I liked this man. He had suffered, I was certain.

At about 3 am the following morning, a silver-colored taxi cab pulled up outside our house and winked its headlights in the pre-dawn suburbia stillness. I was already wide-awake and fully dressed. I had even laced up my Dr. Martens boots and stood in the hallway with a bag slung over my shoulders. My heart and mind was already racing. I had raided my mom's wallet for some smaller bills that she surely wouldn't miss. That I, her oldest daughter, surely needed more than her.
At one point I had told my parents that they should pay me a salary for allowing me to lend their pointless lives meaning. My mother's bottom lip had quivered for a split second and then she had told me: But we already do. We give you a monthly allowance. 
A generous one, Dad had added. And at that I had sneered.

Because before I was punk rock or goth rock or whatever you wanna call it, I had been a blond girl eager to fit in and to be sweet and popular. That, in my mind, required the right attire, and the right brand names. Which my parents never supplied. When I wanted Levi's Jeans, they had bought me Rocky Jeans, H&M's cheap and highly uncool denim trousers. And when I had been yearning for Adidas or Nike sneakers, they had come home with Lejon tennis shoes. That was beyond humiliation. And maybe that was the reason I had turned punk rock. Because I had known with rock-hard certainty, that I'd never fit in anyway. At least that's what I had sputtered at them when dad was upset that I had pierced my nose just before going to visit grandma. And then she never even noticed the little silver stud.

                                                                         ***

The cab driver's name was Börje. He was a gray man with skin that had begun the sad surrender to gravity. His eyes were pale. He looked at me over the rim of his glasses. I sat in the passenger seat and felt a bit uncomfortable about the fact that I didn't have any money to pay for the 150 kilometer cab ride. It would surely cost at least 400 SEK, which at the time was a small fortune, more than a pair of Levi's jeans cost. As I conversed with Börje, I was also, in the back of my brain, trying to decide how I would deal with the situation.
I liked this man. He had suffered, I was certain. But he hadn't come out of it bitter, but kind. And as tired as if he hadn't slept for a thousand years. His shoulders were hunched and his hands, clutching the wheel, dry and big.
I have a daughter your age, he said. You seem a bit like her. Then he looked on the road that stretched its black pavement and white lines into the morning that had started to break ahead of us.
But I don't know if it's because all teenage girls are more or less the same. Or maybe I don't know my daughter as well as I should. This Börje mumbled more to himself. So I didn't answer. I had been honest with Börje about where I was going. He didn't frown or turn to me with disgust on his face. He just stated: It will probably be interesting.

When we arrived in Umeå and he pulled up to the curb a block away from the courthouse, I hadn't resolved to one plan of action. So I just told him that I had no money to pay for the ride. I would have to owe him 437 kronor. Börje sighed and the sigh seemed to rise from an abyss. I noticed that his stubble has streaks of white in it.
Why do you take a taxi when you don't have any money?
I didn't have a good answer to that. But I asked him to send me a bill to my parents house.
He wished me good luck as he slowly pulled out and away.