The young woman behind the wheel of the red Subaru Outback hummed along with the radio as she navigated New York City traffic. A year ago she’d been scared of the BIG CITY and its TRAFFIC. Now, however, it had gone down to lowercase letters and she drove across the city with the same comfort she had felt in Charleston. The cities were very, very different, but the act of driving was essentially universal. At this point she could (almost) make her way without the app on her phone telling her which route to take. It felt good--even if her dream wouldn’t have included all of her side hustles. 

The song changed to a commercial as Thelma put on her blinker to pull up to the curb. It looked like, according to her phone, that she was looking for a ‘Julia’. She scanned the passerby but had no real way of telling whom she was waiting on. The people watching element of working for a ridesharing service was her favorite part, but it also meant that she never had an idea of who (or what) was going to end up in her car. She kept a protective layer of plastic on the floor in the back--just in case.

Usually she was lucky...and if she wasn’t...more often than not, the young woman found herself using her powers in the car in an attempt to smooth out any weirdness. She also used her powers when she needed higher ratings or better tips. Was it a perfect system? No--happy people still had free will, after all. Did it help on her off days? Yes, yes it did. The kickback she received from her mood alteration field were an added bonus. Overall, she was a very relaxed driver.

Thin fingers tapped out a rhythm on the plush covered steering wheel as she waited for her rear passenger door to open. The radio went back to a familiar song and Thelma began humming once more. Her brown curls bobbed along as she sat in the still running car. 

Julia had a long day that she will always want to forget. She wanted the h*ll out of this stupid *ss city but she had been drained from her power usage and her day in general and so she needed a place to eat and be away from this many people as she did it. So she had finally hawked over some money for a ‘repurposed’ minute phone with an App Store on it so she could call a stupid Uber that is more likely to allow her to f****n be the way she was without having the police called on her. After all the drivers usually needed the money, and more importantly the cash that she could exchange for her ride being ‘off the record.’

It had taken an hour for Julia to set up her phone and another thirty minutes to figure out and set up the uber app. Julia had never had a cellphone in her life and this stupid *ss city obviously wanted to make things much more difficult for her today. Suffice to say, Julia’s self proclaimed cr*p day from h*ll had continued and she hadn’t even gotten the chance to leave the f****n city. So there Julia waited impatiently( even for her norm of impatience it was impatient) as she glared at every last person who glanced or even passed by her with no glance at all.

Swearing up a storm when someone bumped into her, she stayed tense the entire five minutes that she had waited. To her it mind as well have been five hours because she had more human interaction in that time than she had ever thought she wanted in her lifetime. When the car pulled up Julia debated throwing out her phone so no one could ‘track her’ but she decided against it when she remembered how much of her own money she had spent on it. So she walked to the car with her cell phone, and cussed out one more person before she had entered the car with the aroma of burnt flesh following her into the car.

Her hands had been burnt a bit from her earlier use of her powers, and was indeed smelling up the car with the smell, but she wasn’t going to apologize to the younger individual in front of her, instead she got to the chase with what she intended to receive out of this ‘uber’ ride. She had ignored the stupid humming that any other day Julia probably would have left a car for( even if any other day she would be in a place too small for a taxi lead alone uber) instead of her usual actions she had said “ let’s make this f****n off the books” She knew that many people liked things off the books. Julia herself had made every dollar that she has ever earned ‘off the books’ and the employers are able to avoid benefits when it’s ‘off the books.’ She didn’t think an uber driver would be any different and so she gave her desired location without pausing to see if Thelma was okay with the agreement. “ Take me to the most f****n grossest, cheapest and most isolated f****n restaurant that you know of.” She said. Those three characteristics of a restaurant in Julia’s opinion guaranteed a restaurant with no one other than the chef working at it and no other annoying customers there.

The only thing that greeted her when she (assumed) Julia entered the vehicle was a strong burnt smell--as if her new passenger had just been through a house fire or something. Thelma’s nose twitched, but she made no comment and kept her face in a practiced relaxed pose. She’d definitely smelled worse things in her car--it's why she kept plastic down on the floor in the back during weekends. The young woman tried to focus on the soothing smell of her coconut and rose lotion instead of her passenger. 

Brown eyes stole a glance in the rearview before her passenger began to speak. The woman in her backseat was young and apparently violently angry about something. This assumption was based on her body language and then confirmed a moment later when Thelma found herself being cussed at. Thelma rarely swore--her momma saw to that. With all of the infinite combinations in the English language, she found it a bit mundane...that or she’d read Shakespeare one too many times. 

