Taxi Scramble

By Harriet Rogers

Here comes Honey! Honey Walker is back in the people moving business. Her BFF, Belle, her mentor, Lucille, and her friend with benefits, Jon, are out to crack the local drug ring.
Welcome Oz the wonder dog who provides therapy for everyone and helps solve the murders and mayhem created when a computer algorithm runs amok in the world of wheeling and dealing drugs, humans and anything else that will create cash flow for the robots that the algorithm directs from a warehouse on a back street on the outskirts of a neighboring city.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Harriet Rogers
• Release date: Oct 2, 2019
• ISBN: 9780463236703

Harriet Rogers

When Harriet Rogers was fourteen, she picked tobacco and didn’t learn to smoke for three years. When she was seventeen, she picked oranges in Israel, where she finally learned to smoke, and got Ben-Gurion’s revenge for a month. When she was nineteen, she worked the night shift at the Oxford pickle factory and couldn’t have relish on her hot dogs for five years.She spent ten years getting through three years of college and, while she still doesn’t have any letters after her name, she can swear effectively in five languages.She has some second and third place ribbons from a childhood of horseback riding, and a bad back, knee, and elbow from the same.When she was driving a taxi, she started to write about her experiences. Her mission is to make people laugh. Laughter is the soul of the human machine.

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Taxi Scramble

by

Harriet Rogers

at Smashwords

Smashwords Edition

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This e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This e-book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

This is a work of pure fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

This book is dedicated to small town life which is always on the verge of something.

The younger generation does not want instruction, being perfectly willing to instruct if anyone will listen to it. Rudyard Kipling, Under the Deodars

Taxi Scramble

Copyright ©2019 Harriet Rogers

This book may not be reproduced in whole or in part without written permission from

Harriet Rogers

Chapter One

Fascination and terror short circuited my brain as the skinny guy in line ahead of me shoved a gun in the clerk’s face and demanded money. It was one of those I can’t look away moments. The convenience store clerk shrugged and held out a wad of singles, as if this were an everyday occurrence. The robber snatched the bills, grabbed an open carton of jumbo Snickers off the display, shot the ceiling, and bolted out the door. Ceiling pieces rained down as I watched the hold-up guy through the glass wall that covered the front of the building.

High-speed disaster turned to a slow-mo Oh God, please don’t moment when I saw the passenger side door of my taxi open. Lucille, my elderly passenger, put one sensibly clad foot on the ground. The other foot followed, and she stomped forward. A snub-nosed pistol somehow moved from her bra holster to her hand. My mouth opened and squeaked a protest.

Lucille is possibly, maybe, could be, somewhere in age between Social Security and infinity, with a background that included knowing a lot about weaponry. We had stopped at the convenience store to pick up milk to go with cookies she had baked to curry favor with taxi drivers, friends, relatives and, most of all, the male population at the local Senior Center.

I hammered on the automatic door until it reluctantly reopened. By the time I got outside, the would-be robber was stomach down, hands restrained behind his back with a pair of fuzzy purple cuffs. Lucille’s gun was pointed at the ground, her sensibly clad foot holding the hoodie covered neck tightly against the pavement.

Move one muscle and I will staple your junk to your ears and kneecap you, Lucille said sweetly.

I sighed, pulled out my cell phone and speed-dialed my personal police officer, Lieutenant Jon Stevens.

Where are you and what have you done? Jon asked.

At the Stop and Go convenience store, and I didn’t do anything, but Lucille has a present for you and it’s wearing purple handcuffs.

Christ, Jon mumbled, and the phone went dead.

My name is Honey Walker and I drive a cab for Cool Rides Taxi in Northampton, Massachusetts. At five-six with curly blond hair, blue eyes and a button nose, I’m considered cute, sort of what people thought Shirley Temple should have looked like all grown up. Women usually like to hear words like striking, beautiful, gorgeous, even interesting. My best friend, Belle, would be all of those with an explosive side of glitter. But I’ll settle for cute.

Northampton is a small town with a near schizophrenic mix of liberal and conservative small-town values. The excitement level has increased as the larger cities to the south export their criminal elements northward up the interstate. Although convenience stores have a high robbery rate, this was the first time I had witnessed one first hand. I’m young and foolish enough to find it more interesting than terrifying.

Lucille rolled the idiot who flunked Robbery 101 over as I picked bits of ceiling tile out of my hair.

She gently pushed the dirty hood away from his face. Why, you’re just a child, she said. I do hope I didn’t frighten you with all that talk of staples and kneecapping.

A boy, not more than fifteen and possibly as young as twelve, stared up at us with panic and defiance settled in equal measure on his cherubic face.

Unfortunately, we have already called the constabulary, Lucille said.

Yeah, and I called the cops, said the clerk, joining us in the parking lot.

