Taxi

      The first fat drops spattered against the windshield of the cab as the clouds which had been lingering overhead finally parted with the rain. Within minutes, the black asphalt shone like a mirror, bouncing the light from a dozen different neon signs back into the night.  The driver saw a man in a rumpled brown overcoat with outstretched hand and pulled smoothly over to the curbside with the practiced ease of a veteran. He checked the watch and pressed the fare button on the meter as the man hopped into the back.

      “—can’t, I’ve got something else to do,” said the passenger as he adjusted himself in the seat.  The driver wondered whether the man was talking to him.  He looked in the rear view mirror and saw that the man was wearing one of those little headsets on one ear, its long cord dangling on the front of one beaten lapel.  He himself wasn’t a fan of the technology; it was difficult enough in this job to tell the regular people from the nutcases without everybody walking around looking like they were talking to themselves. Ah, well, he mused, maybe this Y2K thing won’t be all bad.

      He turned back to face the passenger. He looked about forty going on dead, with a pale puffy face and lank black hair marching backward across his skull.

      Workaholic, thought the driver. “Where to?”

      The passenger stared out the window, eyes unfocused.  “I’m sorry, too,” he said. “I’ll see you when I get home. No, shouldn’t be more than a few hours. Well, you know Ron. Okay, yes, I, um…” A strange look passed over the man’s face. “I love you, too. Okay. Bye.”

      The driver was about to repeat himself when the man suddenly shifted his gaze to him.  “815 West Oak Street,” said the passenger before taking a short, sharp breath and returning his attention to his phone.

      The driver nodded and checked traffic before pulling back onto the street.  They rode in silence for several minutes, the city blocks melting by in an unending parade of lights, sounds and people out for a good time.  Suddenly the driver heard tinny music coming from the backseat.  For a moment his mind refused to track the melody, but then it came to him from years and years ago in the piano lessons he had taken as a boy: Beethoven’s Ninth. The Ode to Joy.

      The passenger answered his phone and the tiny symphony ended abruptly. “Michael, I—yes, I’m on the way there now.”

      The driver glanced in the rear view again. He kept an eye on the man’s thin restless lips.

      “I talked to him; he was there like you said he’d be.  No, I’ve already got it.”

      The man clearly didn’t like what the person he was talking to said next; the driver could hear the plastic of the phone give a bit as the passenger’s grip tightened.

      “Listen, this has to happen, do you understand? This has to happen tonight, I can’t live with it anymore!  You owe me, do you understand? You owe me,” the man finished quietly. “Now, will you help me or not? What do you mean, ‘what do I mean’?! She has been lying to me for months! I can’t work, can’t sleep, I can’t eat, the only—“ 

      Wrapped up in the rider’s conversation, the driver just barely noticed a semi making a fast left from the crossing street. The truck swerved alongside the cab, inches from the driver’s side mirror. Startled, the driver leaned on the horn for a good five seconds: BWAAAAAAAAAAAAMMMP!

      “—ill her, tonight, right fucking now!  I’m nearly there.  No, she thinks I’m staying late again.” The man chuckled; it sounded like ice skates on a frozen pond.  “I bet she just couldn’t wait to call him up, the whore.  Oh, I’m counting on it.  An hour at most.  Alright, I’ll call you back.”

      The driver gripped the wheel as if his arms were steel, not quite sure if he’d heard what he thought he’d heard.  He glanced at the man in the rear view mirror, only to find the man’s hollow, tear-streaked eyes staring back at him. The driver flinched as if burned and quickly looked out through the windshield.  He could feel the man’s eyes on him in the mirror, his stare as heavy as a lead weight.  The feeling remained for the rest of the drive, but he did not look in the mirror again.

      After ten more minutes—each one seeming a century—the driver turned onto a quiet tree-lined block.  He parked in front of a large, well-lit brownstone. There was a light on in the foyer. Standing out in silhouette on the transom window over the front door were the numbers 8-1-5.

      The driver spoke through lips that seemed impossibly dry. “We’re here.”

      The passenger said nothing.

      “Tell you what,” said the driver, not turning around, “this ride’s on the house—“

      “You know she’s been complaining for years about how much time I spend at work,” said the man as he looked out the window at the house, taking no notice of the driver. “She thinks I don’t love her. Who does she think I’m doing it for? Look at me.

      “Look at me.”

      The driver, against every ounce of good sense within him, looked in the rear view mirror. The man’s eyes swam with tears; with a start, the driver realized, He’s been crying the whole ride.

      “I haven’t cried since I was 13 years old,” said the passenger with a revolting smile of equal sweetness and sadness. “Isn’t this love?”

      The driver said nothing, only nodded slowly.  The man lowered his eyes.  He appeared to be considering what to say next.

      “I quit my job today,” he blurted. “I quit everything.” He looked at the driver with manic desperation in his face. “If the person you loved turned her back on you, if she spread her legs for another man… what would you do?”

      The words hung in the air. The driver struggled for an answer.

      “297, come in,” crackled the radio; his heart nearly stopped. “297, this is Dispatch, come in, you out there?”

      The driver kept his eyes on the man in the mirror as he gingerly reached for the handset. “297, go ahead,” he said quietly.

      “Got a pickup for you at 1007 W. 61st Street. What’s your twenty?”

      He looked in the mirror; the passenger reached inside his coat.

      Fear closed the driver’s eyes tight. “I’m, uh—I just got done eating dinner. I’m on route to pickup now. Out.”

      The cab door slammed shut; he hadn’t even noticed it opening. He let out a breath he didn’t know he’d been holding and looked in the backseat.  On the seat was a .38 Smith & Wesson snub-nose revolver.  Next to the gun was about four hundred dollars in cash.  The driver picked up the cash, left the gun.  He quickly counted the money, subtracted the fare and shoved the rest in his pocket. He peered out at the brownstone hoping to catch sight of the man, but there was no one around. The light had gone out in the foyer. 

      The rain drummed steadily on the roof of the cab, in anticipation of the torrent to come.  The driver wanted to get away from the house, but he couldn’t move.  He wanted to rush out into the oncoming storm and somehow cleanse himself, but he could only look back at the gun, its metallic sheen glinting in the light from the dashboard, the hole at the end of the barrel as deep and black as the one growing in his heart.

      He never even heard the woman scream.