Barney Mansfield

I observed Edison,  the dalmatian belonging to the owner of a cheap hardware store, piss all over the side of the fire hydrant across the street for the...six-hundred and forty-seventh time this year. I`m keeping track. Keeping my mind busy.

I live on the eighth floor of The Dutchess apartment building in room 3B. Don`t be fooled by the classy name of the building. It`s shady and reeks of piss in the hallways. Everywhere - piss.
I keep a spare key to my apartment hidden behind a piece of plaster that`s been punched inwards. Most likely by some junkie or some raging idiot on God knows what. My part of town is scum. Everywhere I look I see crack

fiends, meth heads, heroin junkies, shootin`piss up their arms that doesn`t belong.
I work at a cab stand down the block. It takes me sixteen minutes and fourteen seconds to get from the outside of my building to the door of the cab stand. Obviously I`ve been working there a long time. My cab number is eighteen zero two, it`s been that number for twenty-four years, one month, and eighteen days.

In a cab you see all the city - everything it`s worth. Everything it contains and everything it hides. I`ll bet I could write an entire novel or some collection of short stories based on all the crazy things I hear from some of the fares. I don`t think I`d do that though, I`ve never really been good at writing. I actually kind of hate it.
My first fare of the day is this is really high class looking guy, I mean you could just tell he was high class. Dapper and all. This guy was maybe about forty-two, maybe forty-three, and he gets in my cab smelling all dapper with a skirt no older than nineteen. It was disgusting. "Hey driver!"he yells at me,
"make it Angelo's on West sixty fourth street. You know it don't ya?!"
Boy this guy was a real b*****d. "And make it snappy, will ya driver!"
The b*****d was probably taking his little blonde pet to Angelo's to shovel sixty dollar plates into their filthy rots.

When I'm not driving my cab, which is rare, I'm playing cards. I play alot of cards. Gin is my game, of course. I play regularly with some of the other drivers from my stand, none of them have much brains for cards. Not to say I have exceptional intelligence, I don't, I just know how to beat them. I can read people and just tell things. Like I can tell that dapper b*****d and his bimbo left a less then satisfying tip to their faithful waiter.

I have this fare in the back, a young guy, business kid. I work alot in the business district and uptown. Anyways, I see this slick glance up at my badge for my cab for my cab license and I know exactly what's coming next.
"Barney? Your name is Barney? As in the big purple dinosaur Barney?"
I should have introduced myself by now, I'm sorry. My name is Barney Mansfield. "Yeah!" I yell back to him. "That's me!"
He shut up after that. They all shut up after that. What's the fascination with my name? So it's the name of some big purple dinosaur suit, big deal. Hasn't anyone heard of Barney Ruble?

At the cab stand, sitting around the table, one of the other drivers who`s name I don`t even know (or care about knowing) asked me:
"if you could drive anyone, and I mean anyone, who would it be?"
These idiots always insist on asking each other that from time to time. The hell if I know why.
"Well...ya know. I don't really know..."
"Oh come on there's gotta be one! Don't you got a favorite ball player? Mantle? DiMaggio?"
Persistent b*****d. Why does he want to know this so desperately?
"Nope." I tell him solemnly. "Not a fan. I don't know who I'd drive. Maybe some kinda of performer."
The raspy voice of the driver who stole eleven bucks from my locker two years ago comes out from behind a stack of files and folders,
"Like a circus performer?"
I thought that was a pretty stupid question.
"No. More like an entertainer. Siegfried and Roy for instance. I bet they'd have something interesting to talk about."
"I don't see anything interesting about that."
God, I hate that raspy b*****d.

There isn't really anyone at the stand that I would consider a friend. Most of them I don't even know their names. When I need to get one of their attentions I usually just call out something neutral like "chief" or "bud" or "fella". None of them are really that interesting or exciting if you want to the truth. There's only one fella at the stand that I really connect with. I think I know his name... I think it's Ray. Ray and I go to the occasional Yankees game, even though baseball is arguably the dullest sport in sports history. He thinks I like the Yankees because I wear a faded and ratty New York Yankees ball cap. The only reason I wear it is to cover up some unsightly pattern baldness. Other than that, I have no connection with it. It gets goddamn annoying listening to him drone on. I can think of ten million other things I'd rather do than sit through those Yankee games, but Ray is a tricky conversationalist. He'll say things like,
" I got tickets to the Yanks tonight! You and me buddy! Don't worry, you'll pay me back later! I'll pick you up at six!" All before you can get in even a single word.
Besides ball games with Ray, I do everything alone. Eat alone, sleep alone, read alone, go to movies alone, drive alone, exist alone. It's how I like it. It's how I stay so normal.

It's eight forty-nine and the sun is setting over the Empire State Building. I'm worn out. I think these days are too long. Cooped up in this cab so long everyday I'll probably go crazy. I see a fare, another rich executive with twenty hands in his pockets. He looks desperate enough. I pick him up. He's a big mammoth of a guy. Height wise, not width. He was rather skinny actually and had these big coke framed glasses on that gave him that classy intelligent look he was probably going for. He shouts to me,
"Nineteen forty, one twenty-fourth street please driver." I wasn't expecting him to speak that kindly. "How longs that gonna take uh...Barney?"
"Twenty-nine minutes, fifty-five seconds."
Silence sits like a brick in the cab for just a few seconds.
"How do you figure that?"
"Well, going up here, seventh avenue takes seven minutes and six seconds. Left on Broadway and one eighty first street up to Queen is eight minutes and fourteen seconds. Queen to Grand is three minutes and forty-one seconds. Then I go right on one seventy second down Park Avenue, that's six minutes and twenty-eight seconds, and then left on Park to one twenty fourth, four minutes, twenty-six seconds."
Silence...again.
"You're good with numbers huh?" I just shrug and nod. "Have you ever considered working for a branch sir?
And there it is...Opportunity.

Reviews

[Wunderlich]

I should have read this first before the other chapter, haha. This is a good read, and I'm looking forward to more chapters. Like I said in my review of the other chapter, I love the detail you put into your work. Well done.