The cab ride.

He picked me up from my home in Stoughton, MA and drove me to Boston's Logan airport for a flight to Atlanta, GA on New Year's Eve day (2009). None of this is strange so far. Just wait. His name was Steve. He smoked half a cigarette in the driveway and saved it. He wore big glasses and didn't smile. He talked a blue streak. I counted; he must have had 15 jobs over the past 20 years. Driving a cab was not his chosen profession, he told me. He still has dreams of running for state representative. "Why's that?" I feigned interest. "For the money," he replied. He talked long and he talked soft. Almost in a whisper. Almost like he didn't want me to listen. But he did. He hadn't touched a drink in 10 years. He lived with his mother. Did I have a boyfriend? He asked me personal questions. I didn't think I'd make it to the airport, I didn't think I'd make it to 2010. He kept telling me to tell my father how sorry he was for smoking in our driveway. He must have told me this 7 times. He asked me if I thought he was neurotic. He told me the cab company "hated his guts." I wanted to die in the backseat. He creeped me out in the worst way. When he pulled up to the curb at Logan airport, he asked me out for a cup of coffee. I ran like a Kenyan.



He kind of looked like this. Minus the suit and the comb over. He was disheveled, after all. He was a cab driver.