11. Traffic
Traffic
It got worse every day. The noise, the accidents, and the fumes.
There was never this much congestion when I started working in Miami Beach.
The commute was short. Pleasant even. And now, it’s painstaking.
I’ve been stuck on the same street for the past forty minutes on my way back to the station after running down leads all day.
And so far, nothing. The only thing I learned was that the tag on the van belonged to a different car altogether.
It was registered to a work van for a restaurant on Fifteenth Street, just off the beach.
My foot slips off the brake as I hit the forty-five-minute mark, and the old car the captain gave me inches forward slowly; I dozed off.
I had been listening to the classical music channel for some time now; those strings really soothe me.
They remind me of my grandfather who used to play the guitar for me when I was a child.
I press the brake softly, and the car comes to a stop.
Traffic is still bumper to bumper. And so, I changed the channel.
I need a pick me up. I can’t risk damaging this car, too.
The captain will have a fit after what happened to my last work vehicle.
It’s been several months, but he still brings up the restaurant I partially destroyed.
It wasn’t my fault, though. An old lady lost control of her car after peeling out of a pharmacy and crashed into it as I was investigating a petty theft. Yet, he still blamed me for it.
Switch. And static. The old antenna on this Ford Cruiser doesn’t work as well as it used to. But it’ll do.
“And—thank you for tuning in! This was DJ Zee with the four o’clock mix on ninety-eight point nine, Miami.
The station with the best pop, R give us your requests!” DJ Kai said. And the station went to break; a litany of commercials played before she returned.
“We’re back! And now to take our first caller!” DJ Kai said, ushering in a listener.
“Yes? Hello? Is this DJ Kai?” The caller said.
“DJ Kai here. I can hear you loud and clear,” DJ Kai replied, laughing naturally. It made my skin crawl.
“I would like to listen to that song that goes, ‘If you want me, you can have me. Da-da-da. Oh, baby!” The caller said, doing a terrible job singing out the words.
“Well? What do you think, listeners? Is he talking about ‘Have Me’ by Jessy T?” DJ Kai said.
“Yes! That’s it!” The caller said. And the AI played the song soon after; then another caller requested a song, and DJ Kai responded as a human would; then she proceeded to play the song that had been requested.
Later on, she would announce advertisements and, sure enough, cracked jokes with the callers.
It felt like the real thing. I was amazed, and yet deeply concerned.
If this technology is available to the public, I can only imagine what the hell was being worked on in that lab; how much damage could it do out in the wild?
After about thirty minutes, the traffic eased up.
I had driven far enough that I could see the exterior of the station undergoing repairs when a call came in. I picked it up.
“This is Alex, go ahead,” I said.
“Alex, this is dispatch. I have an update for you on the BOLO for the black van. It’s been spotted in a warehouse parking lot near the station. Captain Smith is aware, and I’ve dispatched two cars to meet you there. Are you close?” The dispatcher said.
“Near headquarters? Really? Yes, give me the address,” I replied.
“It’s an old warehouse that’s been on the market for a while on the corner of 14th and Washington.”
“Got it. I’m on my way. Oh, and do me a favor: tell the captain to notify our uptight friends.”
“Uptight?”
“He’ll understand. I left their number back at the office,” I replied.
I ended the call and turned into the side streets, bypassing the gridlock.
Several minutes later I arrived and, sure enough, there it was.
The black van I’d been chasing, with the same tag, for the past month.
Parked awkwardly, with one rear door open and the passenger side half ajar, and no one in sight.