((Atocongo Station) (a short radio play))
By Dennis L. Siluk, Dr. h.c.
“Full with
half comic throbbing of the human race, this radio play is written in strong,
dramatic dialogue that is real both in its insinuation and in its suitability.
So I believe.” The Author
Cast
Rosa
(daughter to Papa Augusto—47-years old)
Dennis
(son in law—59-years old)
Papa
Augusto (Father to Rosa and David, 91—years old)
Sofia
(daughter in law to Papa Augusto, wife to David—37-years old)
Maria
Sofia (Granddaughter to Papa Augusto—10-years old)
David (son to
Papa Augusto, husband to Sofia—39-years old)
Martha (eldest
daughter to Papa Augusto—54-years old)
Two people
standing the Atocongo Station, in Lima, Peru, it is four days before Christmas;
they are waiting for the train, and two other family members, Sofia and Maria
Sofia (or Mary-Sofia), are to go Christmas shopping. David is going beyond the yellow line, looking
down the tracks for the train, at the same time looking for his wife Sofia and his
daughter Maria Sofia glancing at the steps leading up to the platform where the
train will stop, Sofia is to pick up her daughter upon arrival back from
Satipo, the Central Jungle of Peru (where they are building a motel), then take
a taxi over to Martha’s apartment in Jesus-Maria, a section of Lima, and pick
up her daughter, then hightail over to the train station near Maria Sofia’s Uncle
Dennis’ and Rosa’s house.
There is
music in the background, Christmas music, where it is coming from, is questionable,
only the station manager and God knows.
A Voice:
Here she comes!
The music
gets louder. You can hear footsteps. You can hear a few murmurs then they die
out.
You can
hear the crescendo of the train whistle approach; the sound of iron and steel
on the tracks rushing.
The train
now enters the dock area—within the station, pulls up to the edge, there is a
hissing, a clanking. Now the noise of the people standing on the pier are about
to board the train— (English and Spanish mixed voices, whatever, however you
prefer) then a dead stop of the train.
Voice
comes over a loud speakers saying: Stand back of the yellow line until the
train opens up its doors and the passengers leave, and then step up… (Repeats.)
David:
Rosa, do you see Sofia or Mary-Sofia, they’re to meet us here?
Rosa: We can wait for her, wait for next
train don’t worry, they come every
fifteen minutes, she’ll be along.
David:
I left Mary-Sofia with Martha, she’s watching her for the weekend, but
Sofia
was to pick her up, as soon as she arrived back
from
Satipo!
Sofia suddenly
appears on the platform holding little ten-year old Mary-Sofia’s arm. Papa
Augusto is with them, he drags the heels of his feet somewhat and you can hear
the sound on the cement, and stomps his cane, step to step, unknowingly or
purposely, he likes his attention. And recently he had had an accident,
breaking his femur, thus, he’s been laid up in Huancayo, up in the Andes all
this time, and it has halfway healed, this is his first real visit back down to
Lima in a long while. It was an eight-hour bus ride to Lima.
Rosa:
Oh, Sofia, there you are! (Sofia
hastens towards Rosa, leaving Mary-Sofia
to assist her grandfather, meeting Rosa—face
to face, and David rushing over to greet his wife at the same time) David’s been so worried, nervous as a rabbit
being chased by a hound (they both
chuckle, David grins).
Papa
Augusto dragging his feet a little as Mary-Sofia hasten towards them.
David
(finally, after a greeting kiss): Where
on God’s earth you been?
Papa Augusto (coolly): Martha’s, we’ve been at Martha’s, and you
know how
she
likes to talk, and talk and talk.
David: All this time?
Papa Augusto: Maria Sofia eats so slow, you
could milk a hundred goats!
Papa
Augusto pacing in a circle, dragging his feet, thudding his cane stick... David
kisses his daughter, hugs her.
Sofia (to David): The truth of the matter is, your father was in the ‘men’s’ at
Martha’s if you know what I mean… ((?)(Then quietly in a whisper)) That’s why we’re late…
Rosa: We can catch the next train (Rosa goes to kiss Papa Augusto and give him
a big hug, he likes it but the hug is a little
too long, and he fusses a tinge, says in his osculating, and higher pitched
voice, the one he saves for such occasions:’ Yaw, Okay, okay!’).
