. His wife’s head, he imagined it on a wall, next to deer and rhino head mounts. He would tell her all the time: “There is no scale invented that will not say “to be continued” when you step on it”. She cried, he smoked. His oldest son was such a trickster. Last time Costel had pulled him by the ears, he told his father: “ Dad, you’re such a fuck up!” Costel went with his oldest son the day when they released the results of the finals exams for the college graduation. He felt good like it is his merit. He felt like being a father, caressing his son head in a drowsy, yet parental way. When they were little he didn’t care much. He used to retreat in the kitchen where he would have been smoked and drink alcohol while watching the small TV hanged on the wall. He would have filled two ashtrays in the weekend. Sometimes he would have listened to old folkloric music while drunk, repeating the words of the songs and imagining himself in the deep sorrow or happiness that the song would have projected on him. He liked to remember the happy years, before the marriage, when, as young students, him and his soon to be wife wandered the trails in the forest, laughing, making plans, talking, fucking and idling in a neverending state of forgetfulness. He envisioned his life as being one full of achievements, filled with revelations and universal truths as he would have surpassed the biological and emotional barriers of mere humans. Funny thing life is.
“Ici…c’est ici...”
“Here...sure...we stop”.
He watched her step out of the car, and a young, unshaved guy approaching her. They stopped when they were face to face, they hugged, they kissed, they touched and kissed their hair, caressed each other’s face, rubbed their nose tips. “Viens ici, Costel!” As if life gave you a sentence of a lifetime. A few bums gathered around the taxi. Costel took out a few 1 leu bills and gave them away to them “Here you poor wretch, have some!” The bums showed their toothless smiles, they stank and grinned. One of them scooped out a loaf of bread. The 1 leu was his money for the full day. It was as if Costel was expecting for some sort of balance mechanism to go into action. Do me some good, and I’ll do the same for you. Make me happy. Thank you.
“You idiot, you should have taken that English class!”
They both got in the car. Her and him. Costel behind the wheel of a red Dacia Logan. The wheel of The Red Fury. In the rearview mirror, he could see fragments of people: hands, eyes, ears, lips, legs. His hand under her skirt. His dirty hand under her immaculate skirt. His hand on her thighs. Costel’s hand under her white skirt. Costel’s foot on the accelerator. His eyes in her eyes. “I am Costel!”