The Taxi That Waited for No One

The rain fell in steady sheets, blurring the edges of the city as if the world itself were unsure of its own boundaries. A horn blared. Tires screeched. Then—nothing.

Silence.

When Ethan Miles opened his eyes, he expected pain. The crash had been sudden—a truck swerving into his lane on the highway, glass shattering like frozen rain, his car spinning into a metal symphony of destruction. But here, in this moment, there was no pain.

Only the low rumble of an engine and the faint scent of tobacco and pine.

He was in a taxi.

The driver, a lean figure in a dark cap and heavy coat, said nothing. His face was obscured by shadows, and the only light came from the dull glow of a flickering ceiling bulb. The dashboard didn’t show a speedometer, just a softly pulsing meter that read: “Passengers: 1.”

Ethan sat up. “Where am I?”

The driver finally turned slightly. “Now boarding. Next stop in three minutes.”

“Boarding? What is this?” Ethan’s voice was shaky, even to his own ears.

“You’ll see.”

The car slowed and stopped in front of a desolate alley where a young woman stood hunched under a dim streetlight. She opened the door without hesitation and slid into the seat beside Ethan.

She looked at him with tear-swollen eyes. “Do I know you?”

Ethan blinked. “I don’t think so.”

But something about her seemed... familiar.

She didn’t speak again, just stared out the window as the taxi drove off.

“Who are you?” Ethan asked her.

The driver chuckled. “You’ll remember. They always do.”

The second passenger was an old man with a limp, holding a weathered violin case. He got in silently, nodding toward Ethan.

“You left my funeral early,” the old man said.

“What?”

“Too busy to stay for the whole service. Your mother was crying.”

Ethan’s breath caught. “Mr. Carrigan? My old music teacher?”

The man smiled softly. “You had talent, Ethan. Real talent. But you quit. Said it wasn’t practical. I always wondered if it was your choice… or someone else’s expectations.”

Ethan swallowed hard. “I... didn’t think it mattered.”

Mr. Carrigan leaned back. “It always matters.”

Passenger after passenger entered the cab, each bringing with them pieces of Ethan’s past. The co-worker he’d lied about to get a promotion. The college roommate whose calls he never returned after his father died. The woman he dated briefly and ghosted after she said she loved him. Even a small boy who looked up with wide, hurt eyes and simply said, “You said you’d come back.”

It was Leo—his nephew.

Ethan felt the weight of guilt like a stone pressing into his chest. “I was busy… I had meetings. A deadline. I didn’t know he waited all day.”

The boy didn’t reply. He just laid his head against the seat and closed his eyes.

The cab was now full. The meter read: “Passengers: 7.”

Ethan leaned forward. “Driver. Where are we going?”

The driver didn’t answer. The road twisted, dark and endless, no signs, no turns. Just a void.

“I need to get out. Let me out!”

“You’re not done yet,” the driver replied. “There’s one more.”

The taxi came to a final stop.

Outside stood a woman Ethan hadn’t seen in over ten years. Claire.

She stepped in, wearing the same red scarf she’d worn the day she walked out of his apartment, eyes brimming with tears.

“You told me to leave if I couldn’t accept being second to your work,” she whispered. “So I left.”

Ethan lowered his eyes. “I didn’t mean it. I was angry.”

“No. You meant it. And that’s why it hurt.”

Her voice was not bitter, just tired.

“I loved you,” she said, “but I needed to be loved back.”

The cab was silent now. The passengers sat like monuments, not speaking, just existing in the space of Ethan’s memory and regret.

Ethan turned to the driver again, this time pleading. “What is this? Purgatory? Some kind of punishment?”

The driver finally looked at him fully. His face was neither cruel nor kind, just old—older than time.

“This is your reckoning,” he said simply. “These souls weren’t lost. You were. Every moment you abandoned, every connection you broke, every person you left behind… they are your unfinished story.”

“Is it too late?” Ethan asked, voice cracking.

The driver didn’t answer immediately. The taxi’s meter now read: “Passengers: 8. Choices: Pending.”

“You died,” the driver said, “but you’ve been given something rare. A glimpse.”

The doors clicked open. Ethan looked around. The cab was no longer moving. Outside was a road bathed in sunrise, stretching toward a city that pulsed with life. Sounds of laughter, footsteps, distant music.

“You can’t undo the past,” the driver said. “But maybe… you can choose differently, if you go back.”

Ethan stood, trembling. “Go back?”

“One chance. No promises.”

He looked at the faces around him one last time. They didn’t speak, but he saw in their eyes not accusation, but something softer. The possibility of forgiveness.

Ethan stepped out.

He gasped as air rushed into his lungs.

The beep of a heart monitor.

White lights. A nurse shouting. “He’s back!”

Ethan’s body ached with fire, but his soul felt different. His mind clearer.

He was alive.

And the taxi?

Gone. Like smoke from a memory.

But something remained.

A number etched into his mind: 8.

Eight people. Eight regrets. Eight second chances.

This time, he would take none of them for granted.

Because the taxi waits for no one.

And next time, it may not offer a return trip.