Working the Hard Side of the Street Read online

  I was willing to try again with Kendall. I didn’t know her, it was true—but I would make that effort. My guess was she worked as a waitress—as she had indicated she was in a real hurry to get to the place on time. By now I was pretty good at guessing what people did for a living, what part of the country they were from, and at times I could even discern what part of the world they were from. Often, if someone got in the cab and they had energy and were alert—they were not from L.A. Simple as that. If they talked about things that mattered, world affairs, anything of any importance, they were not from Southern California.

  The L.A. type talked about modeling, screenwriting, acting, making money and getting a Mercedes, getting that toot.

  Kendall had been living here four years, was studying to be an architect, which sounded pretty impressive to me. She was more beautiful than any model I’d ever seen and she had the good sense not to be interested in any of that: movies or modeling.

  The sucker kept thinking: Maybe we can fall in love and my past won’t matter, and maybe we can move out of L.A.

  I told her I was writing and not selling anything. When she inquired why I had moved to L.A. from Chicago I told her that I had moved out West believing I would have better prospects out here, and that I had family here. I had moved out after returning from Nam, that was true, but had only seen my parents and younger brother and sister but once.

  I did not wish to burden this person that I had just met with further details. I couldn’t bring myself to admit either that I had anything to do with movies and that that had been the real pull that had landed me in Tinseltown.

  I couldn’t admit it, was ashamed to—and as far as the rest of it was concerned: I had told the truth; I no longer had any interest in filmmaking. I had been trying to write fiction, books, stories, nothing remotely to do with Hollywood. Screenplays were not my forte (not that I knew what my forte was, or that I even had a forte). Hollywood was a ball-buster, simple and true, a jaded, evil whore.

  I got Kendall to the coffee shop on time, and hurried back to my apartment to grab a copy of my book, that self-published, self-help book on how to recover from a bad love-affair. I had used a pen name for the cover: Alec Summers; my reason being I wasn’t in it for fame and glory—but had sincerely wished to help others who may have been going through the agony of a divorce and/or bad breakup with someone they loved dearly.

  I shaved, cleaned up, and drove back to the coffee shop.

  I wrote my home phone inside the cover, my name and cab number, and handed it to Kendall.

  Later that evening the dispatcher informed me to call Kendall at the coffee shop. “In fact,” said he; “she called several times.”

  I dialed the number, asked to speak to Kendall.

  “I’d like to talk to you,” she said, no longer sounding indifferent (as before). She was excited about something.

  “What do you think of the book?” I asked.

  “That’s what I’d like to talk to you about,” she said. What was she all-aflutter about, I honestly wondered.

  I stopped by the coffee shop and, although she was quite busy, I was given special attention by her as I sat there at one end of the counter. She was wide-eyed, curious and excited and wondered why I had given her the book.

  I shrugged, grinning sheepishly. “I just thought you might like to read it,” I said, not knowing how to break it to her or whether I even should, that I had written it and paid for the actual printing…

  I didn’t know what her reaction would be if I’d confessed: Because I saw you as a potential mate. Admittedly, there was a good degree of anger in the book that I was not entirely aware of (at the time of the writing); like I said, while I wrote it, it was either pick up the razor blade again or write the book. It had taken four months to complete the manuscript, and I thought: I feel fine. I’ll be okay now.

  It’s over, the pain is over. I can do without April; I really can. The book is over and so is my pain. She never loved me and that’s why she never bothered to call, why I had never mattered to her.

  And then I had a relapse, got it bad (at about the eighth month of being on my own), just as fierce as before; all the aches were back. All of it: the begging to the ceiling, the pleading to the walls, everything. So it was not over, far from it. I had hoped to fool myself into believing that the book had cured me of my ex, that I had been healthy enough now to go on with my life; if only I had known that five years later I would still be mixed up, screwed up, a hopeless case, that I never would get over her, no matter what I said or did. If I had known all this right after the split I probably would have chucked it right there and then. I’d had no idea that the healing would take years and years…

  As I said, I was at the coffee shop, and this radiant woman, I guessed Kendall to be 24, was giving me attention I rarely, if ever, got from someone with her looks. Yes, April had been attractive, but that too had been another of those rare occasions.

  And there was something about Kendall’s face: it was radiant. There was a radiance, there truly was.

  She looked like a woman in love. Have you ever seen a woman in love?—the way a woman’s eyes can brighten and glow? Her face glowed, exuding that happiness that came from within.

  I was looking at Kendall and her transformation was obvious to me and I wondered if it could have been this slim little book that I had written?

  Was it possible?

  I did not know how to take it. Was she actually interested in me?—the loser cabby with no future in sight?—the loser sinking lower and lower, who lived in that dark hole full of dying senior citizens? Me?

  She kept asking about the book, kept asking about me. Was I going with anybody? I let on that I did write it. She had guessed that much. Every chance this woman got she made the effort to be at my end of the counter; at one point even planted both of her elbows on the counter directly in front of me, resting her chin in her palms and saying dreamily:

  “You know something? You really are special. I’d like a chance to get to know you.”