With a small sigh, Thelma stopped humming, squared her shoulders and turned in her seat to reply. Manners were very important in the Jones family and Thelma silently prayed that she could hold on to hers. Abrasive passengers were the worst. She’d dealt with plenty before, however, and had a basic routine to follow with them. 

 A smile curved her lips upwards as she replied calmly, her slight Southern drawl slowing things down. “Hi, I’m Thelma. I’m assuming since you got in my car that you’re Julia.” She thought a moment about the ‘off the books’ demand. Thelma earned her rent money through rideshare. Her biggest concern about working ‘off the books’ was the lack of accountability. If she canceled the ride in the app, there was no way to guarantee that Julia would give her a cent once they got...wherever they were going. Also--how was she supposed to charge without an algorithm? But...Thelma was also very interested in getting this encounter over in a timely manner, so she said:

“I guess that’ll be fine--I’m usually an ‘on the books’ kind of gal.” Again, still smiling. “Does Brooklyn work for you?” Thelma was not a real cabbie and had only been driving in the city for about a year. Major landmarks and airports she knew, basic directions she could fake, and Brooklyn was where her apartment was. With a signal and a blind spot check, she pulled from the curb and started driving. “I can make no promises about gross, but I can find you budget-friendly and somewhere with a lot of….er, space?”

She’d only used her powers a little on her barista that morning so she mentally prepared herself to use them if the young woman behind her continued to be so agitated. 

Julia hadn’t even thought it would be an issue to make it ‘off the books’ and so she had rolled her eyes when Thelma said she was fine with it but that she usually was an ‘on the books type person’. She didn’t see that Thelma was still smiling for Julia had pulled out her wallet from inside her jacket and had started to grab out a fifty dollar bill. She didn’t know how much cab services cost and so she assumed fifty dollars would more than cover it.

Nonetheless as she was busy rummaging through her wallet, she could just imagine the cheeriness from Thelma as she asked if ‘Brooklyn’ worked for Julia and as Thelma spoke about a restaurant that she could find. “ I don’t know where the h*ll Brooklyn is, and you really don’t have to put on whatever this f****n nonsense is.” she said, referring to what Julia had only surmised must be an act.

It was too annoyingly happy. Still Julia had decided to give the fifty dollar bill ahead of time since Julia assumed that that was why the cab driver usually preferred ‘on the books.’ Julia was a lot of things, but not a cheat… or well not with direct confrontations like this… okay Julia hasn’t stolen in awhile… or well she wasn’t going to rip off someone who wasn’t being an *ss to her. She held out the fifty dollar bill as she said. “Here’s a fifty take me to any empty restaurant as long as it’s moving away from this f****n city, then it’s fine. Because I am going to need a f****n cab ride out of this stupid *ss mother f****n city as soon as I f****n get done f****n eating.” She said, the hostility not aimed at Thelma, but it could be construed as that.

She took the fifty and placed it in an empty cup holder. It was way too much, but she’d break it when she wasn’t driving. 

Oooookay...Thelma slow blinked a few times at the way she was being spoken to. There had to be some kind of excuse for this girl’s behavior--alcohol or something worse because this was ridiculous. Thelma knew it would take a lot of strain to pull this chick down from whatever ledge of anger she was on...but she had to at least try. The warmth that signaled her mood-boosting field turning on dripped down her spine. The young woman at the wheel felt herself relax a smidge--thank goodness her powers had a little kick back. At least if they had no effect on her irate passenger she’d feel a little better. 

She chose to ignore the “nonsense” jab. Her powers calmed Thelma’s temper and she continued to drive, trying to get to the nearest major road so they could make a final decision. This was not her thing and she was rapidly regretting pulling away from the curb and pretending to be a real cab driver. 

“Okay, I didn’t realize you weren’t a tourist or a local--my bad.” Or had heard anything about New York City before… She thought about suggesting a different neighborhood when what her passenger was saying actually sunk in. “Totally not my place, but are you running from something? Someone? There’s a police station three blocks from here if you need help…”

It definitely wasn’t her place, but Thelma was not about to let someone under emotional distress make any bad decisions (or messes) in her car. Asking forward questions was not beyond her comfort level, either. She wasn’t intimidated by the girl behind her, just very, very confused. With a thought she pushed the aura from her body once more, hoping to coax a de-escalation from Julia. 

Julia hadn’t always been so suspicious of people. There was a time when she was quite a gullible individual. Even after her father’s actions against her, it had taken over a year to develop the aloof, distrust of everything persona. The anger had periodically came and went throughout the years, but as time went on, it seemed to stay, or well her hyperbolized anger appeared to stay and come out more often and with more dramatization, and longer durations as time went by.

