A Night's Work

The rideshare I work for is always encouraging drivers to mop up partiers late on Friday and Saturday nights. They pay better during those times for one. I made a hundred bucks in an hour late New Years Eve, 300 altogether. I have a theory that you're more likely to deal with a raging alcoholic late on a random weeknight where New Years turned out great. Everyone was cool and several female groups were sweet and silly and flirtatious.

Oddly I can have several late nights in a row with nothing but people going to and from their jobs and nice, fun, likeable partiers. Then every once in awhile some deliberately abrasive confrontational drunken thug.

I picked up a congenial couple at maybe 12 minutes to midnight, wanting to get to a corner gas station to buy some booze before it turned into a pumpkin that quits selling alcohol at the witching hour. The rideshare app on my phone estimated that I would be at the "Speedway" gas station at about exactly that time. This was in Rio Rancho, New Mexico where cops hide in the shadows like hungry bull sharks if hungry bull sharks were Rio Rancho cops hiding in the shadows.

So I wasn't getting them there Dukes of Hazard style. I did however use a shortcut turnoff a little shy of the intersection and, since it was clear, raced up the wrong side of the street a couple car lengths to pull up by the door rather than ducking in the back to go all the way around the building. This made them happy as they could tuck and roll inside in the nick of time.

After their joyous departure I decided to turn the car around as I was of course returning them home once they emerged. Almost no one goes one way to Speedway. I figured they would fear I had abandoned them. Something people often assume when you want to park or otherwise move the vehicle to get out of the way of questionable late night traffic.

A guy came out of the store and approached and I thought it was one of the people I'd dropped off. He asked if I was his ride. I said yes wanting to assure them that I was just moving the car. Then the couple came out to protect their ride and go and I corrected myself that no I was with them. It turned out the guy was a creep who laughed at them when he thought they lost their ride as I moved the car and pestered them to buy alcohol for him.

On the way back the girl, who has worked for the same company I do, mentioned how they cannot get a ride after a downtown Albuquerque concert in the wee hours. She got it when I explained that it's because of people like him. They go through your mind when you consider working late. I wonder if it ever occurs to them that the majority of people do not want to deal with them in any capacity, the OG, aspiring rap star petty thieves, scammers, and slime bags who go in and out of Albuquerque's "gated communities." By which of course I mean jail and prison.

After the couple I had one more ride and decided not to push my luck beyond that. I arrived at a party house in the dark with a lot of vehicles outside. Two girls stood in the shadows, one holding the other who looked possibly upset and definitely drunk. Her distress might have just been from drinking too much or maybe there had been drama on top of that. The more functional girl reassured the other and made sure I was who I say I am, asking who I was there for and what her destination was. The second time I've had a girl place her drunk female friend in the care of a male stranger's car in that mindset. Once the one girl was in the back seat her friend was at my window which I lowered. She wanted a blood oath that I would deliver her friend safely. I smiled, understanding and admiring her protective love for the other girl, as well as one can smile in a covid mask. And for the second time reassured her that "She's safe. She's good. I will get her there. I promise."

The girl was quiet in the back and I think passed out for awhile. I followed the GPS and we were in the dark of the high plains on a winding dirt road peppered with houses. That middle ground between wilderness and subdivisions that characterizes much of Rio Rancho. I nearly had the girl home when she livened up and started overriding the GPS verbally about where to turn. She sounded a little nervous, undoubtedly feeling vulnerable because she was drunk alone out on The Moors with me. As if, mere minutes from home, I might turn around and laugh like Freddy Kruger.

But I got her there and wished her well and she seemed to relax. Partying is a dangerous rite of passage. Kind of like baby sea turtles having to run for their lives to the surf after they hatch. It's sad that things are as bad as they are now but I understand. They are that bad. And it's nice to see people who care about their friends.

You learn. You experiment. You control your drinking or at least a few of us just lose interest in it or you have to forcibly quit or find that you can hold your liquor but can't put it down.

My big orange Tom who sleeps with me every night informed me at ten a.m. that it was feeding time. Sundays are often very light traffic with not many Uber drivers so want to get out there soon. Need to hit the weights, shower, and eat. If you have to put your incapacitated girlfriend into an Uber and I'm who shows up she will get home safe and sound.