  If she were blushing—I had to be doubly so.

  Was this really happening? She wanted to get to know me?

  I was at a loss for words, and sipped at the tea I had ordered. We made small talk at every opportunity (as the place was busy and she had customers to wait on). Kendall said: “I’m working all night. Would you like to get together in the morning at the end of my shift for coffee or breakfast?”

  I’d never had a woman that looked like her come on to me this way.

  “I’d really like that,” said I, and left.

  At 4:30 a.m. I got another message from the dispatcher.

  “Call Kendall,” he said.

  I phoned her.

  “Would six o’clock be all right with you, Cash?” she wondered. “I really would like to talk to you.”

  “I’ll be there,” I told her.

  “I can’t believe there’s still guys like you around here. You’re special. I really mean it.”

  “Thank you, Kendall. You’re pretty special yourself. I’ll be there.”

  And I was.

  We ordered two cups of coffee to go, and I walked her to the parking lot in back of the building. Kendall was driving an old Volkswagen Beetle that had seen better days; it was rusty and beat-up looking, a dune buggy of sorts, a real mess, just out of place in Beverly Hills, so I thought: a good sign. I was impressed. She doesn’t care about cars and things that are not important anyway. She’s got a good heart, and that’s all that matters and that is all that should matter.

  “What would you like to do? Where would you like to go?” she asked.

  I shrugged, and thought Roxbury Park might be appropriate.

  “We can park our cars and just talk.”

  She liked the idea. I would drive my cab and she would follow behind in her Volks. “That way you’ll be able to drive home directly from there,” I explained: “and I’ll be able to go back to work.”

  She was agreeable to anyt
hing I said. I had the magic formula: Cash Register.

  Can you see how confused this had made me? What was so new and different about me all of a sudden? Did my face become handsome suddenly through some strange miracle? God had waved his hand and given me good looks? I glanced up in my rearview mirror, did it twice. No, I was still the same average-looking guy: longish brown hair, tired blue eyes, tired features in general; a cab driver with no money in the bank, no car, and I still owed my buddy Angus Gladwyn that two hundred and fifty bucks I had borrowed from him, money that had made the move into that one-room apartment on Hauser possible. That loan had been a Godsend. I was still Cash Register, and this attention made me suspicious.

  What now? Why now? How real could all this be?—all this affection she was lavishing me with? (This woman that really did not know me—nor I her.)

  We reached the park, and it was decided we would sit in my cab and sip our coffee and talk. That was all I had wanted. Talk. Let’s get to know one another. I was physically attracted to this blond-haired, well-built lady, there was no doubt about that, but I had learned—to have love there had to be more. You had to take the time to know one another. Right? Right.

  She got real close, sipped her coffee, her eyes dreamy and focused on my own, and she was looking, more like gazing, deeply into my eyes this way. God, how I had wanted to fall in love with her, just a man aching for love, and how much I had wanted to hold her in my arms and kiss her. But I said to myself: No, you would feel awkward and uncomfortable about it, because you know you are not in love. This isn’t love; it couldn’t be this soon. It might happen, but only if it is given the proper chance to flourish. This is what went on inside my head, while Kendall pressed herself up against my torso and revealed her life story. It poured out of her, the men she had known over the years and fallen for, and the lies she had been fed by these men so they could get to her and use her: the professor who had lied to her and gotten her pregnant (and later turned out to be married with three kids), the subsequent abortion; and there had been other love affairs gone bad, a rape even, at gunpoint. It seemed she had had nothing but bad luck with the opposite sex, just as I had. My heart went out to her. It was easy to relate to the pain, loneliness, of having been used and later conveniently discarded.

  I was beginning to feel that there might be a chance for us. God was smiling down on Cash Register this time, and had sent me someone decent to fall in love with.

  I had attempted to explain my life to so many so often in my cab in the past that I was weary of hearing myself express another word about it, and this time would make sure to let this woman do most of the talking. I was no longer interested in the Cash Register story. More often than not, when someone got in your cab, and if the ride was of any length at all, in order not to appear rude, you gave them (if they inquired) a capsulized version of your background. Where you from? How long have you been in L.A.?

  How do you like it? What brought you out here? Ever miss the seasons? How about them Lakers? Ever go back to Chicago? Where are you from originally? (That one in those days I considered a bit personal—and would answer around it; on the other hand, if the person asking was a genuine human being, I might say Sarajevo.) If people were friendly, and I did get some passengers who genuinely were decent and interested, I opened up a bit. It made the job easier to take, the rides smoother.

  This time I would allow the other person to do most of the talking; I wanted to know about Kendall, and I listened intently while she spoke. And when two hours later it was decided it would be best for her to go home and get some rest—after all, she had been on her feet all night—we hugged, and agreed to get together at a later date. We would go out, a dinner or something. Her face was still glowing, and she needed, desired me to kiss her—and I could not bring myself to do it. That’s too intimate. I felt awkward; it was too soon. Not now, not yet, I reminded myself. Once, years before, while sitting in my car with a date at a drive-in movie, our first date, I had attempted to be romantic, had moved in for that first kiss, missed the woman’s lips and our teeth had clashed!