Suffice to say, in the year 2018, Julia was overly suspicious of everything. Sometimes it was warranted, most of the time it wasn’t. Julia therefore had seen through or thought she had seen through the first sentence and didn’t really appreciate what she ‘saw’ or well what she assumed. That is she felt that the words weren’t really sincere nor well intentioned like the prospective tone Thelma used to imply the opposite.
“and I didn’t f*****n realize that you were a f****n clairvoyant.” She mumbled sarcastically.

This was followed by her shoulders going from tense to completely taut as Thelma mentioned the police. “ Stop the f****n car right f*cken now” she exclaimed. Was this some type of sick joke? She thought to herself, thinking that Thelma must have known that she was a mutant, assumed that maybe ‘those stupid robots recorded every f*****n thing’ and Julia felt like she was stupid enough to not have fled this city on foot instead of using a cab. Julia thought about what she was willing to do to get out before she was interrupted by feeling more content.

Thelma’s powers had worked ish, or at least made her more content than she had been, not making her happier but kind of making her less mad. “Just f****n get me to a restaurant.” she said still with anger, though it was forced anger at best. Though not happiness, it was a 360 from wanting to burn up this car, which would harm her, therefore would have been considered crazy to say the least. Her shoulders were still slightly tense, but she was trying to find things to be mad about. She wasn’t immune by no means to Thelma’s powers, but she wasn’t the type to be able to be happy even when under the influence of powers, because she was just an emotional person, who hid behind anger, especially right now given everything that had happened today.

Thelma’s patience with people was usually fairly high. In her year of driving rideshare, she had seen her fair amount of gross and annoying--driving tourists and picking up people at bar time exposed her to plenty. She had built up a tolerance to ignorance and stupidity and could laugh off both on her own or with friends. Disrespect was an entirely different animal. Being cussed out was not part of her threshold and Julia’s constant use of the f-word pushed Thelma’s sensibilities over the edge. The young woman had tried to keep her tone and manners even throughout this strange and aggressive altercation, but she could feel through her emotional field that she was losing her patience. 

But her momma would be disappointed in her  if Thelma lost her temper. Instead of raising her voice and responding to her passenger, she squared her shoulders and turned all of her efforts to driving and soothing her own feelings with the field she was still projecting around herself. If this girl didn’t want help or to treat Thelma like a person, that was fine. There was nothing she could do to control the actions of others. Thelma was going to give her exactly what she asked for and then go home for the day. She was done. 

Part of her was tempted to drop her off at the closest precinct station anyway, but her conscience wouldn’t let her. Whatever was going on in the back seat was more than she could apparently help in one ride. If this girl was under the influence of something or someone, she sure didn’t seem to mind. Thelma felt a small amount of pity--to hold on to so much...whatever it was...wasn’t a good way to be. If this was how Julia went through life...it probably wasn’t a very good one. (Thelma guessed that those thoughts were a result of the mood boosting impact of her mutation--without it she would have been too annoyed to be even a smidge compassionate.)

“I’ll get you some food, honey. Don’t worry.” Her tone had lost some of the cheeriness, but it was still bright. Thelma signaled and then pulled up next to a park. She put the car in park and turned off the engine quickly. “I’ll show you the cheapest and grossest New York food the city can offer. If you wouldn’t mind hopping out, I’ll walk you.” Her accent was all neutral southern charm. Thelma grabbed the fifty from the cup holder and unbuckled her own seat belt. She’d seen the familiar colors of the stand from the road--blue and yellow would solve her problems. 

Julia didn’t need to be walked to the place, she just wanted to be there already. Julia easily felt like she could find it herself. Suffice to say, Julia was done with human intereaction. She was close enough to something, and while Julia may have been a smidge auspicious about Thelma pointing her in the wrong direction, all to gain some money. Julia was even more suspicious of Thelma walking her to a mutant robot. “I f*****n can find it myself, thanks” she said with brevity. She wasn’t in the mood, and although the swear word was used in a habit forming way, she was too focused on getting to the restaurant to have any sort of politeness. She left the car. Shutting the door in a lot less forceful way than anyone would expect given her tone. But she didn’t look back as she walked away. Her hood now up, and her shoulders back to being tense. She was done.

And with a final f-word, the girl was out of her car. Thelma sighed and silently appreciated the polite treatment of her car door. She still held the fifty in her hand and wasn’t about to keep it. Julia probably needed it more than she did--especially with whatever ‘off the books’ business she was dealing with. Thelma really felt like there was something her passenger had been running from--still was running from. It didn’t feel good to leave her be, but it also wasn’t her place.

