(Author's note: The following story was narrated by a retired Chicago policeman who drove a taxi in Kalamazoo, Michigan, one lazy winter day at the bus station while waiting for fares. You will find the story being told as if I were the cabby's fare, and can only hide behind artistic license in an attempt to make the environment more interesting. According to the narrator this event really happened, and I have tried to make his telling of the story as original as possible. Unfortunately, most readers have stated that they have difficulty getting around an old black man's dialect, particularly in print, so I have included a transliteration just after the original story. May one or both of these help bring you closer to the story as I heard it. jth)
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He told me about the amnesiac cop on the way to Flint, and fifteen years later it still sticks in my mind like dirty nails. I think it was more the way he said it than the story itself; his slow, black, southern bass rising and falling over the highway whistles coming through his taxi’s windows seemed a mystical chant. It was more like a dream then than now.
“Don’t know if ah should tell yuh ‘bout the wust t’ing evah happen’d to me in mah yeahs on de foce, but since you write ‘n awl, I reckon ah maht as well. May be you could put it in one o’ yore books.”
I sat behind him, could see his mud-brown eyes and bushy white eyebrows in the rearview. He would often look at me this way, sometimes for so long I would break from his gaze and crane over his shoulder to see the traffic ahead. His eyes would always be waiting for mine to return, his words never breaking rhythm.
“Ah’d been on de foce twenty–six yeahs when it happen’d.” The plexiglass behind him was scratched with undecipherable symbols, creating a mosaic of anarchy between us. “Joe Lorenzo – may de Lord bless an’ keep him – was mah pahtne’ den. He took one obeh on Cicero jus’ a mont’ later, right in de chest, by some punk nigga’ kid wid a foty-fahv. Di’nt ebben get to testifah at de trahl for de one ah’m bout to tell yuh.”
The skin on the back of his neck and head wore the etchings of time like old leather left out in the sun. “We wuz on Challs ‘n Foth at de station, waitin’ fo’ owa shif’ to staht when dis cawl comes in to dispatch ‘bout a domestic distuhbance a block down on Fif’. Joe ‘ n I hopp’d up frum owa seats, jump’d in owa patrol cah’ and headed on down deh, afteh de dispatchuh tol’ us he’d send hep soon as dey sho’d up.” He paused while a semi growled by in the passing lane.
“Fo’ we’uz haf way deh, dis ole lady cum runnin’ up de street in huh nahtgown, holl’in an’ carr’in on ‘bout sum’n gettin’ killed, so we hump’d it de res’ of de way deh. Lemme tellya, it don’t mattah how many yeahs you on de foce, ebby tahm you gets a cawl lak dis, yo hart getsa poundin’ lak it wansa jump outta yo’ches’. Ah din’ no what to espec’, so ah grabb’d mah gun jus’ in case.”
For a full minute the only sound came from the clicking meter, the taxi’s tires on the highway and the steady whistle from a window not entirely up. His reflected eyes bored into my head like he was trying to determine whether I would be able to handle the rest of the story, so I sat quietly, patiently, all the while screaming at him in my mind to continue. At last he spoke again, his voice slightly lower, causing me to lean forward just to hear him.
“We come up on dis young man standin’ on de sahdwok holdin’ a lil baby nex’ to him lak dis,” he curled his right arm as if he were holding a football in front of him “an had a big ol’ butcheh naaf in his ubber han’, wavin’ it ‘roun’ lak he wuz tryin’ to cut up de air aroun’ him. Dere wuz a woman behin’ him standin’ haffway up a set of rowhouse steps screamin’ ‘Mah baby! Mah baby!’. Man, dere wuz blood ebbyware! On de woman, on de steps, on de sahdwok, on de man, on de baby, ebbyware.
