The Switch. Olivia Goldsmith

Heights was the kind of town you drove in, and even when they went to the airport, she and Bob preferred to drive and leave their own car in long-term parking. The taxi that was now waiting outside was all blue—the beaten-up exterior, the vinyl interior seats, the dirty floor mats, and even the ineffective pine-shaped deodorizer hanging from the windshield. Well, blue matched her mood, Sylvie thought as she got in. Since the driver didn’t even offer to help with her bag, she threw it in the backseat herself. Might as well get used to doing everything for myself, she thought.

      “Where to?” he asked.

      “Longworth Avenue. Crandall’s car lot.”

      “No problem,” the driver said. She could only see the back of his neck and a strange hat he had pulled down. It was blue too, and shaped like a mushroom with seams. The cab took off and Sylvie leaned forward.

      “Let me ask you a question,” she said. She tried to catch his eye in the rear view mirror. “Did you ever cheat on your wife?”

      “Not that I can recall,” the driver said. Sylvie raised her brows.

      “I think if you cheated you’d be able to recall it,” she spat.

      “Maybe not if I was very, very drunk,” the driver said. “Not that I drink. Anymore. ‘Course, I’m not married anymore either.”

      Sylvie directed the driver past the main entrance of the BMW lot and onto the side street off Longworth. Sylvie asked the driver, after lambasting him for most of the ride, to try and not be obvious. She got out of the car and, perhaps out of shame, he handed Sylvie her bag, obviously relieved to be rid of her. She fumbled with her purse. She wasn’t exactly sure how to tip. The ride had been awful, but so had her behavior and, after all, he had gotten her there and taken her abuse as well. She handed him the fare and fished out another two dollars. “This is for calling you a scumbag,” she told him. “I’m sorry.” She reached into her bag and took out another two dollars. “And this is for referring to you as a ‘hopeless asshole.’ I’m sure you’re not hopeless.” She paused for a moment, remembered something, then handed him a five. “And this is because you said I’m still pretty.”

      The driver smiled. He was missing a bicuspid and the teeth he had didn’t seem worth keeping. “Hey, thanks, lady.” As he started to pull away, leaving Sylvie in the middle of the empty street, her mother’s car pulled up, Mildred at the wheel.

      “Don’t argue. Put your suitcase in the backseat and get in,” Mildred commanded. Sylvie had last heard that tone of voice when she was in the seventh grade and, to her own surprise, she responded automatically and did exactly as her mother told her. Once in, Mildred rolled up the window and turned to her daughter. “Okay. You want to confront Bob?” Sylvie nodded her head and held up the envelope full of proof. “Foolish girl. If you have to confront someone, I say you confront the girlfriend. Throw her out of town .”

      “Mom, this is not about two women fighting over a man. This is about Bob lying and making a fool of me.”

      Mildred sighed, shook her head, and then laboriously managed a three-point turn. As she braked for the stop sign at Longworth, they simultaneously spotted Beautiful Baby zipping by.

      “Oh my god!” Sylvie cried. “I’ll bet he’s going there. To her.”

      Mildred pulled out and began to follow him. “We can’t get right behind him,” she said. “Do you know where she lives?”

      “Across the bridge. Cleveland. 1411 Green Bay Road. That’s where the negligee went.”

      Mildred snorted. “I bet there’s no green and I bet there’s no bay,” she said. “I think that’s the section beyond the airport. Condos,” she sniffed, as if it were a dirty word. They drove in silence for a while. Grimly, she clutched the wheel and stared ahead at Bob’s distant taillights. Mildred kept a car between her own and Beautiful Baby. As they left their Shaker Heights neighborhood, the houses got smaller and the traffic more congested. But Mildred never lost sight of Beautiful Baby.

      “Hey, you’re good at this,” Sylvie marveled.

      “There’s a lot of things I have experience with.” Way ahead Sylvie saw Beautiful Baby pull off the road.

      “Look!” Sylvie cried. “Bob’s stopped. Does he have car trouble? Or is he having second thoughts?” They slowed down. “It’s a roadside stand. What does he want?”