Uberculosis

Gary had just given up the black taxi game. He was done with it once and for all. Now, he was an Uber man. Using his own black ford focus. He was loving the freedom of it, no more pished old men, not as many racist conversations and he could blast his own tunes because people just sat on their phones the whole time tapping their phone screen. The rating system was the real problem. Cunts in Ubers don’t want to talk, they’re mostly young, I mean what old cunt would know how to download an app and understand that the journey is prepaid!? He was fine with that, he liked his own headspace. What he didn’t enjoy was all the messages he was getting about his ‘rating’. He was getting shanners. Uber were sending him messages telling him what his customers were thinking of him. He’d been at his wits end. ‘Having a nice day?’he would say to customers in the hope they would chat and make a connection. He would always pipe in a wee;

‘Mind and rate me 5 stars! Kidding on pal, you have a good day!’

But he wasn’t kidding, no even a wee bit. He wanted those fat stars on his Uber profile and he was getting fuck all of them. When Gary got home he would stick on the kettle and think about how badly he had fucked every car ride. It was like a gig, having to perform everytime someone got in. He was starting to think he wasn’t cut out for this, maybe he should have took that job up the Clydebank shopping centre doing surveys about where people get their gas and electric from. He liked wearing suits. Just as he was about to kick his trainers off his phone shook the arm of his two seat settee. ‘Try making your car ride more unique. mayb tri using mints in the back of the seat for the passengers. Probly a good idea to play music they like, will get your rating up, get you more work 2.’

‘Who this? lol’ Gary texted back immediately, before reading the entirety of the first message.

‘Person that works at Uber. We use our own phones,, dont ask me y, jus do. jus tryin to help u out m8’.

‘Ah snd snd, cheers m8, wil try that1’ at last Gary was looking at things from a different perspective. Customise the experience for the passenger. This could be fun Gary thought. He could really express himself. He immediately went up to his uncles hoose, the one that has a costco card and convinced him to take him up and let him buy a few things for his taxi. Gary bought a load of twenty gram, eight pack boxes of Smint mints. Then it struck him. The passenger might not just want Smint mints. They might have weans. So he bought 4 different childrens books, just in case they were a reader. He also bought a plush toy so that it disarmed children as they entered the car and made them feel more at ease.

‘This’ll make the car look a bit nicer, um a goin overboard wae it?’ Garys uncle had absolutely no opinion on the matter and the checkout woman was just as helpful, she just gave Gary sleekit looks and said fuck all. He would have to judge it as it went.

He went home and downloaded chart music. He researched what was hot in the nightclubs, what people were into these days. Fucking everything.

Picking up businessmen he would play classic FM or old rock music and talk about their work with them, kiss right up their arses and all that. ‘Ooft, ah would like tae work at JP Morgan mate, believe you me, some money but that’s me bud, I just studied how to drive taxis and talk pish, no?’, he would follow these comments up with a wee laugh and the businessmen fucking loved it, a real authentic Glasgow cabby but working for a sleek, cutting edge new tech company. He was giving nice harmless patter with a slang accent and that was great. The young adults were a bit more challenging. He once chided someone for taking a key in the backseat of his car and that was an instant one star banger. So from now on he decided instead of tackling drugs, he would embrace them. In story form. He managed to ask a few of them where they were going, what club they were going to and what they were going to see. He gave them his headphone jack so they could put their own tunes on. He told them about that time he took so much ket he thought he was falling into a black hole for hours and was freaking out, only to wake up to a pyrex jug and a dog bowl full of water hours later. That was the route to their heart. To those precious 5 stars. ‘Mon out big man, get baned wi us! Just patch the taxi ya madman!’. Bless their Canada duck jackets. Things were going well for Gary. But he was only hitting an average rating. He was constantly close to a snide level that he wanted no part of.