Rosa (continues): Why are you here papa?
Papa Augusto: I wanted to surprise Dennis,
where is he?
Rosa: Taking a siesta at home. I see pa, you
have a tie on Dennis gave you it
looks good on you, and the ring he gave you,
Dennis always likes it when he sees you with the ring on, he says it makes you
look like a big shot. (Pause.)
Papa Augusto: Now never mind about that, you
should have brought Dennis
along.
Rosa (her
voice a little dejectedly) I didn’t
know you were coming.
Papa Augusto: I had such a hard time getting
here with this leg and all, this
stupid cane, up those flights of stairs,
coming all the way down on a bus from Huancayo to this dusty-cloudy city, with
all the ‘rateros’ (robbers) I just gave them a few of my mean looks and
they backed off…Dennis and I are
warriors you know… (Pause.)
David:
Let’s go back and wake Dennis up, maybe he’ll go Christmas shopping
with us, that will make dad happy?
Papa Augusto:
Good Idea, yes, who knows, I’m 100-years old, maybe more, I
may be dead tomorrow, let’s see if he is up,
I may never get to see him if we don’t.
Rosa: Okay but you know he likes his naps. Pa
you’re 91-years old, not 100.
Papa Augusto:
How would you know, you weren’t born yet, they never even
had a birth certificate of me until I went to
the courthouse and they wrote down the day I went there, not the ten-years
earlier as my birthday should have been? So how old does that make me?
Rosa: Yaw, I suppose there’s some truth to
that, ma even said that before she
passed on.
Papa Augusto (in his osculating, and higher pitched voice): Yaw,
Okay, Okay!
…let’s get going.
They walk
off the platform, descending down the steps; you can hear the pitter-patter of
footsteps, and the dragging of the cane.
At the bottom of the steps Papa stops to rest, it would seem he’s thinking
initiatively, as if he has a plan.
Sofia: We could have saved all this time ((pause.)(David motions to Sofia, she
has not finished her sentence, they are at
the bottom of the station platform, and papa is starting to walk away from them
dragging his heels…))
Rosa: I hope you’ll be happy now Dad!
Papa Augusto:
Don’t ask me to speak and walk at the sometime, I’m worn out,
end of conversation.
They move on across
the street, they halt at the corner to chat a bit.
David: Papa, put your arm around my shoulder.
Papa
Augusto: Have you been drinking, I don’t
need another cane! (Pause.)
David:
you’re quivering some (Pause.)
Papa
Augusto: I’m in good enough condition to
lead myself.
Rosa:
You and your cane are going to fall in the cracks of the sidewalk; you
should
let David help you!
Papa
Augusto: Pull yourself together; it’s only a few blocks to your house.
Rosa: Let’s get a motor cart, I mean, a taxi.
Papa
Augusto: No, no need for it, it’ll cost three soles. ((One dollar) (mumbling
while
calculating, 1, 2, 3, 5, people, two cars…))
Rosa:
no, one and a half soles, only you and I can go, and the rest can walk to
the
house, it’s not that far.
Papa
Augusto (Thinking.): The sun’s hot!
David:
let’s not argue, the rest of the way is per near all downhill. (Plus, Papa
Augusto,
looks firm, and David can see this.)
They walk three blocks;
you hear footsteps for a long minute.
Papa Augusto:
Do not ask me to count, but this is more than a few blocks.
(Pause. Irritable.) I
think they’ve made these blocks longer since last I’ve been here.
Rosa: No paw, it’s the same distance it has
always been, you’re just thirty-
years older with a bad leg, it is although
all of four blocks, or bit more.
Papa Augusto:
Well, if that’s what you call a short walk. (Rosa silent).
Now they
are at the house, standing in the front of the door, you can hear Rosa
unlocking the door with the key, the door creeps open with a light noise from
the hinges. Papa Augusto is tired, not
extremely tired, putting on more of a show, than is reality for some reason.
Rosa: One minute please (she turns
on the hallway light so everyone can see their
way to the upper section of the house, there
are three steps to the next floor, they are in the den.)
