into the North End after dark. No one told him such fares could be dangerous.
"Where to?" asked Bugsy.
"253 Eureka," she said angrily. "I don't know why it took you so long to get here. I ride this time every day."
Bugsy didn't say anything although he knew it was only because it was getting darker earlier these days. He drove past the Deluxe Tavern and Murphy's Pub. He got tired of fighting the lights so he turned left on High Street. His passenger caught her breath and Bugsy knew she was about to tell him this wasn't the right way and she knew how much the fare should be because she rode it every day, but she kept her mouth shut.
253 Eureka was a prefabricated duplex on a dead-end street. There was a tricycle in the yard and he saw a child peek out the window. After the woman paid him, Bugsy turned his cab around and called the dispatcher to tell him he was turning in early for the day. He was stopped at a corner when he heard the back door open.
"You free?"
Bugsy turned around. A thin, light skin black wearing a leather jacket had gotten into his cab. He had dark pinpoint eyes, like he was flying high on something.
"Where you going?" asked Bugsy.
"Just a couple of blocks," he said smiling and pointing up the street.
"Twenty-nine," said Bugsy into his mic.
"Twenty-nine."
"I got a passenger."
"I thought you were coming in, twenty-nine?"
"I was but I got a pick up."
"Where you headed?"
"He wants to know where I'm going," said Bugsy to his passenger. "I have to give him an address."
"Corner of Lincoln and Eureka," said the passenger.
Bugsy noticed most of the streetlights were broken as he drove the twelve blocks to Lincoln Avenue. The street was full of potholes and he drove very slow because his cab needed new shocks. Bugsy passed a boy in the street playing with a wiffle ball. The boy seemed surprised to see Bugsy driving so slowly down the street.
“Pull into that alley,” said the passenger. Bugsy did as he was told. The cab was hidden by a garage on one side and a massive oak tree on the other. “How much do I owe you?”
“One ten,” said Bugsy.
“Can you change this?”
The passenger leaned forward and when Bugsy turned around, he felt hot, foreign breath on his face. The passenger was waving a hundred dollar bill.
“No way,” said Bugsy. “I just got on duty a few minutes ago. I’ve only got about three bucks.”
“Well, this is all I got.”
A month ago, Bugsy would have let the guy go and forgotten about the fare, but he’d been driving too long to do that now. Naturally, he didn’t have enough change, and if he did, he knew he’d probably end up getting robbed. Bugsy had suffered enough for the little he made to roll over for anyone. Just yesterday he’d chased a woman into a supermarket because she tried to short him ten cents. He yelled at her loud enough that everyone in the supermarket heard. After being so shamed, the woman coughed up the dime.
“I can drive you to a store for change.”
“I don’t want to go to no fucking store, man.”
“You should have told me that was all you had before you got in.”
Bugsy had forgotten to shut off his meter and it clicked over for another ten cents. He leaned over and turned the meter off.
“How about if we just make it a dollar?” The passenger smiled, reached into his wallet and pulled out a dollar. Bugsy took the money and put the cab in reverse. Before his passenger got out though, he rapped Bugsy hard on the back of the head with a bony knuckle. “Better watch yourself,” he said.
The passenger was gone before Bugsy could think of anything to say but he wondered if he’d actually had the hundred in change, would that knuckle have been a bullet in the back of the head?
Bugsy made only $17 on paper, but he really made $32 counting tips and what he skimmed off meter. He owed the company $21 and put the money into an envelope along with his log sheet and handed it to the dispatcher. He walked outside, got into his car and drove to the Deluxe Tavern.
Bugsy liked to eat at the Deluxe because it was one of the few places on campus that hadn’t changed since he was a student four years ago. It had a long, hardwood bar and a dark smoky backroom with a pool table. It also had the best fish sandwiches in town. Roger was sitting at the bar drinking a beer when Bugsy walked in. Bugsy ordered a fish sandwich platter and a Pabst.
“How’s it going, Roger?”
“Same as usual,” said Roger. “I’m taking it one day at a time.” Roger had been on unemployment for four months and was not actively looking for work. His major activity of the last month had been to grow a beard and gain ten pounds.
