Just Drive

***
Maybe it was just a racial incident.

I was dropping off a woman near the Western Addition projects when two African American men in their early 20s appeared in my driver's side mirror. They were dressed ghetto. I didn't know where they came from. It freaked me out.

"Are you the one I called?" the taller one asked.

It was a line. He hadn't called. Or had he?

I reflexively went into a racist mode.

All the stories about cab robberies zipped through my mind: the guy from the projects who beat and robbed a cab driver and then went back to the same address where the driver had picked him up, two guys who'd shot a driver and left him on top of a hill, the guy who'd shot and killed a driver two blocks away from where I currently was talking to the dude. All black guys.

"I got an appointment," I said lying.

"Come on man - I just need a ride," the tall one whined.

"I got a radio call," I said, lying again.

"Ah - come on," he said, "don't be like that ... you're not taking me cause I'm black."

He was right. I was being a racist and it didn't feel right.

"Okay," I said, "I'll cancel the radio call."

I pretended to talk to my company while the tall man stepped into the backseat on the passenger side. I started driving and asked,

"Where ya wanna go?"

"Just drive," he snapped, "I'll let you know."

I looked at him in the rear-view mirror. He glared back at me. I felt myself fill with fear.

At the next corner I said,

"I need to know where to go."

"Just drive!" He snapped more loudly.

The neighborhood was quiet but not completely deserted. There was a car driving toward me and another at the intersection. A couple walked slowly in the distance.

"I'm not supposed to take anybody without a location," I told him.

"Just drive!" He snarled.

I looked in the mirror. Now his eyes were filled with hatred.

I headed toward downtown. I started looking for cop cars. I asked him to give me a destination two or three more times - always getting the same answer. If he was going to attack me, he'd have to do it before the streets became more congested. Both his tone of voice and his look became more and more intense.

He began to piss me off. I mean, all right - I was a racist but I had picked him up. He was riding to nowhere in my cab wasn't he? What right did he have to hate me. Just 'cause I was white!? I was probably the only taxi driver in the city stupid enough to give him a ride and here he was hating me for it. Where was the logic?

I looked in the mirror and glared back at him.

"I need a location," I snapped.

"Just drive," he snapped back.

We glared at each other in the mirror.

I figured that if he'd had a gun I would've already seen it so I decided that, if he tried to rob me, I was going to put up a fight.

Slowly, glancing back and forth from the street to his eyes in the mirror, very slowly because I didn't want to panic him with a sudden move, making sure that he was watching me, I reached my arm out, opened the glove compartment, took our a heavy flashlight and slowly brought it back to my lap.

The son-of-a-bitch might take me out but he'd have a sore face for a long time afterwards.

"Where da ya wanna go," I asked evenly.

"North Beach," he said quickly, caving in.

I looked in the mirror. He stared nervously back at me. I floored it, whipped a right, took a quick left down an alley, then stopped the car. I turned around and faced him.

"This what you lookin for?" I asked evenly.

"Yeah, Man," he said tensely. "Just where I want to go." He started opening the door as he spoke.

"That's $9.85."

The creep pulled a twenty out of his pocket and handed it to me.

"Make it ten."

"What?" I asked. "No tip?"

"No - no ... make it ah twelve - no thirteen," he said as he climbed out the door. "Tell you what - keep the change."

He turned and ran down the alley. I guess he thought I'd pulled a gun out of the glove.

Stupidest thing I've ever done in my life. If he'd been packing, he'd a blown me away and thought it was self-defense.