It was early in the morning. The night was pitch black. I sitting in the taxi in the city waiting for a trip.
I was watching the digital dispatching screen in the taxi and received notification of an available out-of-town trip. Those trips were rare and not automatically assigned to the closest driver. They were offered up to all of the drivers on duty and you had to electronically bid for them. After a minute or so, the trip would be offered to the closest driver who bid for the trip.
I was always hopeful those out-of-town trips would be that elusive “golden-ticket” trip to the Mexican border or to Las Vegas. Those trips were the equivalent of winning the lottery in the taxi business. Being an optimist, I was hopeful this night would be my lucky night. I bid for the trip and sat staring at the screen to find out if I had won. I was rewarded when I received notification that I had been assigned the trip.
On out of town trips, the dispatcher gathers more information than for a regular trip. On long distance trips out of town, they almost always provide you with the destination and the estimated fare that was quoted to the passenger.
As I started to review the information for this trip, I was a little disappointed as I scrolled through the details. In this case, the dispatched did not provide any destination information. They only indicated that the passenger agreed to a $50 trip charge. Fifty dollars did not equate to Las Vegas, but it was better than nothing. So I started driving to the pickup location.
The passenger was being picked up on the far south side of San Antonio. Outside what most would consider the city proper. Much farther away than any of the regular business on a typical night.
That part of town is generally sleepy compared to the rest of San Antonio. Even more so in the early morning after the bars have closed and nobody is stirring for work or school. I was the only vehicle on the road for several miles.
As I drove, I wondered who the passenger could be, where they could be going, and what their story might be. Why would they need a taxi at three in the morning?
I was cautious because a trip like this was out of the norm. We rarely received calls from this far out in the country and certainly not at this time of day. I tried to calm my nerves by settling on deciding that they could be an international traveler preparing to leave for the airport very early in the morning.
As I passed one of the last gas stations and entered the deep country on my way to the customer’s house, I noticed a white vehicle had pulled out of the gas station and seemed to be keeping pace with my speed. The white car was behind me but wasn’t passing me.
This normally wouldn’t be a big deal except that because I wasn’t familiar with this area, I was slowing down and speeding up repeatedly in an attempt to read the street signs in the dark. I expected that someone who was familiar with the area would have passed me and continued on their way instead of keeping pace with my alternating speeds. When I slowed down, they slowed down. When I sped up, they sped up.
I also noticed that their headlights were different than most vehicles on the road. I’m not knowledgeable about vehicles so I referred to their headlights as “Lexus lights” because those were the only vehicles I knew of that had those lights. Lexus vehicles were not common this far out in the country. Especially at three in the morning.
I started to worry that I was being followed. I was wondering if someone had placed a call for a taxi, was following me, and was then going to trap me at the destination location or run me off the road. I was trying to keep calm and think about what to do.
For a few quick moments, I was distracted by trying to find the street I needed. In the dark. I wasn’t focused on the Lexus as I found the street I needed and made the turn. When I looked behind me again, I noticed that I wasn’t being followed. So I dismissed my initial concerns and proceeded to concentrate on the passenger that I would be encountering in a few seconds.
As I pulled up in front of the passenger’s house, immediately I noticed there were at least three late-model vans in the driveway and about half a dozen people standing outside. That seemed odd to me. Why would this passenger call for a taxi if they had access to working vehicles? Why would this passenger call for a taxi when there were people available who could give them a ride? My guard went up.
As I watched the scene of people on the front porch, I noticed nobody was hugging. Usually when loved ones are separating, there is at least the appearance of affection as they hug each other goodbye. My mind was telling me something was wrong.
Also, no one from the group of people immediately came to the taxi to acknowledge me. Usually there is someone in a group who will greet the driver and will ask the driver to wait while the others come to the vehicle. Nobody immediately acknowledged my presence.
Finally after several minutes, a middle-aged man carries a suitcase across the sizeable lawn in front of the house and brings it to the vehicle. I get out of the van, open the back door for him, and he puts the suitcase into the trunk.
He doesn’t say anything to me and walks back to the house. He doesn’t look happy. This catches my attention but I try to give him the benefit of the doubt. I’m not exactly my best self either at three in the morning.
It was odd to me that there was only one suitcase and so many people on the porch. I would have expected a taxi to be called if an entire family was leaving on a trip but it was odd that so many people were available to drive the passenger and yet they called a taxi.
After several more minutes, a lady walks to the van and asks me to wait. She doesn’t appear any happier than the man who brought the suitcase to the vehicle. At this point I’ve decided that whatever is happening with this group of people, it is not a pleasant situation.
Since I needed the money and had already driven so far, I decided to wait for the woman. As I waited, I watched as the people on the porch were talking and walking back and forth in and out of the house. Something was wrong but I couldn’t figure out what was happening.
All of a sudden, a much older man crosses the land and approached me in the taxi. He opens the passenger door and angrily demands, “Where are you taking her?!”
I’m a champion for the underdog. I’m a champion for women. I’m already on guard. I think to myself, “The only loyalty I have is to whoever is paying for this trip. It appears that the woman is going to be the passenger. I can’t let this guy push me around.”
I’m hoping good old-fashioned friendly courtesy will do the trick. I reply calmly, “I don’t know sir. She hasn’t told me.” It was the truth.
He angrily replies back with more force this time, “You don’t know where you are taking her?!”
