The Outsider Ch. 01

Mike went up one row of cars and worked his way down the next, ticketing each and every one. A frat guy yelled at him:

"Hey, parking Nazi! How's it feel to be paid to be an asshole?"

"Feels great! How's it feel to be born an asshole?"

Ruthie smiled at Mike's comeback. She continued to watch as he came closer and closer to where she was sitting. She decided to put on her dress when she heard the faint rattle of the ticketing machine's printer. It was close to the time she had to leave anyway. She packed up her books and walked out to where her classmate was working.

"Still working on trying to be popular? I don't think this is the best way to do it."

Mike understood that Ruthie was trying to make a joke. He was not a humorous person, but tried to play along with her:

"Well, if I can't be famous, at least I can be infamous."

Ruthie smiled slightly. She asked Mike how the ticketing machine worked, since she had never seen one up close before. The device looked like a very large calculator with a roll of receipt paper on the end. Mike allowed Ruthie to look over his shoulder as he used his finger on a touchpad to type in information on the car he was ticketing: license plate, description of the vehicle, violation, and if it was present, the student parking permit number.

"Here, you can push 'print' if you want."

Ruthie pushed the "print" prompt and the ticket was printed out. Mike tore it off and stuck it into a red envelope. He looked the fanny-pack that contained his ticketing supplies and quietly said: "shit".

"What's wrong?"

"I'm running out of envelopes. I've hit pay-dirt in this lot and now I have to go back for more envelopes. I didn't realize I'd need so many."

"Pay-dirt?"

"Stats. Management pays attention to how many tickets we write each month, and it looks like it hasn't occurred to anyone to come over here to this lot. It's just meter tickets, but they'll add up."

"So...you're gonna be ticketing here? Permanently? Not just today?"

"You bet. This'll be my new home. All these violators...I didn't realize these meters weren't getting paid. This'll be great for my stats."

Mike noticed the disappointed look on Ruthie's face. "Are...you...OK?"

"Yeah...I'm fine."

Mike was puzzled by his companion's expression, because she didn't look fine. She looked very depressed.

"Ruthie, I mean...if you've got your car here, just tell me what it looks like and I won't ticket it."

"I don't have a car."

"Then, what's wrong?"

"It's nothing...really..."

"You got friends parking here?"

"I don't have any friends...uh...I mean...I don't have any friends who are parking here....that's what I mean."

Ruthie blushed; not just because of the slip, but also because her correction was not convincing and she knew it.

"Look, I gotta go to class. I'm running late." She turned to walk off.

"Ruthie!"

She stopped and looked back over her shoulder at Mike. "What?"

"Are you working tomorrow?"

"Yeah."

"I'll see you then. Jo as always."

"OK."

Mike watched her as she walked towards the Econ Building. The late afternoon sunlight shined through her dress and made the cloth almost transparent. His heart stopped as he studied her attractive figure and realized that she was not wearing any panties. He wondered if she was aware of the extent to which her body was visible under that thin cloth.

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As soon as Ruthie disappeared around the Econ Building, Mike mounted his bicycle and sped off to the Parking Enforcement Office. He put a fresh battery into his ticketing machine and grabbed several fist-fulls of the infamous red envelopes.

He returned to the lot to continue ticketing at the spot where he had left off. There were hundreds of cars, stretching out in every direction. Mike knew that he would only get to a fraction of the violators that afternoon, but the following day he would be on the lot right at noon and work it non-stop until his shift ended. He was very efficient with the machine, being able to write about 80 tickets per hour if the violators were parked in a small area. If he stayed out all afternoon the next day and the machine held up, he calculated that he would be able to write around 400 tickets. That would be a new record for the department and one that would be very hard to beat. He would come back day after day until the students got the message that a meter was not a "free parking" sign. October was going to end very well for him.

By 4:30 students began returning from their classes to leave for the day. As soon as the violators saw the dreaded red envelopes on the windshields closest to the sidewalk, some of them started running to their cars. Around the lot there was swearing and insults directed at the parking officer, but he was used to that. Working for the Parking Department had its advantages, but popularity was not one of them.

The truth was that Mike was totally unconcerned what the students he was ticketing thought of him. He hated the people he ticketed every bit as much as they hated him. For the most part they were irresponsible rich types: spoiled pot-heads, fraternity guys and sorority girls, and student athletes. They were a varied crowd, but they all had several things in common: wealth, privilege, attitude, and a feeling of entitlement. They drove expensive cars that had been given to them by parents or sponsors: BMW's, Jeeps, even a few Escalades. Mike delighted in taking a dig at the elite crowd and their fancy cars whenever he could. His uniform and his ticketing machine gave him the power to harass people who otherwise would be untouchable. Yes, the elite crowd hated Parking Officer # 036, just as much as he hated them. Mike wanted them to hate him: he wanted to make their lives miserable and make himself worthy of their hatred.

As 5:00 approached, he picked up the pace, trying to squeeze as many tickets in as possible before the lot opened. The last ticket he wrote was at 16:59, on a bright red BMW with sorority stickers. Yes, maybe it sucked having a ticket on one's windshield that was written one minute before the lot opened, but even with only a minute to spare, the sorority bitch could not argue that it was not a valid ticket.

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A few minutes later Mike returned his ticketing machine to the dispatcher. He announced that the next day he would need an extra battery and 400 envelopes. The older woman looked up.

"Four hundred? What are you gonna do with 400 envelopes?"

Mike smiled: "Stuff tickets in them." He handed over his radio and added: "can you keep a secret?"

"Hun, d'you know how many secrets I've heard? C'mon, you know I keep secrets."

"No one's been paying the meters over at Econ-A. It's all cars with student permits and none of them are paying. Tomorrow they're gonna be mine. There's 400 spaces out there and I'm getting them all."

The dispatcher smiled sarcastically: "You know you're a real jerk, Mike, but we still love you."

Mike forced a smile, not sure how to take the dispatcher's final comment.