The Taxi Service

Following on from my outing to Landscape with Weapon at the National, about 24 hours later I found myself kangarooing over Waterloo Bridge in the Dustbin on Wheels off to Euston Station to collect a gaggle of teenagers.

At about 4pm the ladies had decided to go to Hatch End. To visit a boy, of course. Whose parents were away, of course. Armed with their travel cards, off they went from the badlands of South London. Parental warnings of do you realise where Hatch End is? It's Sunday, the transport stops early fell on very deaf ears.

At 10pm, the calls began. "Are you thinking of making your way home now?"
An hour later : "We missed the train. The next one is at 11.30 and we'll come home on the Night Bus"
"No you bloody won't - we'll collect you from Euston."
"Don't fuss, we'll be ok".
An hour after that :"Mum, this train is taking forever, can you pick us up from Euston? We'll wait by the Taxis".

By this time, it was well after midnight, I was in my best tea stained pair of jamas, but had to get dressed as Daddy had consumed a bottle of wine "Would I be OK to drive? "
"No, you bloody wouldn't!"

So off I go, Bat out of Hell CD blasting out into the night. It was quite exciting, really, having the car to myself, driving through Central London. It was almost like being young again.

As they finally piled into the car, I realised I would not be going straight home - I would be doing the tour of South London to drop this lot off.

There was silence as Meatloaf did his stuff. Under normal circumstances, the CD would have been chucked out of the window by now. I gently lectured them on would it not have been better to set off late morning and arrived home at a decent hour without getting the parents upset. The journey home was interrupted by phone calls from hysterical parents wondering where their lovelies were.

"What's this we're listening to?"
"Meatloaf - Bat out of hell. I've got the Grease CD if you fancy a change."
Silence.

At each drop off, it was easy to find the house - it was the only one in the street with its lights still on. As each girl approached the doorstep, the front door swung open and a hand reached out to grab her.....

Finally at home, I found that Daddy had gone off to bed. Swine. Whatever happened to solidarity amongst parents?

Finally in bed at 2am, I was woken up the following morning by a call from a grateful mother.
We've decided to exchange mobile numbers. We wouldn't want our daughters to know what we were up to.....