Author: Hadacol (---.client.mchsi.com)
Date: 11-07-05 14:41
Status:
The solicitation. Well, I alluded to it in a follow up to my first post, but, more detailed:
My first night. Tuesday night. Pretty slow. No drunks. Old ladies. Quiet. Calm. I had some romantic illusion that every night would be like Taxi Cab Confessions. I was kicking myself for taking yeat another boring, shitty job.
At about 3 am I get a call from dispatch. I'm being sent to 'Germantown.' When the dispatch radios that I have a call, they give a general location but no address. That's because they think the other cab companies are scavenging calls off of our frquency. So, when I get in the area they radio back with an address.
I'm told that this is an 'experience call' and that I should lock the doors and demand cash up front before I let anyone in the cab. I'm more than a little paranoid.
When I get to the area, I'm a little surprised that it is not seedier than it is. I remember looking at duplexes in the area a few years ago. It is pretty clean, open, and well lit. I see a house with lights on and a black woman in her early thirties opens the door and waives. I wait in the cab for someone to come out for a couple of minutes. I can see people shuttling back in forth in the living room and maybe a kid or two through the open door.
Eventually the woman comes storming out, beer in hand, followed by an angry husband type fellow. He's trying to keep her from leaving and she's arguing with him. It's not panicked but it is tense. She is drunk and loud and pissy, and yells for me to open the door, which is locked. I politely ask her if she has any money for me and she yells something about not robbing me or not paying with food stamps and is pretty demanding. I let her in and she continues her love/hate drunk discussion/argument/emotional outpouring with her husband.
We finally get out of the driveway. Dispatch isn't supposed to send me without an address for drop off, and I'm not supposed to take off without one from the fare. I ask her where we're going and she says 'just take me downtown.'
"Where at downtown."
"Just anywhere downtown. I'll find some place that's open. It don't matter. I just gotta get ot of here."
Then she asks if we can just 'drive around.' I told her that I had to take her somewhere and drop her off because I had other calls. Then she says she's going as far as $10 will take her and then she wants out. But, she says to go towards Sexton and Mikel. Not, friends, what I consider downtown.
She's manic, crying about losing her step-father that day, mad because her family was at her house and she had to get away, that she had to grieve by herself, that her daughter didn't get to say good bye to her grandfather, etc, etc. She tells me that she's 'drunk, fucked up--but not out of control.'
Anyhoo, we head towards the hood. Somewhere along the way she says something about the fare and if there's anyway we good work/trade it out. I sidestepped a bit. She said 'I need to be held, it could be your lucky night.'
Then she made some more blatant offers. I told her that was nice but I couldn't pay my rent with a blow job. She said she would pay for the fare and then we could party later. I told her that sounded nice, but "I don't think my old lady would like it much." I'm single.
We got closer to her stop. She kept trying to get me to go 'one more block, one more block.' Now I'm wary of a set-up again. A lot of robberies in Columbia involve at least one woman and a dude. I thought she was luring me into a trap. I stopped and tried to get her out of the cab.
I kept telling her that I had to get back, that my dispatch would be looking for me, that I was trying to get off work because I wanted to go home.
"well when you get off, baby?" Damn.
"I'm not sure. I have a bunch of paperwork to do before I can go home and I don't know how long it will take, because it's my first night."
"well when do you think you'll get off?"
"I don't know."
"will you come pick me up when you get off work?"
"I don't know, I'll have to see when I get off."
"well come and get me baby."
"where you gonna be? You can't hang out here."
"oh I'll be right here."
"well, we'll see."
"and I could give you gas money to take me home tomorrow. It don't cost money to ride in your car, does it?"
"There ain't no meter in my car baby."
"well you hurry up and you come get me."
"we'll see."
"What kind of car you drive?"
"A gray Chevy."
"A gray Chevy."
"Yeah."
"well hurry, baby, I'll be waiting."
It got a bit more graphic at times. She said something about "you can wear my little pussy out" or something. I was doing my best to not hurt her feelings, sending her into a manic fit, and get her the fuck out fo the car before I got ambushed by a crack dealer. Total time elapsed was probably less than 20 minutes. This was all for a $10.30 fare and a tip I wasn't about to cash in on. Of that the cab company got less than $7.
When I went back to base to call it a night the dispatcher told me she knew they were drunk, that they were fighting on the phone, that she was beligerant, and that she asked if she could pay with food stamps.
And this was my first night. |
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