Wednesday, October 24, 2007

Arrival

“Are you traveling alone?”
“No. I was traveling with friends before this and in Rome I’ll be starting a study abroad program.”
“Oh, that’s good then. Traveling alone, that’s bold.”
“Yeah, it is.”

I had lied and I knew it. Only partially though. Literally what I had said was true. It’s just that four-day stretch that I left out. Had it only been four days?

Out the window a station approaches. There is absolutely no pomp, no circumstance. I know it is my stop only because the time is right. Termini is just another stop marked only by the gray concrete barriers that have marked the stops before it and will continue to mark the stops I will not see. The tracks are the same, the blue signs the same. I can see nothing of the city I have long studied. No monuments, no ruins. HFS TEAM is scrolled in vibrant colors on the wall outside. I smile as I stand, the train has slowed.

I nervously pat the pocket that holds my next step. Vorrei andare a Hotel Campo de’ Fiori. I force myself to mumble. Of the station I take in very little, only the signs that say taxi matter. But when I reach the curb the taxis come to me.

“Taxi lady?”
“Taxi?”
“Taxi?”

Three men, no taxis. All are dressed in jeans, worn shoes, and faded shirts. They smell of smoke, mainly because one’s cigarette dangles lit between his lips. They are not the taxi men I had envision, but I have no chance to look around. I am engulfed by the swirl and my only focal points demand my attention.

“Where you going?”

The shortest of the three with the roundest potbelly and only a snaggle of a tooth. His dark eyes stare out hard and focused above his unshaven chin. The two men at his side fall silent waiting for a reply.

“Hotel Campo de’ Fiori,” as bold as I can muster, my grip has tightened on the bag I roll behind.

“50 euro.” He says it directly. I stand aghast. There is no way.

“50 euro? To Campo de’ Fiori?” The disbelief in my voice is undeniable, it rings shocked and hurt.

He makes a small hand gesture, as if to apologize for his mistake. “Ahhh, for you 45.”

“No. No more then 35.” So bold, I forgot who spoke. The shock and realization of my aloneness passed with his reply.

“35. No e impossibile. Might as well take the company.” His tone is mean. He searches my face while playing with the pocket of his denim button-up shirt. I do not understand, but I cannot move, for I know nowhere to go. His shoulders shrug and he half turns away from me. I am participating in a dance my conscious self has never learned, but there I stand.

“Ok. Campo de’ Fiori for 35.” It is the taller. His white shirt and hair are pointed downward in a stoop. As he passes the turned he receives a look I can’t quite read. I haven’t time, I’m already following long, jeaned strides across hot pavement. But still I see no taxi and he is drawing me away.

“I can take you within 100 meters of Campo de’ Fiori.” He says it mid-stride without so much as a head turn.

“What?” I am jogging at his side. He still has not looked me in the eye.

“It is not possible for me to get closer. Can I take your bag?” He turns abruptly, and though he asked it as a question, the pointed way in which he extends his arm is making no request. My grip is iron now. His command denied, he meets my eyes. Brown like mine, but full of a sorrow too fierce to inspire trust, like a dog that’s been kicked too many times.

“No.” He continues on as before. We are hurrying away from the safety of people and I still see no car. I must know. “Where is your taxi?”

“It is a flat-rate taxi.”

The Italian accent is too thick. “What?”

He stops and turns. The wrinkles around the eyes that won’t meet mine are snarling. I read his lips. “A flat-rate taxi. You pay only one fare.”

We have reached an island of concrete floating between the station and parked cars.

“No.”

The answer is instantaneous. I completely disregard him and turn myself. Now I see. From the island I can see the line of marked taxis formed at the front right of the station. I had been distracted. I leave him standing there with his hands out of his pockets and march off to find the front of it.

The taxi ride to the door of Hotel Campo de’ Fiori cost 7 euro and 35 cents. I paid in exact change.

Welcome to Rome.

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