Satan's Dollar Store & other stories

In the Bathroom on the Bus

I was at the stop by 6 a.m. No one else was there. I knew it was the right stop, because there was a sign, but I had never taken this bus before. It went on Highway 9 to Wetford, about a three hour ride from where I was. The sign said 88X, so I assumed it was an express bus, but if it was an express bus, then why would it stop here? My stop was half a mile from anywhere, and that anywhere wasn't much, just a half a dozen houses and a Super Seven Store, which is where I worked. I rode my bike to work, but I didn't want to ride it all the way to Wetford, so I had to take the bus. I never had a car, and Megan needed hers to go to her job, which was just as far as Wetford, but the other way. It only took her forty five minutes to get there, so when they told me it was three hours, I figured it couldn't be an express, even though it seemed it was because it had an X on after the number. So, I didn't really know, and that was one thing I was going to be discovering for myself.

The bus was supposed to show up at six fifteen, but it did not arrive on time. I figured that was normal because although I almost never take the bus I have heard about these things. I wasn't worried, but I was a little cold, and it was boring standing out there all alone. But there wasn't any reason for anybody else to be out there at 6 a.m. People in my town don't go to Wetford very much, and when they do they drive their cars. So that was just another reason why I got to thinking it was strange they had a stop right there, since no one ever used it. But then I figured there are some things I don't know too much about and that was probably one of them. I stood around and every now and then I looked up and down the highway, but there wasn't any bus. A couple of cars passed by but so fast that I couldn't see if they were anyone I knew who might be going to Wetford but I doubted it. At six thirty five I began to think that maybe it was the wrong stop after all. So I lit another cigarette and tried to think.

If it was the wrong stop, then I didn't know what I was going to do. I had to be in Wetford by eleven or else I'd miss the interview, and I didn't want that to happen. It was an opportunity, and I never got too many of those where I happened to be living at the time. Okay, it wasn't much, but it was something and I needed that. I couldn't just hang around forever there. For one thing I was almost twenty two years old and that meant Megan shouldn't still be taking care of me. Of course, I had this job, so I earned my keep all right, but I was tired of living in my sister's house, especially since I didn't get along too well with Jack, her second husband. He was a writer, so he wasn't any fun, and he didn't want anyone around the house when he was writing, which was almost never, but he said that was because he couldn't do any writing when the situation was "like this". So that is why I had to catch the bus, and if it wasn't the right stop after all, then I didn't know what I was going to do.

I was going to call the people from the bus again, but there wasn't any phone booth right near there, and if I went to where there was a phone I would miss the bus if it came by after all. So I decided I would wait some more before I really got to being worried about the thing. I figured that this is how it is when you do a thing that you have never done before and just don't know that much about. People should never have to do anything for the first time. It made me think about the time I went over to the college down in Calamar. I didn't know that much about it at the time. I just went down one day and found the place to ask, but since the people there knew all about that stuff and I did not, it got to be confusing, and finally I said well thank you and came home, but I never figured out exactly what I had to do or when to do it by.

I thought next time I'll know better and I would have, maybe, except there was no next time after that. But this was different. I was going to have to take the bus back in the afternoon, so by then I would know better because I had already done it in the morning. And when I came back from the college down in Calamar, I did know all about that bus, and it was easy getting home. I thought well that's something at least, and I felt better about the thing. But since by six forty five there was still no bus and I was still out there alone, I figured maybe it was time to worry just a little bit, so I lit another cigarette and began to start worrying for real. I worried maybe it will never come, and this is the wrong stop after all. Maybe I will waste my whole day off just standing out there like a total moron, and I will lose this opportunity and have to stay with Megan and her second husband for awhile until another chance like this comes up, and then that might be years because there isn't much that comes my way, and it would be a shame to blow it all because I waited at the wrong stop for a bus that never came. Well that was all the worrying I could do, because I never was a person who could worry very well, so it was now six fifty one and I was all out of ideas on what to do.