cabman #9

while i was waiting for a fare, i stopped in Market Square to get a cupcake at the bakery shop. the meters give you seven and a half minutes for a quarter. when i came out of the place, a meter maid was about to put a ticket under my windshield wiper.

“what are you doing?” i said.

“what’s it look like i’m doing?”

“wasting your time.”

“is that so,” she said, and ripped the citation from her pad and placed it under the wiper. “you have a good day now, mkay.”

“what am i getting a ticket for?”

“you are parked in a metered space. to park there, it requires you pay the City a quarter dollar for an allotted fifteen minute parking privilege. the meter’s currently empty.”

“i didn’t think you had to since it’s a leap year. my quarters wouldn’t fit. i think the slot is jammed.”

“the hours of operation for the machines are Monday through Friday, 7:00AM until 6:00PM. the slot is fine, sir, but if you wish, you can report any mechanical difficulties you may have experienced to the Department of Public Works over on…”

“but i’m working here. i’m down here spending money.”

“would you rather i have the vehicle towed, sir?”

“what?”

“be happy i gave you a ticket,” she said, and wiggled her ass down the sidewalk.

who the hell gets happy about a ticket? it was so early that there wasn’t even anyone down there trying to park. there were just some pigeons bobbing around and a few perverts standing on the corners. no one was looking to park. and i was in and out, five minutes. not even.

goddammit, i thought, she fucked up my cupcake.

i opened up my car door and slumped inside, turned the key in the ignition, and turned on the windshield wipers. i let them sweep back and forth and back and forth until that yellow ticket dingledoodled in the breeze. my glove box was filled with them and another would make it a fire hazard. i clicked the latch on it and surveyed the damage. the Meter Maid was behind me now, heading across the street and picking her nose.

i rolled down my window. “hey Rita,” i yelled, “Rita! hey Meter Maid.” and when she turned around, i threw a handful of the yellow slips from my glove box out the window. “hey!!! here’s your tickets,” i said and threw another handful out the window and then another.

“hey,” she said, “HEY!!!” as she began running towards me, talking into the radio mouthpiece that was on her shoulder as she was reaching towards her belt, probably for a can of pepper spray. but my ride was already in gear and riding off into the sunrise. after i’d rounded the corner and driven a few blocks, i pulled over to use a pay phone. The Doktor answered after several dozen rings, probably impeded by pulling himself from under a sweaty pile of innocent female college students, confused by a night of drinking at the Sorority House and easily led by the hand of Satan himself into the stinking den of iniquity that vicious pigfuck of a man calls “home.”

“h-h-h-h-hello,” he whimpered.

“awww get up,” i yelled, “get the fuck up.”

“who is this?”

“you know goddamm well who this is.”

“what are you doing up?”

“i got another ticket this morning down in Market Square. what am i paying you for if you can’t even properly get me immunity from a stinking parking violation.”

“you don’t pay me.”

“NOW IS NOT THE TIME FOR TECHNICALITIES!!!”

“oh wow. what time is it? i drank too much.”

“FOCUS!!!”

“ok. listen man…i put a call in to That Guy, but they weren’t trying to listen.”

“i know man. we gotta do something about that.”

and he said with an air of terrible certainty, “we gonna go to jail man. That’s what we’re gonna do.”

that was really all i needed to hear.