Flash Fiction: Sir’s Grateful Drive
This cab driver couldn’t have had a better customer from abroad. At the end of each visit, Sir tipped generously. Every year, the tip was double the previous year’s.
Amma had told me that the decade would open auspiciously. My first customer of the year was new—rather like that new year’s day. I carefully wrote his name on cardboard that Laxmana Sir had given me and drove to Bengaluru’s international airport in the middle of the night. I was proud to be a Laxmana Limos driver. Technology royalty from all over the world hired us to safely drive them on their visit to the garden city: from the airport to their five-star hotels; to-and-from the gleaming curved glass office complexes; and round trips to the airport for their flights home to America, Europe and various parts of Asia. Because I could speak English, Laxmana Sir always selected me to drive the non-Indian customers. The funny thing was that none of my customers said much beyond “Hello” and “Good-bye.”
But that night, a week before Pongal, was different.
My customer came out of the air-conditioned airport. He looked tired by the long flight and, at the same time, also energized. He saw his name on my cardboard, smiled, and briskly walked towards me. As I reached out to take his carry-on suitcase, he shook my hand warmly and said, “Pleased to meet you, Driver Ji. How are you on this beautiful Bengaluru night? Thank you for being on time.” I was a bit confused when he insisted on managing his suitcase, but since it was on rollers and Laxmana Sir taught us drivers that “Customer is King,” I led my New Year’s customer to the waiting area while I retrieved the car.
Once in the car, he asked me to turn off the A.C. and lower the windows. He wanted to breathe the Indian air. He told me that we might have to raise the windows if his wife called on my phone. I responded, “Yes, Sir. If you are wanting a charger for your iPhone, I am having one.”
He laughed and said, “I don’t have an iPhone. Indeed, I don’t own a smartphone of any kind. And please don’t call me Sir.” Even though I already knew his name, he casually said his first name and asked, “What’s your name?”
I said, “Yes, Sir. Customers call me S.V.”
He was noticeably irritated. “Okay. Looks like you’re not going to call me by my name. Do you use your initials to make it easier for foreign tongues?”
“Yes, Sir.”
“I’d prefer to use your full good name.”
I paused, remembered Laxmana Sir’s instructions about protocol, and complied with this crazy king of a customer. “SriSatyaSuryaSaiSubrahmanyaSastry Venkataraman, Sir.”
“Oh, I see. Very blessed name. Are you also blessed to still have your parents?”
Before I could reply to him, my phone rang and displayed an international number. A female voice asked to speak to my customer. I raised the windows, turned on the A.C., and stretched to the back seat with the phone in my left hand. “I believe it is Madam, Sir.”
He spoke in a fast-paced accent that sounded more like my usual American customers. I tried not to listen but could hear inquiries about children’s health and studies. He then said something about refilling the phone card and whispered, “I love you, too,” before returning the phone to me. He shifted from a loving whisper to a gentle question in the same way as I shifted gears on the open midnight highway. “So, as I was saying, are you blessed with your parents living here in Bangalore?”
No customer had ever asked me about Amma and Appa. I wasn’t sure how much to share. I said, “Sir, Amma is living with me. Appa is no more.”
“Oh, I’m sorry. Your father must have been a young man when he passed. I’m sorry for your loss. Do you mind if I ask you what name Amma uses for you?”
Thinking of Amma finally put me at ease. She had raised my two younger brothers, baby sister and me after
Appa died of drinking too much. Everything I had achieved to become a driver was because of her. I happily said, “Amma calls me Raju.”
“May I call you Raju?
“Thank you, Sir.”
“Thank you, Raju. I look forward to you showing me Bengaluru tomorrow. Monday through Thursday, please come by 7:30 in the morning for the drive to the office. I fly back to California on Thursday afternoon. Now I hope you don’t mind if I sleep until we reach the hotel.”
The next morning Sir was fresh and ready for our city tour: Bangalore Palace, Nandi Bull Temple, Cubbon Park and the Shiva Temple near the hotel.
Over the decade, Sir would visit several times each year, sometimes with other colleagues, sometimes with Madam, and once with their children. Each time, he and I visited different parts of the city. While he seemed happiest in Cubbon Park and the Shiva Temple; when he was with family, Sir also took longer excursions to Mysore and Shanti Bhavan, a village school for Dalit children.
At the end of each visit, Sir tipped generously. Every year, the tip was double the previous year’s. That first year, he said, “I’m grateful for your services; thus I provide this small gratuity.” After Sir re-entered the airport, I googled “gratuity” on my phone: an English word that sounded much more noble than the Indian baksheesh.
In the year the gratuity surpassed the amount due, Sir suggested that I start my own company. I protested that it would not be fair to leave Laxmana Limos. Sir explained words like cash flow, cost of doing business, margin and profit. He made no mention of loss. When I said that I did not have enough reserve to purchase a car, Sir clarified lease agreements and offered to help with the down payment. When I said that I did not have customers, Sir told me to look in the rearview mirror at my first customer who would bring more customers.
Before Sir’s next trip, he called me directly and asked if I had procured a car. When I proudly proclaimed that Amma had blessed the purchase, he said, “Good. I will not be calling Laxmana.” On that visit, Sir asked me to take him to Commercial Street to purchase a silver Ganesha, which he gifted to me. On future trips, we would buy jewelry, saris and gifts for his children’s weddings. On his last trip, Sir purchased a sari for my “wife.” I reminded him that I was unmarried.
“You will be, Raju,” he said. “You will be.”
But the decade’s last year passed without a visit from Sir. Indeed, no one visited from outside of India except a virus that forced me to sell four of my five cars. At the end of the year, I sent Sir a WhatsApp message on his wife’s phone, “Happy Diwali, Madam. Please convey my regards to Sir. When will he be next visiting Bangalore?”
She quickly responded. “Thank you, Raju. He would have been happy to receive your Diwali greetings. He would have also wished you and your family good health at this terrible time. Please know that he will no longer return to India.”
Dr. Oza has written Globalization, Diaspora, and Work Transformation, Satyalogue // Truthtalk: A Gandhian Guide to (Post)Modern-Day Dilemmas, and P.S., Papa’s Stories. He can be reached at satyalogue.com or amazon.com/author/rajoza.
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