At this point, I’m tired of this whole situation. I thought this was going to be an easy fifty dollars. I don’t have the patience to spend my morning caught in some family drama. I just want to get out of there and go back to town. Plus this taxi is like my house and I certainly can’t give him control of my space.
So I gather up as much courage as I can fake and raise my voice to match his, “No sir! She hasn’t told me where she is going!”
He concedes defeat, turns around, and stomps back off towards the house. I felt proud of myself but now I was even more on guard.
I was concerned for the woman who had asked me to wait. I didn’t know how long I should wait for her. She is obviously at the center of whatever problem is occurring.
Finally I see her walking towards the van all by herself. This was very abnormal. Most times loved ones will escort a woman to the taxi, make sure the taxi driver isn’t a creep, tell the female to be safe, and then stand outside and watch as the taxi drives off. It was very odd that at three in the morning no one was seeing this woman off. Again, my suspicions were being confirmed that something was wrong.
Immediately after she enters the taxi and closes the passenger door, she tells me, “Drive! Please! Quickly.”
Now, I might be a champion for women, but that doesn’t mean I trust them. In my business, a woman might be a match for me physically but was no less of a threat. Commonly women were used to bait drivers into an ambush or used the sympathy of drivers to obtain free rides.
I might be kind-hearted but this was still a business to me and I still cared about my safety. I couldn’t let her boss me around. I had to regain control of the situation.
I told her, “Hey, wait a minute! I need to receive payment first and I need to know where you are going!”
“I’ll pay you. I promise. Just drive! I need to get away from here.”
“Fine. I’ll drive a few blocks, pull over, and you’re going to pay me before we go any farther!”
“Ok. Ok. Just drive.”
I start confirming the $50 fare with her and I relax a little because she doesn’t seem concerned about the price and I can hear her digging in her purse for the money. Usually if someone is up to no good, they will try to bluff you into believing they didn’t know how much the trip was going to cost or that the dispatcher quoted them a difference price, etc.
I drove a few blocks and pulled over in the dark on the side of the road. She gave me the money and then urgently asked me to continue driving.
The money helped ease my fear but I needed to know where we were going. It was typical of people who were up to no good to not give you a destination. I asked her again where she was going and she just said, “I’ll let you know. Just turn to the right.” For some reason I let my guard down and decided to drive.
We turned onto the main road and headed back towards the city so I was not as scared. I figured if she was leading me to an ambush, it would have been deeper into the country versus off a main road headed to the city.
I was starting to relax but I was not going to let her just drive me around aimlessly. I decided to approach her differently in order to obtain the information I needed. I less aggressively asked her, “What is going on?”
Surprisingly, she was forthcoming. She started telling me that she had been a student in medical school in Chicago. She was only a semester or two away from graduating when her mother called her from India and advised her that she was being married off to a man in Texas in an arranged marriage. My passenger had never met the man before. She was expected to leave medical school in Chicago and move to Texas and get married. And that’s what she did.
After she married and arrived in Texas, the new husband and his family put her to work in the gas station that they owned. This was not a corporate gas station. This was one of those little gas station dumps out in the middle of the country. She said they violated all the labor laws and she was stuck at the gas station working long hours. Then when she came back to the family compound, the family treated her like a slave and she was expected to spend her time doing housework. She was about to graduate from medical school and now she was reduced to a slave working for strangers.
As she is telling me this story, all of a sudden, what do I see in the rear-view mirror!? The same white vehicle with the “Lexus lights” that I saw before! I’m sure it was the same white car that had followed me so many miles on the way to her house.
Before I even had time to think about what was happening, the Lexus races up next to the side of the van and starts honking and driving erratically. It felt like I was in an action movie. I was scared but incredibly calm. I turned my head towards her as the car is driving erratically alongside me and I ask her, “Do you know these people!?” In my mind, I’m thinking her in-laws have tracked us down and are going to run me off the road and kill us both in some kind of twisted honor killing.
She calmly responds, “Yes, follow them.” I have no idea how to explain it, but I trusted her. The Lexus speeds up and I switch lanes and follow it.
Almost immediately, the Lexus pulls off the road and onto a dirt road. I’m thinking, “Great, a dirt road. Of course it’s a dirt road! This is like a bad B movie. Is this how my life is going to end?”
I ask my passenger, “What’s going on?!”
She tells me that the people in the Lexus are friends she met and they are helping her escape. For some reason I believed her. I assume that she didn’t want this couple to drive to her former residence for fear that her in-laws would find out who was helping her.
The Lexus drives over a cattle guard and stops in the middle of the pitch black night. The only lights around are the headlights of our vehicles. A man and a woman step out of the Lexus. The man wastes no time in approaching the taxi, opening the van door, and helping the woman out of the back seat. I somehow decide that I feel safe enough to exit the vehicle and open the trunk so they can retrieve her luggage. The woman from the Lexus comforts my passenger as the man takes the luggage back to his vehicle. He tells me thank you and they all get into the Lexus and drive away quickly.
I’m left by myself in the middle of some random pasture in the pitch black night. I catch my senses and drive away as quickly as possible to get back to the city. I call my dispatcher and I tell him to please not give out my name or number to anyone who might call from that trip. I was worried her in-laws were going to track me down once they realized their free labor had escaped.
In the end, I felt honored that God would provide me the opportunity to help a woman escape from bondage. As so many other times before, taxi driving proved to be more than just a job. More than just the money.
Sarah Nyhan 