Passengers who ask for the long way around — I don’t mind them at all.

I’ve been doing this job for seventeen years. My name is Horikawa, and I’ll be sixty-two before long. After enough time behind the wheel, you start reading faces. The ones who insist on following the navigation to the letter are the ones who end up arriving late. I’ve never pointed that out, though. Saying too much, I’ve decided, doesn’t suit this work.

The passenger in question got in on a Tuesday morning.

“Fastest route to the station,” he said, and immediately held up his phone showing a map. He was a man in his forties, suit pressed sharp. He gave his name as Suzuki — I’m putting that down because he only talked about his receipt after that, so asking his name got delayed a little.

“Of course.”

I drove without a word. The fastest route has seven traffic lights. At this time of day — just after nine — a delivery truck is almost always blocking the single-lane stretch in front of the convenience store. That morning it was there too. Suzuki watched the navigation and said, “Why aren’t we moving?”

“Looks like a delivery.”

“Does this happen every day?”

“This time of morning — yeah, pretty much.”

Suzuki went quiet. We sat through another red light, then another. He reached the station thirty-two minutes after getting in. Nine minutes behind my usual.

The next morning, same time, same spot — he climbed in again. He started to say “fastest route,” then stopped himself.

“Is there… a different way than yesterday?”

“It’ll be longer,” I said.

“How much longer?”

“About 1.3 kilometers. But only three traffic lights. This time of day I’d say around twenty-three minutes.”

Suzuki thought for a moment. ”…All right. Let’s go that way.”

We took the long route. No delivery truck, no long red lights. He was at the station in twenty-two minutes.

As he took his change, he said, “Why didn’t you say so yesterday?”

“You asked for the fastest route.”

Neither of us said anything after that.

On the third morning, Suzuki got in again. Before he even closed the window, he said it.

“The long way today.”