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plane to catch.’
    The cabbie wore an Orioles cap turned backwards. I ain’t understood how men got to keeping their hats on indoors in this day and age. He shrugged. ‘Sure thing, boss, BWI.’ He punched the meter and pulled away.
    The city always struck me as dirty this early in the morning. The streets wet with the night rains, the slow scuttle of rats under parked cars, the trash and blown papers in the alleys. Wasn’t always this grim.
    At my age, a man shouldn’t have to take a cab to the airport. Should be someone he can call, take him there, wish him a safe flight. I ain’t got no regrets about it though.
    ‘No regrets is right, boss,’ the cabbie said cheerfully. ‘Regrets don’t do you no good.’
    I looked at him in surprise. I hadn’t realized I’d spoken out loud.
    ‘Where you off to?’ he said.
    I watched his eyes in the rearview mirror, drifting over to me, away.
    ‘London,’ I said. ‘I’m going back to London. I live there.’ Better not to tell folks your business, I figure. Nor to let them know you’re leaving your pad empty. A man’s got to be careful these days.
    ‘London?’ the cabbie said. ‘No kidding. I used to live in London. England’s alright but the food’ll kill you. Whereabouts you live over there?’
    I frowned. I ain’t got no mind for this damn small talk. Best to shut him up quick. ‘Not London England,’ I said. ‘London Ontario. In Canada.’
    The cabbie’s eyes sort of glazed over. Canada kills any conversation quick, I learned long ago. It’s a little trick of mine.
    I was watching the streets scroll on past. Baltimore always seems like the kind of city you’re either leaving or just returning to. Ain’t no kind of place to hang your hat. Even as a kid I’d dreamed of getting out. I watched the green wall of shrubbery along the freeway pour past the cab window, feeling uneasy. I ain’t no fool, I known this was like to be my last trip away.
    See, I was born here, in Baltimore, before the Great War. And when you’re born in Baltimore before the Great War you think of getting out . Especially if you’re poor, black and full of sky-high hopes. Sure B-more ain’t south south, sure my family was light-skinned, but if you think Jim Crow hurt only gumbo country, you blind. My pals and I was as much welcome in white diners as some Byron Meriwether would be breaking bread in Jojo’s Crab House. Things was bitter . Some of my mama’s family – two of her brothers and a schoolteacher sister – they was passing as whites down Charlottesville way. Cut us off entirely. You don’t know how I dreamed of showing up there, breaking up their parade. I ain’t so sure about it now, I suppose they was just trying to get by best they could. We could’ve passed too, said we was bohunks or something, but my pa ain’t never gone for that. Negro is what the lord made us, he always said. Don’t want to be nothing else.
    At the airport, I checked myself in and started the slow walk to the gate. Long white tunnels, checkpoints, passports. I didn’t see any sign of Chip.
    Even when they called for boarding, I ain’t seen him.
    Not a bad start, I thought with satisfaction. Hallelujah. Maybe Chip going to miss this plane.
    We was set to fly first-class, courtesy of old Caspars, and I’d no sooner settled into the wide seat, slipped off my old orthopedics, and leaned right back, than I saw Chip shuffling on down the aisle toward me.
    ‘Sid,’ he said, out of breath. ‘I didn’t think I goin to make it. They damn near lost my reservation.’ He looked crisp, sharp, perfectly attired in a black silk suit with a grey kerchief folded in the breast pocket. ‘I think you in the wrong seat,’ he said, studying his ticket.
    I pulled mine out, looked at the numbers on the overhead latches.
    ‘Ain’t you in 2B?’ he said.
    ‘4D,’ I said. ‘I’m in the right seat.’
    He frowned. ‘I’m in 2A. I ain’t nowhere near you. That can’t be right.’
    He ducked his head,