  Talk about your embarrassments. She had cut the date short, and had never wanted to see me after that. Some guys were cut out to be Romeos, quick with the moves, slick and smooth and all those things. I simply could not move that fast. Kissing someone on the mouth was a lot more intimate than having sex with them. That’s the way I was—and couldn’t change it. So be it.

  Instead, I hugged Kendall; gave her a good squeeze with all my heart and soul behind it, and we broke.

  But I remained suspicious—about all of it.

  Love did not happen this easily. It never did, even when it appears to be love at first sight—not that I was looking at this experience here with this woman as anything near that; I hoped that it could be, would be. I remained suspicious, scared.

  I had learned.

  She let me know again how glad she was to have met me, and walked to her Volks. We waved goodbye, and drove off in different directions.

  For the next ten days or so a day did not go by that she did not phone at least once, either the cab office or my place. She often phoned two or three times a day, leaving plenty of messages on my answering machine: “I want to get together with you, Cash. I want to see you; just to talk to. Please call me.”

  My lovesick heart was easily opening up to her and doing its darnedest to convince my mind that it would be okay to go along, it would be all right to give in to her—but my mind knew better. Still, my heart would not listen.

  Love did not happen this easily.

  Look how long you’ve gone without someone to love, my heart insisted; and my mind kept countering with: It’s too soon. How can it be love this quickly? It just does not happen this fast. She does not appear to have stability.

  She’s interested in me now—just now—and she’ll tire of me just as quickly. She’s the type. How do I know she can go the distance—or would even want to? I don’t know what she’s like, and don’t have a damn idea, as a person.

  Character, man. Character. It was frustrating as hell.

  And it all happened over that thin, one-hundred-page self-help book I had written on how to recover from a bad split. What a joke, I thought just then—look who’s trying to hand out advice, when I couldn’t even heal myself.

  Forget it. Your heart was in the right place; that’s all that matters—and people know it, see it, feel it.

  Forget it.

  I couldn’t, stop thinking about Kendall, that is.

  The phone rang one evening I happened to be in.

  Kendall wanted to get together. I was petrified, down to my toes. Man, I wasn’t even out of the woods with this thing with April, the one I had given my all to—and here I was with another possible mess looming overhead. I was scared shitless. By now I was certain nothing would come of this.

  What I was looking for, desired and needed, this woman could not give me. I couldn’t put my finger on it, as beautiful as she was, she just did not strike me as the type that would be able to stay with a guy, just one guy—all the way through. She would not be the soulmate I was looking for, and I was already falling for her.

  Do you see my fate now? Do you see that I could not win, no matter how hard I tried?—how hard I scraped and struggled to get on without my girl, to live my own life, to find love and pick up the pieces of the puzzle again.

  Kendall had wanted to come to my place and “talk,” she said; “We can drink beer and just talk.” This woman thought she was in love with me after only ten days. She was after sex, no doubt—which was fine, nothing wrong with that at all—only there was no way I would allow myself to go that route with this woman before we’d had a chance to know what was in our hearts and minds, before we could fall in love. I wanted love, dammit. First love, and then once we knew where we were going, once that was arrived at and understood, why then we could make love and stay together and, who knew, get married?

  This is the way my mind worked. Was it strange? For
L.A. perhaps—but people in other parts of this great nation thought this way, people out in Canada and South America thought this way, people in Europe and other countries thought this was normal—but not here in Tinseltown. This was considered strange and unusual behavior.

  I explained that I was not proud of my small and messy room and that we ought to go out and maybe drive around a bit and we could talk and get something to eat.

  The truth of it was I was not healthy enough to begin dreaming of being in a relationship at this early stage of the game, did not feel safe and secure enough.

  Kendall showed up in her Volks dressed in tight jeans, and a jacket that barely reached her waist, thus revealing a fine and sexy, if muscular rear end. She had all that golden hair done up and she had taken extra care with her makeup and what a breathtaking beauty she truly was, and I knew, as hard as I tried, I was a mess inside my head, the psyche throbbed with pain; it was too soon for me. I was still fighting off the dark, the blues, the past. It would not be long, I was certain, before Kendall got wind of that, how strangely I behaved, how strange and nervous, the silences, and she would walk like the rest.

  But I had to try, had to keep trying. It is tough to accept defeat, tough to admit being a quitter. Quitters never got anywhere, and I would not be a quitter. I would keep reaching out to connect any way I knew how, just keep reaching out to it and I would be saved. Love was the answer, love was the only cure. It was this same love that had cut my heart and mind to pieces, the same love that had screwed me all up, and it would be love again that would come in and save me, put me back together again—so to speak. Only love can mend a broken heart. That was a Gene Pitney song. It was.

  Never mind.

  I kept hoping this woman would understand and give me time, and would not expect too much too soon.

  We got in her car and drove.

  I did not have the money to take her anywhere, nor did I really feel like doing anything but drive around. I simply wanted to be with her. It would be a good way to get to know each other.