The longest drive

Scene of the drop

I get a ping for a shared ride in Trenton. It's five minutes away, 20 minute ride out of the city, at a time when the city has surge pricing. It's not my preferred ride, but my numbers aren't high enough to avoid it, and there is a bit of surge on it, so dammit, guess I have to eat this one. I roll up to a downtown area, put the flashers on and wait. The profile isn't highly rated, but I'm here. Let's see if they show up before I can cancel the ride.

Across the street, a homeless guy is lying down in front of a closed store. He stirs. A few minutes pass, and before the clock runs out on the wait time, he enters the car with an Ikea-style open bag that has whatever he has in this world. It's his ride.

Well. I go into auto pilot, because I only know one level of service; confirm address, tell him about hand sanitizer and water. He doesn't engage, and I've got him for the next twenty minutes.

His phone has power, and I hear his side of three different phone calls over the course of the ride, each one more pleading than the last, as he tries to find a place to sleep for the night. His end of the conversation alternates between violent outbursts and subservient apologies, and each conversation ends with no place to go. 

He scares me. Not just because of the outbursts.

I pull up to the drop point, an apartment complex in Mercerville. The drop is at the door, but he asks to be taken halfway between that point and the next entrance. The first rule of rideshare is get home safe. I do what he asks. 

After another awkward pause of several minutes, I ask him if he wants one of the water bottles, because, well, I have nothing else for him and I have to say something. He's got to get out of the car, and I've got to go pick up someone else. 

Anyone else.

He takes a water bottle, gets out and probably beds down in a grass patch. I pull away slowly, do the responsible / cowardly thing of giving him three stars so that I don't get him again, and try not to think about it. 

An hour later, a violent thunderstorm rips through the area, and I think about him again.

Several times over the next few weeks, I'm called into that apartment complex to pick up other people, and I think of him again.

A month later, on a rare off night, I write this.

Occupational hazard.