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I really wanted to stop the car and drop-kick this guy to the curb, but I needed the money, and although I seriously doubted he was a good tipper, or any kind of tipper, I had to start being nicer. I was oh-so-close to having enough to make my car payment and make the minimum payment on my credit card balance. Every dollar counted at this point.
“So do you want to make that extra stop?” I asked.
“Not if you’re gonna rob me blind.”
Depending on how far off the route he wanted to go, I suspected his stop would have added a dollar or two at most. But I didn’t love the idea of spending more time with this guy than necessary, so I kept that to myself.
We drove in silence for several minutes, and I darted glances at the map on my phone, realizing his destination was in the Bottoms, a.k.a. the old and mostly abandoned part of downtown Cockamamie, not the newer section. If I’d realized that, I never would have accepted the job. The sun had just set, and his destination wasn’t exactly in the nicest part of town. The sooner I dropped him off and got home to Aunt Deidre, the better.
Thankfully, we soon pulled up to the dark doorway of 1435 West Walnut, which looked to be an abandoned building sandwiched between several other abandoned buildings. Other than a run-down convenience store on the corner of the opposite side of the street, there was a whole lot of nothing around us.
“Drive around the block,” Marty the Man said, flicking his hand next to my head.
His hand smelled like rotten eggs, and I tried not to gag. “This is the address.”
“Go around the block anyway,” he said more insistently.
“Just know that the app’s gonna charge you extra.” Especially if he kept flailing his stinky hand in my face.
“Fine.” He waved his hand next to me again.
I wanted to kick him out anyway, but if I were him, I wouldn’t want to go in there either, so I tried to breathe through my mouth and drove around the block.
Old downtown Cockamamie had been pretty much deserted after Briny River flooded about twenty years back. For whatever reason, the town’s forefathers had chosen the low area by the river to build their community, and subsequently, the downtown area regularly found itself covered in six feet of water. I’d been in middle school at the time of that last major flood twenty years ago, and I remembered Uncle Albert, Aunt Deidre, and my mother helping build sandbag walls to save downtown. It hadn’t worked. While it hadn’t been the first time the area flooded, it had served as the last straw for many, as it was sure not to be the last. So the city council had offered businesses incentives to move about six blocks to the east of the river bottom, an area at least twenty feet higher in elevation. A few businesses refused to make the transition, and some of them had managed to stay open, but given the less-than-ideal location, whatever business they operated now was likely shady. Which meant I needed to drop off my passenger and get the heck out of here.
Once I drove up to the curb the second time, I put the car in park, told the app the ride was done, then turned back to give my passenger a big smile. “You have a good night, Mr. Man.”
He glanced at his phone and scoffed. “That seems unlikely after you charged me an extra dollar to go around the block.”
I didn’t tell him that if I’d had my way, the app would have charged him five.
He opened the back door and looked down both ends of the sidewalk, seeming to hesitate. As he leaned out, he leaned out, he accidentally dropped his bag onto the floor of the back seat.
“Shit,” he grumbled. “Can you turn on the light?”
“It’s already on.” But I’d be the first to admit it wasn’t very bright.
Cursing under his breath again, he sat up with his bag clasped to his chest and got out, slamming the car door harder than necessary. He scurried across the sidewalk and stopped at the front door. It may have been a full glass door at one point, but now it was boarded up with graffiti-covered plywood. Uncertainty etched his face, and he looked around the block again before finally knocking.
I started to pull away from the curb when my phone dinged with a message that Mr. Smelly Pants had not only given me zero tip but had also given me a one-star review.
Bitchy feminist who robbed me blind.
“Mother Forker!”
I slammed on the brakes, threw the car in park, then climbed out.
“Are you fricking kidding me?” I shouted over the roof of the car.
He was about twenty feet away, still on the stoop of the address he’d given me, staring at me with a look of oh shit.
“A one-star review and no tip after I had to endure that smell and your paranoia?” I shouted, striding around the back of the car toward him, holding up my phone screen as though he could read it from that distance. In the back of my head, I knew this was the worst decision I’d made in a year, possibly several years, yet I couldn’t seem to stop myself.
“Do you have any idea how hard my life is right now?” I shouted. “Two months ago, I lived a quiet, happy life and then boom! My whole world imploded! Do you think I like driving crabby old men with rotten-smelling brown bags around in my car? Do you have any idea how long it’s going to take me to get that smell out of my upholstery?” I flung my hands out at my sides. “Because I sure don’t!”
“I’m going to report you!” Marty the Man hissed. “Leave me the fuck alone!”
“Go ahead and report me!” I shouted, pointing my phone at him. “But you’ll regret it!”