She jumped out of the car as well, fifty in hand. The door locked with an audible click as the young woman walked quickly towards her destination. The familiar blue and yellow stand was iconic. It was as quintessentially New York as you could get (at least in terms of food, although the pizza was a close second). Her emotional field was still on when she talked to the bored stand attendant and it was at least partially responsible for his acceptance of the fifty for five dollars worth of food. After their transaction, she turned it off. She got two (one was her ‘charge’ for the strange afternoon) and glanced around for Julia.

Once brown eyes spotted their target, Thelma walked confidently towards the other young woman. She brandished one of the red and which checked boat towards Julia. “Here. A New York hot dog with everything on it. Cheapest, grossest, and most delicious street food in the city.” Thelma held the forty-five dollar change in the same hand she held Julia’s lunch.”This one,” She gestured with the other boat. “Is my pay fare.” The selfish parts of Thelma screamed for her to keep the wad of bills in her hand--but that part was quashed by the dregs of her mutation leaving her system. 

Julia had been still looking for a secluded place, with an isolated unpopulated restaurant. Thoughts on why this entire stupid *ss city was so crowded did cross her mind before the familiar sound of her Uber driver with two hotdogs in hand and what Julia assumed was the money she had given her all in her hand.

Julia was ready to just run away from this stalker of an Uber driver, but lucky for Thelma, or well really lucky for Julia, Thelma had spoken all of the words necessary for Julia to give a pause instead of running. Julia heard the words and saw the money placed with the hotdog in such away that Julia concluded Thelma had bought the two hotdogs and was willing to to take only a hotdog as payment, returning the rest of the money.

Julia’s first instinct was to verbally assault Thelma for assuming Julia needed her money returned. Julia knew she was homeless, but her pride told her that was because she wanted to be, wanted to travel instead of be in one place. Therefore Julia’s instinct was aligned with her pride.

Julia’s energy level however was not aligned with her instinct since she was a tad too tired , and hungry to go or well act on her first instinct. Julia took the hotdog, and only the hotdog slowly. “Thanks.” She said, or well half mumbled. “Keep the d*** money.” she said with some hostility as she held the hotdog in one hand and went to grab her wallet with the other.

Julia never really knew how much money she had with her at any given moment. Sometimes she had less than twenty cents, and other times she had four hundred dollars saved up due to having such a low cost of living. The amount being semi high for someone who works under the table but is a result of usually keeping her needs at food, cleaning her clothes, traveling between towns when she didn’t want to by foot and necessities of basic hygiene. Her cost of living being higher when she sleeps the night in a motel room, or like today, over slept on a bus, making the ticket costs twice the amount it would have cost for the round about location that she wanted to be. She bought new clothes sparingly, and new anything like this stupid phone that she had just bought, sparingly.

None-the-less, Julia was a bit surprised to find somewhere around $126 dollars left in her wallet. She maneuvered her hand to grab $56 dollars of it and placed the wallet back before saying. “ Can you get me out of the f****n city?” She said, the swear word wasn’t needed, Julia really didn’t care as she bit into the hot dog waiting for a reply. Julia didn’t like being around people, or rather told herself that she didn’t.

None the less Julia knew she had to get out of the city some way, and it was better using someone she kind of sort of knew instead of another Uber driver that Julia told herself that she would hate just as much, if not more. Plus Julia assumed that these ‘New York City people’ ( she did not really notice or cared to correlate thelma’s Accent with another city) did not like to go under the table as much as other places as shown by Thelma’s hesistency to accept it.

Julia didn’t want to risk an awkward situation, even if it seemed like Julia tends to cause a lot of those for other people. Furthermore, Julia was still creeped out by the mutant robots and did not want to be reported to the police, or found out by other people/ reported to the police for being a mutant or being a mutant who caused the ‘problems’ that the robot had a problem with earlier. Therefore Julia knew or well assumed that Thelma was her safest bet.

A dark eyebrow rose when the other young woman took the offered hotdog but told her to keep the money. It was too high a fare but...Thelma internally shrugged. She had tried. She had failed. She could definitely use forty or so dollars for her trouble that afternoon. Had her mother been a witness to Thelma pocketing the change there would have been a stern expression and disappointed finger-wagging. But….again, Thelma had no control over what her angry (former) passenger did with her ‘off the record’ cash. 

The curly haired mutant was not going to concern herself with the situation much longer anyway. She’d done (sort of) what she was asked to do and had even saved the poor hot dog cart attendant a run-in with Julia. She’d done her good-ish deed for the day and could safely return to her afternoon of driving other people around. Hopefully, the next person that got in her car would be less inclined to swear her up and down Manhattan. 

