Bus Stop

The bus pulls up and it’s yellow and bright with its row of shiny windows. It’s safe, cheery, and all of the kids’ faces peer out. And your son is there at the red stop sign, and you’re there, about ten feet away, so’s to give him his independence. He’s got a backpack on, Barney or something like that. You didn’t buy it. Your mother did, out of her pension, which was nice of her since she doesn’t like kids so much, not even her own, but you’re not likeable. You burned down the shed once–you can’t remember why–you slit her tires once, too, because she slapped you in front of one of your girlfriends. What you need is a girlfriend now, some hippy-type that stinks like patchouli and wears long skirts and carries a guitar that she’ll whip out to play a song for your kid. Some barefoot long-skirt vegetarian type who thinks kids are prophets, who’ll sing “Yellow Submarine.” And that’s what this bus is like, that song, that happy, happy song.

What you don’t need is another woman like your ex-wife who said, “I’m seeing somebody else.”

And you said, “Who is it? I’ll kill him.” But not whole-heartedly, out of politeness more than anything.

And she said, “Ed, from work, from maintenance.”

And you said, “I don’t remember any Ed.”

And then she just blew up. “I talk about him all the time! We’ve been going to lunch together. Remember I wanted to invite him and his girlfriend over for something on the grill! Don’t you ever fucking listen to me?”

“He’s got a girlfriend?”

She left with Ed, and didn’t take the boy with her. She said it was your turn, after all the shit she put up with.

The boy’s got your lumpy hair, your sideways glances. He’s a nervous kid. He’s chewed his nails to nubs, his fingers so pink and fleshy they look like a row of bald heads. The door pops open and the steps are big for him. He climbs up one and then the other. The bus driver nods to you. He’s some guy in mirrored sunglasses with a walkman on under his baseball hat, a Philly fan. He pulls the silver knob and the door slaps shut.

And your boy finds a seat by the window. He waves and you wonder if you should wave back, because you can feel it now. You’re just starting to know that you’re heading out today, somewhere, and you might not be here when the bus comes back. Today you might be ten minutes late or an hour. One day you might just not show up at all. It would be leading him on to wave. You shouldn’t wave because it’s better for him to hate you a little, and that’s life. It’s a good lesson for him to learn. He needs you too much. He’s needy, and it’s a favor to cure him of that. You can feel your hand in your pocket, the one that could wave to him. You feel the tightness of the pocket on your fingers.

He’s wide eyed now. He’s stopped waving. He knows something’s wrong. The engine rumbles. The bus begins to pull away from the curb. (Will every morning repeat itself with this pang?) The bus is big and strong; it muscles its way down the street and around the corner, and you watch it go. You’re handing him over to the world really, just letting him go, letting him slip into the world, and what better way to go than in the big yellow bus, what better thing to have faith in than that?