So, how much did he get? One of the customers had wandered over from the gas pump.

Ten dollars cash and thirty-five dollars and sixty cents in Snickers, including tax, said the clerk. The gathering crowd looked at the rest of the candy bars scattered around our feet.

Hey, once it hits the ground, I can’t restock it. Help yourselves, he said, snatching one, tearing off the wrapper and downing the oversized bar in two bites. The word evidence ran briefly through my brain. The clerk picked up the wad of dollar bills that the thief had dropped in an oily puddle.

I think I’ll pop these in the microwave, he said.

Okay, no more microwave hotdogs for lunch from this place.

A crowd of patrons and passers-by stood around discussing the young robber’s fate, the frequency of such incidents, and the gourmet value of a Snickers bar.

A middle age woman in sweats squinted at the minuscule calorie label on the candy-bar. Look at what’s in this. How can two ounces of anything add five pounds of flab to my butt?

They should tell you more about the levels of bliss attained and less about calorie count. A younger woman swallowed at least a million calories.

Perhaps bliss is not quantifiable, someone added.

The positive outlook achieved by sweetening one’s palate prolongs life.

They say that each cigarette you smoke takes nine minutes off your life. Maybe eating a candy bar adds it back.

Who needs to know how short their life is going to be?

I prefer Milky Way myself, said an elderly gentleman, plucking two Snickers out of a puddle.

No way, said a passing teenager. There’s peanuts in that Snickers. The government says that a helping of nuts every day keeps you stronger longer.

Do you believe everything the government tells you? asked the old guy.

"Do you believe anything the government tells you?" asked a spandex-ed jogger.

I got some hazelnut coffee inside. That gives you double the nuts so coffee and Snickers should keep you alive forever according to the government food pyramid, added the clerk.

The philosophic discussion of Snickers continued until the candy disappeared and sirens screamed up the street. A patrol car slid into the parking lot, spraying loose gravel, but the officers had missed dessert. Lucille continued to keep a close eye on the subdued robber until she handed him over to one of the uniforms.

Jon arrived shortly after the blue and white patrol car had screeched to a stop. Officers were interviewing witnesses. The kid was in the back of the cruiser with less colorful restraints. Purple handcuffs caused consternation among the uniforms, but Lucille smiled in her Debbie Reynolds’ way and returned them to her over-sized shoulder-bag.

So, why did you come? I asked Jon, knowing a lieutenant wouldn’t normally bother with such a mundane event.

Entertainment.

Jon and I met a few years ago when he busted me for vagrancy and assaulting an officer, although the charges were dropped. We watched each other around town for a few years. Eventually we became close personal friends, then very close. The closer we got, the more he tried to assert authority over how I lived my life. He still tries to do the authority thing and I still ignore his efforts, but we get along where it counts. Spending a night with Jon usually involves good conversation, lots of fun, and more than one miracle moment. He is also Lucille’s landlord in the Victorian two-family that he owns and occupies. She and her adopted son, Terry, are the two on the other side of the two-family house.

What’s going to happen to that boy? asked Lucille, glancing at the back of the cruiser.

I’ll need to see if he’s in the system first, said Jon. Find out how old he is, if he has parents, guardian or foster care.

There are a few things you will find out shortly about him. Lucille gazed at the patrol car.

And what would that be? asked Jon, warily.

When I applied the hand-cuffs I noticed cigarette burns on his arms and a crude tattoo, possibly a gang tag.

I’ll check it out. Jon watched the patrol car pull onto the street. Nice handcuffs.

Well, they aren’t yours, replied Lucille.

No, but most of the force knows where you live.

Lucille did the Mona Lisa smile.

We watched the departing cruiser as the crowd dispersed. The kid would be formally arrested and held at the Northampton jail until his case got sorted out.

I started back to retrieve the gallon of milk I had abandoned when the robbery broke out.

Honey? Jon called to me.

What?

I’m glad you’re okay. He smiled, strolled over to me and traced a finger down my neck. Come over tonight, he added.

Maybe. I have to bring Lucille home at the end of my shift. Do I get the remote? I needed a football fix and Jon had a humongo flat screen TV. The mini TV in my apartment did no justice to the buns and tats of an NFL player.

I’ll be home around six. Jon kissed my nose. Don’t entertain me any more until tonight. He paused, added, Please, ambled to his unmarked and drove off.

I went inside, collected my milk and looked at the slightly singed edges of the dollar bill the clerk gave me in change.

In the taxi, Lucille gripped her oversized, overstuffed purse. She had that spacey expression she gets when she is working out a particularly vexing problem.