And then…

Thelma almost choked on her hot dog when Julia pulled out her wallet and asked if she could get her out of the f-ing city. After all the dramatics of their very short ride together, Julia wanted her to drive to...somewhere. Thankfully her overloaded hot dog was a good excuse to keep her mouth shut for a few moments as Thelma mulled it over. The only perk was the untaxed income that she (assumed) her former passenger would offer her. The cons list was fairly high--time, energy, the chance of being cussed out the entire drive. Thelma wiped mustard from the corner of her mouth and checked her phone for the time. Depending on where Julia wanted to go, Thelma could end up driving in rush hour traffic back to Brooklyn. 

“I’m sorry--you’re asking me to drive you out of the city? How far? Queen's, Jersey, Canada?” Her tone was slightly incredulous, but she honeyed over it in her warm accent. “Are you sure you’re not in trouble?” The selfish part of Thelma wanted to just eat her lunch and bolt, but something made her stay (maybe it was her mother’s voice echoing in her head). She’d just make sure Julia could figure things out, then it was back to her ridesharing gig. 

Julia noticed that Thelma was taken aback, and that Julia allowed her to be for a minute as she continued eating the hotdog. Julia was actually enjoying the hotdog. Not that she had high expectations as far as food was concerned, but Julia did enjoy complaining about food in her head, in a way it was just to complain and let out frustrations, but she found no fault in the hotdog.

The words Thelma spoke however, made her more than a bit on edge. Julia felt like it was stupid to assume that she wanted to go all the way back to Canada, and last time she heard, New Jersey was not a great state to be in. Then the question came again. The one that stated that Julia was a young women in distress who needed ‘rescuing.’ Julia never liked being pinned a victim and she didn’t like the fact that this could also be means by which the mutant robot cop thing could catch her. “ No” she said.

Julia finished the hotdog that had been helping to ‘subdue’ her enough to not swear out with her response of no. But now that she was done. She was going to respond her usual way. That included swearing. “ Just f****n bring me to the grass outside of this city. F****n preferably in NY state. Not a f****n park in the city. And don’t f****n worry that it’s just a random location. I can make my way from there.” She said giving a forced smile for assuring Thelma that she was okay. She didn’t need this women playing hero, and dropping her off at a location that she felt better about dropping Julia off at. Which by Julia’s observations, this women appeared to want to, because she seemed like a hero type. Julia wasn’t judging her for it, but did want to protect herself.

Thelma brandished her free hand and hotdog in surrender at Julia’s tone. At least she’d asked twice, just to make sure. This kind of thing wasn’t exactly her cup of tea--she’d have had no idea what to do if her former passenger had actually needed help. Especially considering that the offer of a police station had gotten a visceral reaction. Julia continued to speak and Thelma stopped eating her lunch to listen. 

Okaaaay… Thelma finally let her face freefall into a truly confused expression. Dark eyebrows rose and almost met the coils of hair framing her forehead.  ‘Just f****n bring me to the grass outside of this city.’ could mean so many things. Thelma finally realized the kind of unrealistic, unclear expectations that Julia had of her. Obviously, the person in front of Thelma had no idea what a map of New York City and surrounding areas looked like. The ‘grass’ that Julia was looking for could be anywhere from Nassau, Hudson, or Westchester County. It was clear that she had no real plans--that she just wanted out for whatever reason. The strangled smile did little to soothe any of Thelma’s concern or confusion.

Once again, Thelma was reminded that she wasn’t a cabbie. She drove rideshare--meaning people that called had destinations already preset. She was also reminded of the angry reactions she’d gotten earlier in the car when she’d asked questions and offered options. Her expression settled into something more neutral once more. ‘Off the books’ or not, it wasn’t worth it to her to spend her afternoon driving to nowhere with someone who was just going to cuss her out the whole time. Not to mention the hours it would take to get back into the city during rush hour traffic. 

She sighed. “I don’t think I can do that.” Thelma resisted the urge to explain why--even if the disrespect had wounded her pride that afternoon. No reason to air out her frustrations. “If you take out your phone I can help you choose a direction, but I don’t usually drive out of the city. If there’s a bus station you want I can drop you off on my way back to Brooklyn.” And with that, Thelma finished her hot dog while she waited for a response. At least lunch tasted good…

Julia would start to sigh and turn it into a disgruntled shake of her head. Knowing that thar was more confident than a sigh. “ Thanks for f****n nothing” she said. Irritated with herself and Thelma and so naturally all of her irritation was shown to Thelma. Also the blame was put all on Thelma and not herself. She turned around and and started to leave. Or well walked away to who knows where. Furthermore she just knew that she would find her way, like she always does even if it was in a h*ll of a city such as this.