Stephen Dixon: All Gone

“What do you know? — Just keep driving.”

“Why don’t we drive around another block? One away from the gas station.”

“This block.”

“We drove around another block before.”

“That was till you ran out of gas.”

“I could run out of gas again. This stop-and-go driving drains the hell out of it.”

“Then you’ll get some more at the station.”

“What could I ever say to that man the next time?”

“You’ll say ‘Fill her up, please, and no receipt.’ And then exchange pleasantries about cars, auto parts and motor oils, or just read from one of the books on your seat.”

“You must like that gas station very much.”

“Save your remarks for the gas pumper.”

“I will. I was just trying to be protective about myself then. I don’t want to get hurt or cause any trouble in the least.”

The gun was still pointing at me. I drove around the block another fifteen minutes. Every three times around or so the attendant looked at me and went right back to his work. Then I saw a policeman waving me down on the avenue around the block from the gas station.

“Keep driving around the block,” the man said.

“But he wants me to stop.”

“Pass him the next time you see him too.”

“He’ll have a car on our tail by then.”

“Do as I say.”

I drove past the policeman. Through the side mirror I saw him calling out for me to stop. Through the rearview mirror I saw the man putting the gun in his overcoat pocket. We passed the gas station. The attendant was wiping someone’s dipstick. We went around the block. The policeman ran farther into the avenue this time and waved his nightstick for me to stop.

“The light’s red,” I said, passing the policeman.

“Go through it and around the block again and then stop where he says stop.”

“Why not back up for him now? I could say I didn’t see him the first time because I was keeping my eyes out for a certain address, and only saw him the second time when I was turning the corner and had mistakenly gone through the light.”

He motioned me to continue around the block.

“You’re the one asking for trouble now,” I said.

“From you?”

“From the police. I could still back all the way up this block and around to where he is. It’ll look better for us if I come around backward that way. More respectful, and as if I only passed him once and not twice.”

“Shhh.”

I drove around the block. The policeman was calling in from a police box on a lamppost. Seeing the cab, he dropped the receiver and blew his whistle at me. I stopped. He started over to us.

“Roll up your window,” the man said.

I rolled it up. “What do I tell him when he gets here?”

“Cover your mouth when you talk to me now and don’t turn around.”

I put my hand over my mouth and said without turning around “Well, what do I?”

“Tell him you drove through the lights and didn’t stop when he told you to because you wanted to help him lose some fat by his chasing after you.”

I shook my head.

“Say what I said.”

The policeman rapped my window with his stick. “Roll it down.”

“Three inches,” the man said.

I rolled it down three inches.

“Anything wrong in there?” the policeman asked the man.

“Nothing, thank you.”

“Now let’s hear you start explaining this,” the policeman said to me.

“I’m very sorry, officer.”

“What about what you ordered me to say about him?” the man said.

“What he order you?” the policeman said.

“I think he should be the one to say it.”

“That I only passed you because I wanted you to run a ways after me so you could lose a little weight.”

“Get out,” the policeman said.

“Do I?” I said into my hand without turning around.

“You’re damn right you’ll get out,” the policeman said.

“I don’t know what to do,” I told him. I covered my mouth and said “What do I do?”

The policeman unsnapped his holster flap and tried opening the door. In the rearview the man made a turning motion with his hand for me to roll my window up.

“No need, officer,” I said, when he tried opening the rear door. “I’m coming out.”

He stepped back, his hand on his holstered gun. I rolled up my window. He smashed my window with his stick.

The man slunk back into his seat screaming and then said “Get.”

I drove off. Some glass had got in my cheek. The policeman shot once into the air. Then two more.

“Drive to the block with the movie theater on it,” the man said, pointing to a movie theater a few blocks away.

“And the light?”

“No. This block here with the supermarket. Keep driving around it and don’t stop for police or lights.”

I drove through the red light and started around the block. We were on the avenue in front of the market completing our third trip around the block when I saw two police cars waiting for me in my lane.

“Make a U,” he said.

I made a U-turn and then a left at the first side street as he told me to do.

“Which block?” I said.

“Find another one around here. But a big one. If possible a block with the city’s biggest avenues on opposite ends of it.”

“There aren’t any around here like that.”

“Then drive across the park to the south side. I know of a beauty over there, right off Fourth.”

I drove across town and was heading south through the park transverse when I saw that both lanes ahead were blocked with police cars.

“Around,” he said, but through the side mirror I could see that the way back was blocked too.

“What now?” I said, slowing down.

“Get out and run.”

I stopped the cab between the two police car blockades and said “If I run they might shoot me.”

“And if you don’t run I’ll shoot you. And if you do run and suddenly stop I’ll shoot you. And if you fall to the ground after you get out and suddenly stop I’ll shoot you. I’ll shoot you if you try climbing over the transverse wall or get out and yell to the police and me not to shoot you. Just get out and run either way down the road’s dividing line to the police shouting threats that you’re going to kill them, or I’ll shoot you from behind. Now out,” and he nudged the gun barrel against the back of my neck.

I got out, jumped to the ground and crawled underneath the cab. He began shooting through the floor. Two bullets hit my shoulder and arm, another ricocheted through my ear. The police drove up. They called out to me. They took the gun from the man and asked him why he had shot me. Shaking all over and between loud sobs and tears he said “This bum…this man…he forced me to drive with him as a hostage. I luckily disarmed him of that thing seconds before he was going to drive us straight into your cars and shoot every policeman he could see.”

Even with two bullets and glass in me and blood coming out of my face and clothes, a policeman wrenched my head back by the hair and threw me against the cab and slammed my handcuffed hands on the hood and kicked my feet out behind me and told me to keep my legs spread apart and don’t speak unless questioned or they’ll knock me to the ground for good.

“But the man’s lying. I was his hostage and was forced to drive around and taunt you guys.”

I was punched in the back and head by two policemen till I rolled off the hood to the ground.

The man and I were driven in separate cars to the police station. An hour after I was arraigned and exhibited to the press for photographs, I was taken to the hospital, where my bullet and glass wounds were treated and also a gash in the back of my head that the policeman’s ring had opened up.