I met Lucille several years ago when I drove her to the airport. She was transporting her husband’s ashes to be scattered in some mysterious place that I didn’t want to know about. Most of him got on the plane with Lucille. A few ashes leaked through a hole in his box to be sucked up by the airport vacuum and, possibly, into the nose of a drug sniffing beagle.

Right now, I dropped Lucille, her milk, cookies, quick release handcuffs and her roving eye at the Senior Center and drove back to the Cool Rides garage.

My best friend and fellow cabbie, Belle, was sitting outside in a plastic lawn chair watching the world go by. Her head was bobbing to music from headphones forced down over her four-inch Afro. I dragged out another chair and joined her six-feet of chocolate-brown womanhood.

Where’s Mona? Mona, our dispatcher and general guardian of the cars, frequently joined Belle in people watching and the sport of fashion terrorism.

Inside Zening over driver applications. She is one with her computer.

Zening? I was pretty sure Mona didn’t practice any special religion, so I wasn’t sure what Belle meant other than that we always needed drivers and Mona had computer programs that made the standard police check on potential drivers a waste of time. I leaned back and enjoyed the sun.

Belle smiled. I believe the Urban Dictionary defines it as ‘to be one with the world around you. While in this state of being everything works out for you and enjoyable things spontaneously show up.’ She wants a really good new driver. ’Course you and me, we’re a hard act to follow. How’s Lucille? Belle asked without shifting her eyes from a particularly muscular example of manhood jogging by in bright blue short-shorts and a banana yellow tank top.

I dropped her at the Senior Center with enough cookies to snare any guy over 75 who knows what a vibrator is for.

Umm, a woman with attitude, our Lucille.

We had an incident when we stopped for milk to go with the cookies, but Lucille took care of it. I related the excitement and Jon’s comments on my entertainment value.

You better show him what real entertainment is about tonight. Belle stretched, wiggled her two-inch, two-toned fingernails, red and black today, with silver sparkle. I knew she had a pair of three-inch spike heels that matched the fingernails. They were probably stashed in her oversized shoulder-bag in case she had a date night with Judge Carlton Witherspoon. Carlton was slowly working past her defenses, mostly about her previous employment. She had been a very successful lady of the evening before her pimp was found with a bullet hole decorating the space between his eyes. She decided to change careers, and taxi driving required a different fashion statement but similar people skills, just toned down and physically more limited. But a cabby had to be able to read people.

She stretched again and sighed. She fluffed up her Afro. How’s Terry?

He’s gained weight so he’s not a scarecrow anymore. For all his talk about eating like a king out of the dumpsters of New York, he was still young and scrawny when he came up here. Right now, he’s thinking about the who, what, where and why of his existence.

"The what would be Lucille’s cookies, the where is wherever she puts him, the why he’s gonna have to figure out for himself. Life can’t get more profound than Lucille’s baking, said Belle, closing her eyes to the sun. And he was scrawny because he spent so much time running from the law and whoever else might be in pursuit."

The adoption papers came through. He’s now officially a member of Lucille’s family.

Lucille will make a great mother or grandmother, whichever she chooses to call herself. Lots of food and plenty of protection. She’s a real mother bear when it comes to that kid.

Belle and I sunned and watched people on the bike/walking/jogging spandex highway until Mona yelled, I got rides here. Let’s scramble those taxis. The local Air force base had been practicing the protection of our geo-political borders recently with some fast-scrambled-low-level maneuvers. Scramble had worked its way into Mona’s taxi vocabulary.

Making a living intruded on our tanning. Well, my tanning. I wasn’t sure how much darker the sun would make Belle’s smooth cocoa skin.

I spent the afternoon moving high-school kids. Most of them were older than the boy who held up the convenience store in the morning and landed in jail by afternoon. I wondered if the inept robber went to school. One of the older kids I picked up had an interesting shoulder tattoo that I noticed when he slid into the backseat.

So, what’s the tat mean? I asked. I like some of the more subtle tattoos, but I could never overcome the pain factor enough to actually get a rose tattooed on my butt. This one was some sort of crown. Maybe it’s good to be the king.

Why?

I like tats. Just curious if it has anything special to say.

No. He leaned forward, put his finger against the back of my neck and whispered in my ear. And bitches like you shouldn’t put their faces where they don’t belong.

Chapter Two

I drove like hell for his destination. Partly to prove that I could drive like hell and partly to get rid of this passenger. He was my last fare of the day. I dumped him at the premiere of the locally made movie How do I kill thee, let me count the ways. It was a thriller combined with an all-day marathon of Freddy Krueger films.

I checked in with Mona, gave her my fare money and drove to the Senior Center to pick up Lucille. Since I had an early morning train station, I would keep the car overnight.

We headed to Lucille’s house. I knew she would have cookies and I decided to eat dessert first. Then I could join Jon for a different kind of dessert.

