Note: This story is “historical fiction”. It’s based on two articles from the Chicago Tribune, August 2nd and 4th, 1994, that somehow affected me. I filled in the blanks and made them into a story. There’s no claim that any of this is what actually happened, outside of what was reported. And the names have been altered.
Dark, drizzly, after-midnight, post-thunderstorm Monday evening. Muhammad had just dropped his fare off near the Hilton at O’Hare Airport. The streetlights glistened up off the wet pavement as he traveled the airport access road, heading back east to downtown Chicago. It’s very unusual for pedestrians to walk on that road, especially in the middle of the night, so Muhammad was surprised when he rounded the curve near Mannheim and was hailed by a dark-haired young woman along the freeway.
“Arlington Park in Chicago”, she instructed, in a heavy Spanish accent.
Muhammad had been living in Chicago and working at Blue Ribbon Taxi long enough to know that Arlington Park Racetrack was not in Chicago, but in Arlington Heights. The exact opposite direction.
Muhammad radioed his dispatcher to confirm the shortest route to Arlington Park from his current location on the northwest side of Chicago, and then drove. Airport access to the 294, quick turn to the Northwest Tollway, out to Route 53, and then north, up to Euclid, and you’re there.
Except one problem. His passenger did NOT agree. As soon as she realized he was not going downtown, she became excited. She insisted the park was the other direction, toward Chicago.
“Downtown! We must go downtown!”
Muhammad knew what he was doing, and where he was going. Yet the young woman’s insistence bothered him. She gave him the impression she knew of what she spoke. At the Devon/Rosemont toll plaza on the Northwest Tollway Muhammad pulled over, and sought out a Spanish speaking toll booth attendant.
“She wants to go to Arlington Park, but she keeps telling me it’s in Chicago!”, he said, exasperated.
The toll booth attendant understood. The young woman was confused. The toll booth attendant explained to her, in Spanish, that Muhammad was indeed headed the right direction for Arlington Park, and that seemed to be the end of it. The young woman calmed down and climbed back into the cab, and Muhammad continued west.
The calm was short-lived, as she became agitated again almost as soon as they started to roll. Two miles later, near the McDonald’s family oasis that straddles the tollway, she freaked.
“Stop the cab! Stop the cab!”
Muhammed complied, and pulled over to the right. Hell, he’d had enough. Before the cab had even come to a complete stop she had the passenger door on his side open and was getting out of the car. She lost her footing getting out of the still moving cab, and tumbled out on the pavement, getting a few bumps and scrapes in the process.
“Miss, you okay?”
She didn’t answer. She stood up from her tumble and looked at Muhammed for a moment, a wild fear in her eyes, and then turned and rushed across the tollway toward the southbound lanes, away from him.
Three cars struck her, travelling the normal 70-75 or whatever speed people usually speed on the Northwest Tollway late on a Monday night. She was dead before she hit the ground.
The drivers of the three cars, shocked, pulled over, and waited along with Muhammad until the highway patrol arrived. In the cold and the drizzle they fished her ID out of her pockets.
Green card. Ana F., nineteen years old. Employee at Sportman’s Park in Chicago, a harness racing park this time of year, back south, the direction where she knew she should be headed. Going to work at a horse racing track in a rough part of Chicago, probably for a pittance, in the middle of the night.
The police theorized she’d gotten out of the car because she was afraid Muhammad was intentionally driving her the wrong direction.
But Muhammad knew he was taking her the right way. What does “horse racing park” or “harness racing park” sound like, in a Hispanic accent, to ears from the subcontinent, I wonder? Did she think of all racetracks as “Arlington Parks”, and the two of them just couldn’t find enough common English to figure it out?
The newspaper stories really don’t say more. Tragic accident. Just the facts. Family, husband, children, relatives in Mexico, friends who loved her?
Ana F., nineteen years young. Heading to work in the middle of the night for $5 per hotwalk racetrack wages, maybe.