“Have you heard about the new machine they’ve got,” began Roger as if he had his topic all ready and was just waiting for someone to sit down next to him. “All you do is attach some electrodes to your temples and twist some knobs and you get all the sensual stimulation you need. It will never work.”
“Why not?”
“Because people need stimulation from other people. When is the last time you communicated with a machine? You can’t plug yourself into a machine for sex.” Roger was encouraged by a snigger from Bugsy. “It’s like those pills where you get your daily requirements in something the size of a half dollar. It misses the point of eating. Food is not just a matter of nutrition. It’s also a matter of cosmetics and relaxation. If people didn’t have those moments to sit down and relax they’d go crazy. Everyone is too tense as it is. If you took away lunch hour, they’d be twice as tense. I know a Yogi who gets his nourishment from light waves. Where do you think your food actually comes from?” Roger took a sip of beer and wiped his beard with the back of his hand.
“The supermarket?” offered Bugsy.
“No. THE SUN! The sun is the basis of our food chain. That Yogi found a way to eliminate the in-between steps.”
“You mean he doesn’t eat anything?”
“Doesn’t have to,” said Roger shaking his head. “Two glasses of milk a day. That’s all.”
Bugsy ordered another beer and ate his sandwich. When he was finished, he played some nine-ball with Roger.
If was after 1 AM before Bugsy got home. He was weaving slightly and his eyes were watery as he mounted the steps to the house. A light was on upstairs. Someone was probably studying for an exam in the morning.
Bugsy sat in the dark in his room. He was tired but not tired enough to fall asleep yet. The only problem with living in this town was it often reminded him of Wendy. Although he’d known several girls after her, Wendy was the only one he ever lived with. They lasted ten months and broke up because they argued all the time. Actually they broke up because Wendy left unexpectedly one day. They argued mostly about modern art. When Bugsy was a student Minimalism was all the rage. Bugsy despised Minimalism as he considered it a fascist-based Zeitgeist supported by the major corporations, all part of a plan to derail the counterculture. While in high school, his generation had launched a youth movement, created underground zines, banded together in both garage bands and political action squads. But as the years rolled by, all the popular counterculture teachers at the University that Bugsy respected were swiftly cleaved from the fold and left to wander alone in the wilderness without tenure, while a parade of politically conservative replacements appeared to replace them. Once the Vietnam War ended, the establishment quickly figured out a rapid rise in the cost of living was the easiest method to derail this revolution. Pretty soon, two salaries would be needed to raise a family, and just pray you don’t get hit with a medical problem, lawsuit or divorce, because you’ll be back on minimum wage standards for the rest of your life. When Bugsy was a student he thought most of abstract art was pretty ridiculous, a case of the emperor’s no clothes. So he argued with Wendy constantly about how shallow the work was, despite its massive popularity. Wendy was an art student too and she accused Bugsy of negativism and not being any fun.
Afte
r Bugsy graduated, he moved to San Diego to visit his grandparents. He took a train ride through Mexico and ended up living on an Indian reservation near Puerto Vallarta until his money ran out. Most of the time he spent lying on the beach half-hoping a rich American would appear and offer him a job as deck hand on an around the world cruise. His parents were sympathetic about his not being able to find a job when he got home. After all, what was he capable of doing? One night he was standing barefoot in the kitchen, poking through the refrigerator, when his father walked in. “Try not to eat me out of house and home,” he said. Two days later, Bugsy moved out of the house. He drifted around the country for a year, working as a carny, apprentice welder and house painter. He was never happy with any of these jobs and after holding one for four or five months he would feel bored and self-destructive. He had trouble finding people to identity with.
The last time he saw Wendy was over three years ago. “I probably shouldn’t tell you this,” she said. “But I always thought the only reason you didn’t like modern art was because you weren’t talented enough to produce any.” Their break-up had been a bad one and she was still bitter. Bugsy wondered if she was still bitter today and whether she was married and had children.
At 1:45 AM he crawled into bed and fell asleep. In five hours he would get up and do it all over again.
The End
I’m a writer, journalist, filmmaker, event producer and counterculture and cannabis