Papa Augusto:
I think I shall retire, what bedroom you want me to take,
you got six don’t you? (Pause.)
They move
on into the house, Papa Augusto dragging his feet, panting, thudding his stick.
Rosa: Now mind the three steps up…up to the
living room! …Okay? (Looking
at Papa Augusto, in particular.)
Papa Augusto: I made it. ((Without stopping between steps, he seems a
bit proud
wants a little attention, gloats some.)They
are now all standing in the living room.))
Rosa:
Well we made it (A smile on her face) I’ll see if Dennis is awake.
Papa Augusto: No need to, you folks go do
whatever Christmas shopping you
got on your minds, I’ll stay here, and when
he wakes up, I’ll let him know.
Rosa: Let him know what? I mean he already knows we are out to do some
Christmas shopping that was what our original
intentions were you know.
Papa Augusto:
No-ooo, not that, I know that—don’t let me stop you from your
shopping—but I’ll let him know I’m here. All
this stopping and starting back up, made me tired.
Puzzlement
seems to befall everyone.
Maria Sofia: Is everything okay, ma? (Looking at Sofia’s bewilderment look.)(No
response, just a finger over her lips as if
to say be quite, and wait a minute as for her to figure out what in tar nation
is going on.)
Papa Augusto (Brokenly.)
What was that! (Cries coming from behind Rosa’s
house.)
Rosa: That’s the little boy of Lola’s next
door, Denial, he cries all the time,
makes Dennis crazy, he yells at Daniel now
and then tells him to be quiet, stop the crying, and he does for a while. ((Silence.)(Dogs start barking out in the park
across the street, which is directly in front of the house, only a street
separating them—Cherry Park))
Sofia (In
nearly a normal tone, with a slight irritation to it, to David.): Do you, or do
you not want to go Christmas shopping? At
least I hope you do! (Back to normal-normal
tone.) Let’s rest and start
back up again, I mean head on back to the train. (David looks hesitate.)
David: I was thinking, maybe we can go tomorrow.
Sofia
(Startled.) Really!...
Papa
Augusto is looking about, he hears the little boy starting to cry again, dogs
barking outside, the train halting a few blocks away, the iron and steel wheels
making a squeaking noise, Christmas music coming from some place.
Papa Augusto: Now what was I going to say. ((He’s trying to remember what he
was thinking.)(Pause.)) Oh yes, tomorrow I want to visit the
racetrack!
Rosa: You do have your moments Pa. I might
just as well do some house
work before Dennis wakes up, it looks as if
I’m not going anyplace. If he gets up and sees you walking here and there he
make think you’re a robber, and God knows what then, maybe shoot you.
The Child
is crying again…
Papa Augusto: That’s one healthy child!
Rosa (to
her father): Did you eat at Martha’s?
Papa: No, nothing solid, if that is what you
mean.
Rosa: Well what did you eat? (Pause.)
Papa Augusto: Something she got at Metro, or
Wong, or Plaza Vea, or maybe it
was Totus, her specialty grocery stores.
Rosa: Well what did you eat?
Sofia: Yes, indeed he ate.
Papa Augusto: I confess I forgot what.
Maria Sofia: I think grandpa you had two pantone
slices, a coke, parts of three
eggs and a
banana, and something out of a package.
Papa Augusto
(everyone looking at Papa Augusto, starting to laugh): This cane
takes a lot out of a person when he
walks. (He
clears his throat) I’ll take a sandwich Rosa if you got one.
Rosa: Peanut butter will have to do, and
wheat bread.
Papa Augusto: Yaw, Okay, okay! (In a
high osculating voice.)
Note 1: Written out in an afternoon on the 20 of
December, 2012, on top of my roof patio in Lima, Peru, written out in longhand,
seemingly it appears to lack luster, and
to be a little weak, although it has a few comic throbbing moments, dramatic dialogue, with some hint in
suitability. Rewritten in better form, 12-29-2012; a short and playful;, play with
near
2300-words total. #983
Note 2: The drawing for this Radio Play, is of Rosa
Peñaloza by the Author,,
