VII

Night Shift – I can’t recall what day

I sit in the car, an old Honda with darkish green gloss paint that is only hardly noticeable in the dark. The inside is dull in a brown or rather black interior. My friend is starting the car and before going he pushes a black dusty music cassette in the player of the car. The display lights up in a neon greenish yellow and tune 1 is starting to play. Off we go — driving into the night. The city is glooming. I see a woman standing on her balcony under a large roof enjoying her view over the city towards the beginning of a night. What is she expecting of this evening? A miracle happening taking her to a forbidden, exciting journey? A man in another apartment is standing in his balcony door with his penis hanging down and brushing his teeth ready to go to bed. We instead start our day — the Night Shift. Feeling like workers starting off their day early in the morning when the city is still sleeping and only rats are scurrying around the corner. We’re driving past an advertisement, a huge poster on the wall of one house. At first sight it looks like there is a bombed building on the poster with smoke rising up the sky. But taking a closer look it’s just advertisement for a new building with branches of a tree hanging in the frame of the picture. Am I marked by the war? On the side of the road there is a little magazine store. We are passing a bridge. Standing at a crossroad I see a car cruising by. Its lights create almost a flashlight from the speed. The windows of the houses are glooming in the dark gray night. Street lamps are shining down warmly on the tar ground. I take a look in the back of the car. A Ukrainian woman is sitting there with her long, thin hair looking out of the window. The blue street luster is mirrored in her face with shadows now and then wandering over her skin. Into the night we go. Dark. Like a second episode of my journey. Alone with people I only met at the border. Who are friends now but only for a short period of time, hoping to meet again for a second time. The mood is changing into a dark, lustful story filled with aspiration. The rain is suddenly pouring down leaving the streets wet in the darkness with a red and green play of color mirrored in the wet surfaces. The dark sky is filled with black blocks of clouds. Silence. There’s silence in the car. We’re driving towards Tesco. The humanitarian aid center where we all work. The car smells like gasoline. It’s one of those shady cars. We’re driving towards the border where Przemyśl lays. The thought of Ukrainian border isn’t yet seeming dark in my head anymore. I’m getting used to it. Some people left Tesco. It’s empty. Arriving at the parking lot I spot a black cat head made out of plastic sticking to the ventilation slots next to the car radio. My friend is pushing a button and the cassette pops out. The music stops and we’re walking into Tesco. There is a girl with a Violine playing. A group has gathered around to listen to her and to vibe to the sound. We’re stuck in the building for hours when we enter. It feels like our own little bunker — even though there is no acute danger. People hide from the war, inside the protecting walls of Tesco, under whose rooftop we gather to eat and sleep and to clean toilets, talk, cry, listen, look, comfort, think of our families and try to survive with a lot of pain in our chests, a crying heart and a willingness to help all together. Our lives there are similar to the ones of the refugees — we spent almost as much time there — with the important difference that we choose to be stuck there. And we can leave anytime we want.