He’d get a few queerhawks asking about why he had childrens books and why he didn’t have the green type of Smint mints. Maybe they were all reviewing him badly. Gary catered to all types in the hope it would rocket him to the top. The nine in the morning comedown crowd, the nine in the morning waterloo street suits and the west end crusties taking their weans to an advanced ‘organic earth sounds’ music class. He never cherry picked his rides, terrified of losing stars. He dreamed of stars. He’d drive anywhere. He’d take you from one street corner to the next if it meant he was getting a gold star for his efforts.

Just as Gary was buying water for the expected horde of afters punters he would be receiving he got a message on his phone. It was a potential pickup, just 2 minutes away. Easy money, Gary was on his way to another five stars. He had just bought a couple of Yazoos and his upcoming passenger would be keen to get tore in to the banana one. They would then be keen to rate Gary rather highly. As he set off to pick up his passenger at the Newsbox Gary had a feeling like he had never felt before. A really weird feeling, pure, you know, weird. As if his cranium was trying to squeeze oot a dangleberry.

The door slammed shut. The door on his passenger side. Weird as fuck, no cunt ever sat in the passenger seat unless it was a team of young eccie hunters.

‘Good you’re willing to go to Livingston. Got a few knockbacks already.’ The weirdo blurted out. He seemed pure nervous. ‘Wait! stop the motor. I should sit in the back, sorry. I just think..nobody sits in the front seat, ha, ha. Oh what am I like?!’. At last, the cunt was starting to see sense, Gary thought. ‘It’s all good ma man, don’t worry about it!’ but no sooner had Gary stopped the car and said this the man had retreated to the back seat, putting him diagonal to Gary. The first ten minutes were quite awkward. No talking, the smints getting devoured by the man formerly in the front seat.

‘Get good ratings then? You all get rated don’t you? People give you a good rating?’ he finally broke the silence.

‘Aye ah do. How, you thinking about how many stars you’re going to give me?’ Gary smirked in the rear view mirror.

‘I’m thinking, aye. Gonna play us a song?’ Gary passed the jack to the back seat. He held it out for a few seconds before realising it wasn’t being taken from his hands.

‘No, you put it on. I canny work they phones.’ Gary plugged his phone in.

‘Mike and the Mechanics. Put them on.’ Gary tapped Spotify.

‘The over my shoulder one?’ asked Gary. The man looked up and met Garys eyes in the rear view mirror, ‘Naw. The Living Years’. This was becoming very fucking sad and quickly. But as much as Gary was feeling uneasy he needed his stars to stay up. He needed the work. The song came and went and Gary noticed the man staring into the back of his head.

‘You awrite?’ Garys question was met with silence.

‘Stop the motor. Please.’ Gary could feel a chunder on the cards and he pulled into the hard shoulder.

‘You awrite mate? I canny really stop here, you want me to take you to hospital? You want me to phone an ambulance?’ Gary was shiting himself. The man hunched forward and appeared to be breathing heavily. ‘Ahm gonnae phone an ambulance pal..’ at this the man launched up and glared at Gary.

‘NO! Naw, don’t you phone anycunt. Don’t you bother phoning anycunt.’ It was at this point that the gun the man was holding became a lot more visible. ‘I knew it was you. Gary Priel. You think you were getting away with it?’ he was tearing up.

‘Ah don’t know what you mean mate. Ah really don’t know-’ Before Gary could finish the gun was pressing into his back. The man spat ‘You think am daft ya wee cunt? Think ah button up the back? Ah’ll make sure your BACK NEEDS BUTTONS IN A MINUTE YA WEE RAT!’. ‘Whit?!’ Gary got a poke for his cheek. ‘Ah don’t fucking know what you mean mate, please…please mate don’t’. There was a Gary sized puddle of lower body sweat starting to materialise, it was not pish, definitely not pish.

