#08 HOLLYWOOD EXTINCTION EVENT

THIS IS #08 IN A STORY SERIES. DID YOU MISS ANY EARLIER STORIES? Read them here.

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I couldn’t hold out any longer. It was just too much time between gigs and I had a mortgage on my condo. So I took a cue from Corso and started driving for Uber. Most of my passengers were nice, so it was easy.

Then, after I had been driving for two weeks, everything pretty normal, something happened.

I picked up a passenger who was in a panic. He babbled in English with a light French accent. I didn’t get all that he was saying, but he introduced himself as François.

Eventually, I understood him to say, “I’ve committed a crime. Drive faster if you can.”

I glanced at him in the rearview. He looked scared but I didn’t take him seriously. “I’m sorry, there’s a lot of traffic,” I pointed out. “Also, I’m a safe driver. You picked the wrong Uber to be your getaway vehicle.”

His smile was brief. “Yes, but do what you can.”

I memorized what he looked like, in case I had to identify him later in a police lineup. Dark eyes, black hair parted on the side, expressive eyebrows, downturned mouth, elegant nose. His ears stuck out a little. Something was at the back of my mind about him, but I didn’t want to turn around and look at him directly.

I kept up with my descriptive inventory: black suit, white button-down shirt, colorful tie. All of it out of fashion. He kept tapping a leather briefcase that he held on to tightly. In the app, he had put in LAX as his destination.

“What terminal?” I asked.

He appeared not to understand. “Take bigger streets so we can go faster.”

“I mean, what terminal are we going to?”

He shook his head. “My friend wanted to meet at the airport. I’m not sure I want to go to the airport any longer because it would arouse suspicion.”

I wanted to know more, so I decided to take a chance. “What’s in the briefcase?” I asked.

He started to cry. “You are a monster!” he shouted.

“What? Me?”

He calmed down enough to say, “No, I am the monster. When I got up this morning, I was a small boy. A street urchin. I went to my mother’s purse and took her money. I was running away from home. But when I reached the door of my flat, my phone was in my hand and I was a man ordering a taxi. Then you arrived.” He paused. “There is a problem with time.”

I laughed in spite of his sorrowful tone. I realized what was going on. Someone was playing a joke on me. I called him on it. “I know where that story comes from, the kid stealing from his mother’s purse. It’s in The 400 Blows, François Truffaut’s debut as a director.”

He sighed deeply and slumped down in the seat. “I know, because I directed it. It’s a true story, my story as a boy in the streets of Paris.”

He said this with a bland matter-of-factness, not like a guy who had just been called out on a prank.

“No. This is a joke,” I insisted. I wondered if the guy’s credit card was also fake. I started to pull to the side of the road to let him out.

“No, no, do not stop, please! Keep driving. The police!”

I kept going, but not as fast as before. I couldn’t keep the doubt out of my voice as I asked, “So, you’re François Truffaut?”

Instead of arguing with me, he popped open the briefcase and commanded, “Regardez!”

It was filled to the top with cash. Bundles of neatly wrapped bills.

“Your mom must have been loaded,” I said. I realized that may not have been respectful, but my next question was worse. “Aren’t you supposed to be dead?”

He ignored the question. “I have to get to the airport. I can’t leave my friend standing there.”

So he’d decided to go there after all. “You haven’t told me what terminal your friend wants to meet you in.”

“I don’t remember because we spoke over drinks last night and had too many. He has no phone. Go to any terminal. I haven’t got a ticket. I have to buy one. I am a criminal with my mother’s money.”

I wondered again about being pranked. “You know,” I said with a bit of a sneer, “stealing from your mother is also a bit in Sideways when Paul Giamatti—“

He interrupted me. “I’m not familiar with that film.”

“It won an Oscar.” I thought to ask,”What is the last film you saw in a theater, not streaming on your couch at home?”

He frowned. “What is streaming?”

I didn’t have an answer because my mind started racing. Maybe the time slip Corso talked about was more widespread than he mentioned. Maybe I’d just taken the turn-off. Maybe I really was driving François Truffaut.

“Here! Here!” he all but shouted.

I thought we were at Terminal 1, but they must have been working on the signage or something. It said Terminal 8 1/2.

“I’ll get out now. Thanks for the ride,” he said. He was out of the car quickly, nearly dancing through the doors of the terminal.

Inside, a rotund, bearish fellow raised a hand. “François!” he boomed in greeting, seeming to radiate joy.

François responded with, “Federico!”

The click of a loudspeaker broke my attention. “No standing.” It was the airport police. The cop whooped his siren once to make his point clearer. I didn’t want a ticket, so I drove through the molasses of traffic to get out of the airport.

“What the hell just happened?” I said out loud. I wasn’t troubled only by hearing the guy’s story, seeing the briefcase of money, or the idea that I’d just given a ride to a ghost.

My phone pinged. It was François leaving a tip. Twenty percent.

I tried to force my thoughts into order.

No, what bothered me the most was his attitude. His emotional shift. He was weeping. But as soon as he was out of the car, he dropped the sadness. I couldn’t see his face, but his body language was light and he said the name Federico like he was meeting a long-lost colleague. Why did François remember which terminal at the last minute? Was I being set up? Played in so many ways?

Federico Fellini was the name that came to mind right then.

I pulled over as soon as I could. I had Corso’s number in my phone from the one time he called me. I called him. He didn’t pick up, so I said to his voicemail, “It’s happening.” I couldn’t think of what else to do. I had experienced the turn-off, but now I was back in our time, the present day. I needed to keep driving until I found the right passenger. That’s what Corso had said.

Blue lights behind me. LAPD. The officer strolled over slowly in that special way they have.

I rolled down the window and he asked for my license and registration.

“Are you aware that you’re parked in a red zone?” he asked.

I said I was not aware of that.

“Where are you headed?” he asked, studying my documents.

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you,” I said.

You just read the last installment of HOLLYWOOD EXTINCTION EVENT.

I’d like to keep these stories going, but I'd like to know something: What direction should the stories go in next? I have ideas about the general direction of things and would love your input. Please respond at this link.

Thanks for reading,

Lee