The Man From Canada

The first sign that things were not entirely right with my fare came when I asked him where he wanted to go. “I don’t know,” he said with such troubled diffidence I knew this was not the usual drunk who had forgotten his way home.

“You don’t know?” I asked.

“I don’t know. Just pick a direction,” he said. “Here’s thirty bucks.”

So, I drove up Duboce toward the Castro. The man sighed a great deal and stared blankly out the window. It was as though a great disappointment rode with him. I started on him.

“So, uh, what’s going on? You alright?”

“It’s been a very long week,” he said.

“Care to elaborate?”

He looked at me, trying to make up his mind about me from the back seat, sizing me up. As a cab drier, I was always concerned with my safety, but halfway concerned with his safety, in particular. The back seat was silent. I turned up Market and followed it until it passed Castro and started curving up and around Twin Peaks.

“Do you really want to know?” he asked, finally. It was intriguing.

“Yes I do. Definitely.”

“Well,” he said, “I’m from Canada. I came here a week ago so someone could kill me.”

When you hear such a strange statement it is difficult to diverge from the set storylines already in your head, stories you’ve heard before. So, I misheard.

“Someone in Canada was trying to kill you?”

“No,” he said slowly, stubbornly. “I found someone on the internet that was willing to kill me for $10,000 and make it look like a random homicide. He lives in San Francisco, so I flew down here. Then, he backed out. Something about being afraid of forensic evidence.”

“I’ve never heard that one before. And I have to ask. Why?”

“It’s not important. I’m just really bummed out over the deal.”

And I was no longer afraid. If he was intent on killing himself, he probably wouldn’t be thinking about killing me. This was especially important as we drove higher up the hill, away from the city lights and wandering drunks in the Castro, all potential witnesses. We reached the top in silence and I turned back.. I drove slowly, hoping that he would catch the view of the city and the Bay Bridge and Oakland lighted beyond. For me, the views of this place were enough to keep me going in uncertain times. It was all there and visible – the little stage-set lighting of the Castro below moving out to Potrero Hill and the Bay – seeming more like a fantasy world than anything else.

But, why did he want to do it? The possibilities were numerous: including him having some terminal illness, wanting to benefit someone with his life insurance money; and a simple, if bizarre and fatal, sexual fantasy. Maybe the San Franciscan was to kill him at the climax of intercourse. That would explain the DNA worries. Reasons aside, I knew that the smarter a person is, the more bizarre their proclivities. The Canadian spoke with the force of extreme intelligence in his voice. This was confirmed when I glanced at him in the mirror. He looked back with lucid, intense eyes. But, as I looked at him, I couldn’t help but think of how badly I could use $10,000.

“Do you know of any places with dirty movies, you know, like the booths,” he asked.

“Of course I do,” I said. “I’m a cab driver.”

“I think there’s one down on Folsom. You wanna take me there?”

“Sure.”

We ran down Duboce and onto Folsom. Everything was closed so I suggested North Beach and told him about the Lusty Lady, the only union shop in town.

“You mean actual girls on the other side of the glass?” he asked.

I confirmed it and he cringed.

“No,” he said, “I just want the video booths. I can’t deal with actual girls.”

So, maybe he wasn’t to be killed at the height of a gay sexual tryst in the City. I stopped talking to him. I didn’t care anymore. I just wanted him out of my car. We pulled across Columbus, up Kearny, and I stopped at the corner of Broadway. The Canadian hadn’t said anything for a while, but, before he got out, he asked one last question.

“I don’t suppose you want to kill me for $10,000?”