Terry was at the kitchen table when Lucille got the front door unlocked. She had installed extra security after a prescription drug bust in which she and Terry had done most of the busting. The drug dealers took exception to being tracked and arrested by an old geezer lady and a teenage street kid. They did a lot of damage to the front door and the interior in an attempt to remove Terry. Thus, the new locks.

We were about to dig into chocolate chips when Jon pulled in. Terry groaned, got up and worked his way through the locks again.

Terry had penetrated Lucille’s radar when he had come up the interstate from New York City as a reluctant drug mule for a local illicit prescription drug cartel. He changed his job description when Lucille helped redirect the senior citizens running the drug ring, mostly to state or federal facilities. Terry and Lucille bonded over a shared sense of right and wrong. Terry fell on the right side. He had been born off the grid in a deserted building in New York City, lost his mother when he was five years old and moved into the New York Public Library where he lived until he got involved with running drugs to Massachusetts and points north. He was somewhere around fifteen years old with an off the charts IQ and enough knowledge gleaned from the library system to have a PhD if he had wanted one.

Terry finally released all the locks from their protective jobs and Jon squeezed through the door.

Hi, Jonny. How did that young man turn out? asked Lucille.

Young man? Terry asked.

Oh, we had a little incident at the Stop and Go store this morning. It gave me a chance to practice drawing from my bra-holster.

Terry looked alarmed and sat down with a thud. Bra holster? What happened? He didn’t know which to be more interested in—the holster or the happening.

A very unhappy and very young man, a boy really, attempted to hold up the convenience store. I discouraged him.

She flipped him on his stomach and cuffed him, I said.

You have handcuffs? Terry looked startled. Apparently Terry didn’t know about that side of Lucille. That was a good thing.

They aren’t standard police issue, thank God, muttered Jon.

Did you discover anything more about the boy? Lucille asked Jon.

Name is Tomas, in foster care with one Norman Flunker, has some burns that might be abuse and the tattoo could be self-inflicted. I called his guidance counselor at school. She seemed to think there were gangs involved. Told me some of the gangs have a presence now in the schools.

Oh God! whispered Terry.

What? asked Lucille. We all turned to stare at Terry.

It’s Tomas, he said, using the Spanish pronunciation. I know him. He’s like me, a no baby.

A no baby? Jon’s cop face flickered on as he watched Terry.

Yeah, it’s what I was before I moved into the library. He was born outside the system like me. When someone hears a baby crying, they call social services. Social service lady comes to the door and whoever answers says ‘no baby here.’ That’s what Tomas was. That’s why we call ourselves no babies. He was a no baby until someone dropped him at the fire station safe house. I met him when I transferred to the vocational high school.

Terry, already educated by the New York public library system, had found regular high school boring and realized that most of what he wanted to know was more likely to be available at the vocational school than in a normal, college tracked high school. He was taking courses in welding, wood working and hair cutting as well as a few math, literature and social studies courses that he already knew all the answers for.

Well, you’re in my system now and you have a family. We shall see what we can do for young Mr. Tomas, said Lucille, stepping over behind Terry. She put her hand on his shoulder.

We might start with why he held up a convenience store, I thought.

Jon said, Tell me more about Tomas.

He’s really smart. They put him in the vocational system when he started fixing his math teacher’s car. He has some weird kind of memory thing. He can tell you what he did five years ago. His problem is he can tell you what someone did to him five years ago too.

That’s called hyperthymesia, I believe. Lucille stared off into space. It can be very useful, although in some circumstances perhaps not.

I know what it’s called. We looked it up in Wikipedia. And he really doesn’t want to remember most of his life. It’s been a lot worse than mine ever was.

So you’ve spent some time with him? asked Jon.

Yeah, some. Terry squirmed, remembering Jon’s profession.

Can you tell me about the cigarette burns? Jon asked softly, dropping the authoritative tone.

What’s going to happen to him? asked Terry.

Smart kid. He was negotiating with Jon. Information for information.

He’s in juvenile lock-up right now. His foster will be notified. Then the juvenile officer will decide whether the foster is qualified to take him back until a determination about the robbery is reached.

Oh. Terry slouched farther down in the chair. His head hung a little more. I don’t think he should go back to the foster house.

Terry. Jon moved his chair closer. Did the cigarette burns happen at the foster house?

What?! No, no. Mr. Flunker isn’t like that. He isn’t anything. He isn’t there, he doesn’t feed them, he doesn’t even buy food for them. He just gets something on the way home from work for himself. Tomas was living on the school lunch program. I started giving him your cookies. Terry glanced at Lucille.

She smiled with satisfaction at a creation appreciated.

"There’s one other kid living with them. But he’s about to turn 18, so he’s pretty much out of the system. The case worker doesn’t bother with him. But if Tomas brings your cookies home he has to