Scene From a Taxi Cab

The cab pulls up to the bar, the driver searching for the name of the establishment to be sure he’s at the correct address. Outside the bar, a young man points at the cab driver, indicating that he’s the one who called. Next to him is a fairly attractive blond woman, but she is apparently quite drunk.

The young man holds the woman by an arm and she staggers as they approach the taxi, and the driver opens the automatic rear window from the controls on his door. The young man appears displeased.

“Here ya go, buddy,” he says.

The driver consults the words on his computer’s screen. “Are you Ryan?”

The young man’s expression reads frustration; fear, even. “No, but I think he’s the one who called. We called your cab company, anyway.”

“Okay.” says the cab driver. “I’m here.”

The young man opens the rear door and guides the woman into the seat. He shuts the door and says, “She’s all yours.” He leaves without another word.

“How are you this evening?” the cab driver says cheerfully.

“Mm wunnerful,” says the woman from under her stylish hat. She neither sounds nor looks like she feels wonderful.

“Where are we off to?”

“Take me home,” she says sloshily.

The cabbie feels a twinge of the absurd. “And what’s the address?”

Silence follows. Then the woman sighs thickly. “I don’t know.”

Ever helpful, the cabbie reaches for his GPS unit on the center console between the seats. “Is it here in town?”

“Yes,” the woman slurs.

As the cab driver begins to tap on the screen the name of the town, the woman gushes, “It’s at Salem and Miner.”

The cab driver backs out of the GPS address finder and goes back in through the intersection finder, entering the name of the town again. After entering the second street name, the GPS unit reads, “No information.” The streets don’t intersect.

“I can just tell you how to get there,” blurts the woman. And as the cabbie puts the car in gear, the woman adds, “He said it would all be paid for...”

Another twinge hits the cabbie, and he quickly decides that, since this is a short ride anyway, it’s most important that this woman get home safely. If she has no money, so be it.

He drives the car under the inebriated woman’s direction and, after her second utterance of “Where are you taking me?” he decides that following her directions is an exercise in futility. He stops the car and asks her again for the address.

“It’s at the intersection of Salem and Miner.”

“Ma’am, the GPS says those streets don’t cross.” He thinks for a moment. “Do you have your driver’s license? I’ll just get the address from that.”

“Yeah, I have my driver’s license,” she blathers. “Oh. But I don’t have one for this county. I just moved here.”

Gritting his teeth, the cabbie says, “Can you remember the address? If you can’t, then we’re stuck here.”

In drunken despair the woman whines, “Please help me.”

“I’m doing my best, ma’am,” says the exasperated cabbie, “but without an address, I can’t get you home.”

The woman heaves a huge sigh. “202 north Salem.”

“Excellent!” says the cab driver as he subtly shakes his head in the dark car and enters the new information into the GPS unit.

No more than a minute into the trip, the cabbie hears the sound of a cigarette lighter being operated. He turns to face the woman. “There’s no smoking in this cab, ma’am.”

She flicks the lighter again.

“Ma’am, this is a no-smoking cab! Please put the cigarette away.”

The flame licks the end of the cigarette, and the tobacco glows red.

The cabbie pulls to the curb and stops the car. “Ma’am! There is no smoking in this cab, PLEASE PUT THE CIGARETTE OUT.”

She says, “Okay. It’s out.”

The cabbie looks at the cigarette still clutched in her fingers and notices that the cigarette is indeed out. How she managed that he could not guess.

A mere few hundred yards down the road, the cabbie hears the lighter flick again. He just wants to be rid of this woman, now, so he simply opens both rear windows and locks out the rear controls so she can’t close them. He takes silent glee when he hears the woman pushing her window button to no avail.

The GPS guides them to the address, but the woman points to a building across the street. “It’s that one there.”

There’s no parking lot entrance from the street they’re on, so the cabbie backs the car to the intersection and pulls to an entrance across the sidewalk, but it is clearly not a parking lot entrance, but rather to a loading dock of some sort. “Ma’am, are you sure this is it?”

“Yes, I’m sure. You have to go back to the other street.”

Gritting his teeth again, the cabbie reverses the car back onto the street and returns to the street where he originally stopped.

“It’s this one,” says the woman, this time pointing to the building opposite the one she indicated the first time, right where the GPS had guided them in the first place.

The cabbie stops the meter at $8.00. The woman digs in her wallet and produces a five-dollar bill. The cabbie can see that it is the only paper currency there.

“That’ll do. Let’s just get you home.”

The woman looks at him. “What’s your name, anyway?”

“I’m Tony,” he says.

“Tony, I love you!”

He steps out of the car and walks around to the passenger side rear door, which the woman has already opened. He offers a hand, which she accepts, and guides her toward the building, entirely uncertain if she’s even at the right place.

“Which apartment is it?” he asks.

“Six B,” comes her reply.

Of course, six B is on the second floor. The cabbie is fearful that she’ll never make it up the stairs on her own, so he helps her stagger up both flights, and then he helps her to her door.

The woman fumbles for a minor eternity in her purse, but can’t find the keys, so she thrusts the purse at the cabbie who takes the handles and holds the purse open in order that the woman can fumble two-handed. She produces a set of keys and lunges at the lock, but she can’t manage to single out a key, let alone fit it into the lock. She thrusts the keys at the cabbie, and he finds one that looks like a house key. It slides into the lock effortlessly, but, try as he might, he can’t turn it.

“Are you SURE this is your apartment? Are we at the right building?” he asks, picturing a man on the other side of the door, trembling in fear and aiming a shotgun at the door.

“Yes, this is my place.” The woman tries the door handle, but the door is still locked. “God, I have to pee.”

“The key’s not turning, Ma’am. I don’t know what else to do.”

She lunges at the door once more while the cabbie, stuck with his own sense of responsibility, looks helplessly down at his cab parked at the curb, beckoning him return.

Finally, a minor miracle occurs and the door opens to reveal a fairly nice interior and an unenthusiastic, white Pekingese looking up at her as if to say, “Again?”

The woman staggers to the doorway, and the cabbie puts one, final steadying hand on her back. She makes a futile grab for his hand and stumbles into her own living room and says, “Wait. Come here.”

“I’m sorry, Ma’am,” says the cab driver, backing away from the doorway, HELL NO! screaming through his mind. “I’m not allowed to go inside.” He pulls on the door handle. “You have a nice night, now!”

“No! Wait!” In her attempt to keep the door open, her weight carries forward and she pushes the door shut.

Heading down the stairs, the cabbie chuckles to himself, shakes his head, and pities the woman for the morning she is about to endure.



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