‘Sean would have been 18 this year. He’d have been..he’d have been alive. And here you are. Sitting in a car. Alive. Play another song. Play ‘the foggy dew. The one wae Sinead O’Connor in it’. Gary knew it was on Spotify. He had a strict policy about only playing rebs and that Roy Orbison tune when it was a matchday but now he had a man with a gun pointed at him he could change the rule for today. ‘Did you say Sean?’ Gary felt his mouth go dry. Now it was starting to resonate, he was starting to remember. That night. The boy. He had blotted out a lot of that time. He had been going through a rough patch that time, unemployed for three year, living with his mother. Everything had gone wrong for him back then. ‘I never meant it. Ah hud just. Ah never seen him come out and..’. Gary trailed off.

‘You drove aff. You left him. You hit him and then you..you’. He started to almost choke, gritting his teeth to try and stop his emotion from escaping through his mouth. ‘We never used to let him stay over a lot at wee pals hooses. We used to worry about them aw smoking grass and bevvyin. We knew he smoked at school but who didnae when they were young..’ Seans father pulled out rope and gently tossed it into Garys lap. ‘He had just got his first wee girlfriend. Me and Lisa hud decided to let him go and stay at her hoose. Talked to her Da’ and her Maw. Joking about them sleeping in separate rooms but ah was awrite wae them sleeping the gether. He was 18, fuck, that’s the age int it? That’s the age…tie your fucking feet together Gary.’ Gary picked the rope up and fumbled with it, ‘Ah don’t know any knots but..’. Seans Dad got out and moved around to Garys window, tapping on it with his hand and motioning for Gary to open the door. As Gary opened it, Seans Dad got down to business and started tying Garys ankles together. ‘You were drinking that night. And you got away wae it. Community service?! You’re sitting here. Obsessed with ratings. Every cunt rate you highly? They willnae after Uber sack ye. Ah’ve went and emailed that Uber. Tolt them the sort eh cunt you urr. Whit you’re aw aboot. Get oot the motor. Noo.’ Gary locked up. His legs just frozen stiff.

‘Please. Ah hud been driving back fae ma cousins 40th. Ah had wan Miller. Ah swear! Ah swear on ma life!’, as Gary swore on his life the bereaved father dragged Gary from his seat. He pushed Gary about 10 yards away from the car. The motorway was dead, even for seven at night. ‘Ah didnae mean it. Ah, ah..ah am a good person mate, ah..ah bought Yazoo, ah bought childrens books so weans could read’. At this Seans father smashed Gary on the butt of the nose with the pistol. Gary felt like the world had been flipped upside down. He shut his eyes to try and stop the spinning but it woulnd’t stop his head from spinning. In the darkness his closed eyes provided he was reminded of that K hole he had ended up in during his clubbing years. Except he wasn’t falling down into the blackness, his head was just fucking killing him. As his eyes opened he could not see the bereaved father.

‘Gary. You wanting a good review son? There’s a way you can get it. Stand up and ah’ll tell ye..’. Gary obeyed, propping himself up and standing straight up for him.

‘Here’s the deal, Gary. You’ll get five stars for this ride. If you let me knock you down and kill you. Let me knock you down and kill you, drive off after it, leaving your body in the cold and ah will definitely give you a five star rating.’ Gary perked up. A five star rating would push him into that bit of the diagram that says; ‘Above average! Keep up the good work’. He’d never been there. Never felt that high.

‘If you live through me hitting you wae this motor Gary, bear in mind, I will rate you a one star’. he pulled out a hip flask after this and took a swig.

‘R-r-right. Awrite. Go. Dae it! I’m a good person, ah’m, ah’m..ah’m a good driver. Ahm a good person. Ah never meant tae…Ah’m sorry.’ Gary wept, his legs uncomfortable. The blood from his nose dripping down and mixing with the tears, their warmth covering his face whilst his breath was visible in the cold air.

Seans father stuck his head back in and started the ignition. As the car readied itself, Gary looked to the sky and wondered what his life had meant, if his life would go anywhere after this. What it would be like when it was all over. Gary looked back at the car and opened his mouth to share his last thought with the world;

‘But if he’s getting me sacked from Uber, does that mean my rating will stay above average?!’.

The car roared forward.