Driving Cab: Chapter Thirty-Four

          Driving Cab: Chapter Thirty-Four

 There was the old white bar hopper.  “Here’s a tip for you,” he told me as he lifted his ass and let out a loud fart.

    “You dirty bastard. Don’t you ever try to ride in my cab again, you f---ing bastard,” I yelled after him. He reached for my front door shaking his fist and nearly fell under the front wheels.

     Funny now as I jot the words slowly on paper, but not so funny back then. How difficult it is to capture on paper the fear I felt back then. I remember one of my closest calls. I’m driving back to the garage on San Pablo. It’s just after midnight, dark and foggy. The dispatcher calls for a cab around Four-Thirteen. I figure there is no sense picking up here after midnight. Not a driver in the whole fleet will spot on Four-Thirteen after dark. It’s the scariest part of San Pablo where every fare is badass, poor, and black. I double check my door locks, roll my window tighter, and push on the gas pedal. The dispatcher calls three more times before I cross Stanton. What the heck, I can check it out good, I tell myself figuring it will make my mileage look better.

     The radio gives me an address that takes me to a run down greasy chop suey joint a block above San Pablo. I double park and hotfoot it inside. Probably an old dishwasher or something, I tell myself. Two or three faces look up as I wave my yellow cap in the dimness of the fly-specked restaurant. “Nobody call a cab here,” the old man behind the counter tells me.

     I call in the no go and tell the dispatcher that I’m heading home. As I turn back onto San Pablo, I see a young black waving his arms from a bus stop across the street. There’s a young girl standing next to him. I figure it must have been them that called in the order and decided not to wait. I figure he must be taking his girl home. I make a U and give them the once over. They look pretty safe. The boy motions toward the back seat with his head. The girl shakes her head no, and walks a couple steps away from my cab.

     Trouble, I tell myself but it’s too late. The guy opens the back door and slides inside. The girl walks a couple more steps away and cranes her neck to look for the bus. My fare tells me he wants to go cross-town to Seventy Second and East Fourteenth.  At least a five-dollar trip, I tell myself.  I tell him I need to write down the destination on my trip sheet.  He explains that he doesn’t know the exact address. “I’m staying wid my aunt. I’ll show you when we get dere,” he tells me.  We agree to take the freeway. I jot down Seventy Second and East Fourteenth, call in my destination in an extra loud voice, and flip on the meter.

     Looking to be in his late teens or early twenties, he’s tall, lean, and sporting a thin mustache, and short Afro. I’m glad that he’s sitting on the far right side where I can keep a close eye on him. God damn it. How could I be so stupid to pick up out here? I ask myself.

     “Been driving long?” my fare asks from his corner seat.

     “Little over a year,” I answer.

     “Ever been held up?” he asks as he rubs his hand over his mustache. My heart picks up a beat as I wonder if he meant to add before. My body tightens up and a flash of pain shoots through the back of my neck.

     “No, never held up, yet,” I answer trying to sound cool and calm.

     “What you do if some dude, try it, man?” he asks.

     We’re on Macarthur, now, with lots of traffic. The headlights from the traffic give me a sense of comfort and safety, but I still feel a little tightening of my stomach muscles. “I don’t know, I never thought about it,” I answer. I know my fare knows different. He knows I think about it every night, every single night after ten P.M. Every single time a young black climbs in my cab after dark.

     “Least you got your radio. How dat work?” he asks and leans forward resting his arm on the front seat.

     “It’s channeled direct to the police band. Dat’s one good thing about our cabs. Someone tries to hold me up, all I got to do is pick up my mike and yell for help. It goes right to the police dispatcher,” I lie.

     “Yea, dat’s cool. Is it hard to get a job at Yellow Cab?”

     “No, not really,” I tell my fare and relax a little. “All you need is a clean driving record. Dey’re always looking for new drivers.”

     “Yea, man, I’m thinking about changing jobs. My driving record ain’t that bad. How old you got to be?”

     “Twenty one.”

     “Well, I ain’t reached dat magic number yet. I will soon, though,” he tells me.

     “You ought’a check it out when you do. It’s not a bad job.”

     “Yea, I might do dat. You ever carry a gun?”

     “No. Some of the drivers do, but I don’t. I figure I’d sooner lose what little money I might have rather then kill some dude over it.”

     My fare leans back in his seat and begins to describe his job at Wards. “It’s not a bad job, but I don’t like the hours. I got to leave the streets too early. The money’s not dat good, but I got ways of picking up a little extra bread,” he tells me.

     I weave out to pass a slower car and wonder what I’m going to do. The High Street turn off is coming up. I’ll be leaving the safety of the freeway. In the rear view mirror, I see that my fare is sitting back taking in the scenery. He doesn’t seem a bit nervous. Maybe I’m just imaging things, I tell myself.

      When I take the High Street turn off and my fare tells me to cross East Fourteenth and he’ll give me directions from there. As he settles back in his seat, I drive towards East Fourteenth and feel the cold and darkness enter my soul and body. This is the only part of Oakland that I fear more than San Pablo. It’s an area that even the boldest drivers shun after six P.M. It’s the very heart of the blackest ghetto in Oakland, and here I am a honky mother after midnight all alone.

     My fare doesn’t say a word until we’re on East Fourteenth. “Turn up toward Seventy Second,” he tells me. A neighborhood bar throws off its neon light to the empty sidewalk. The headlights of a single car several blocks away shine into my rear view mirror. I scan the streets for some sign of a black and white or another cab, as I turn up my radio and switch to channel two.

     “We’re on channel two out here,” I tell my fare.

     Several blocks roll by. “Here turn right here,” my fare tells me as he leans forward and points to the corner. I see the lights of a drive in restaurant in the middle of the next block. You could pull in there, call for help and run inside, I tell myself.

     Yea, but what if it’s not a hold up? What if I’m just imagining it? I ask in another voice, and turn off East Fourteenth.

     We travel four blocks or so in stony silence. Then my fare tells me to make a left. Parked cars crowd each side of the dark narrow street. Not an unbroken street light for miles around. The fog is rolling over the dim yellow gray of my headlights. “Turn right here,” my fare tells me. We go a couple more blocks and he tells me to make a left. I haven’t the slightest idea where we are. I couldn’t call for help if I had to. As we go deeper into his neighborhood, I feel the cold sweat under my armpits. I’m certain that he is going to hold me up. What do I do now? What am I gonna do? I ask myself.