When the Bus Stopped

Chapter 2

Carlos watched her drive away, a confused expression on his face.

He wasn't so egotistical to think every soul in the area should know who his alter ego was, even if his face had been on the cover of all the newspapers in town that week.

After all, Alessandro Magno was the hometown hero, returning to sell out shows.

He'd left town ten years ago with only a back pack, and he'd gone on to make millions.

No, he understood his music wasn't everyone's cup of tea.

What he couldn't understand was how any sane woman could look at what was obviously a music video being filmed and start raving on about rapists.

A camera man sidled up to him and nodded after the bus, which was almost submerged in clouds of black smoke. "Pretty out there!"

Carlos nodded in agreement. "She says she's got a broken alternator, but I don't think that's its only problem, it probably needs a new carburetor."

The director called them over. "Ok everyone, we are up to the second scene."

The outdoor sex scene.

Carlos thanked his lucky stars the old house bus hadn't arrived half an hour later.

He was uncomfortable enough about kissing his co-star, without a strangely good looking woman loudly guessing at what crimes were taking place, like she was competing in Whose Line is it Anyway?

"We need to fix Bella's makeup," one of the crew commented.

He glanced at his co-star subjectively. He'd been told she was the best they could find.

She boasted a pair of silicone breasts which made every shirt she pulled on look like it was purchased as a costume for a strip club.

She was fine, he decided. But it really was a pity about the Ozempic. Even if he hadn't seen her injecting it in her stomach earlier, her expression was a give away.

Eyes and cheek bones protruding, and the skin under her eyes so devoid of fat tissue it pleated up like a balloon which had been left for three weeks after a party.

Carlos wondered if she'd auditioned for Gollum in Lord of the Rings and mistakenly been given the role of his sexy love interest.

And now — because he had refused to do his homework through his school years — he had to dry hump Sexy Sméagol for the next twenty minutes.

Sexy Sméagol tottered towards him. "Ready?"

He really ought to get more involved in auditions.

"As ready as I'll ever be."

They had to lean in and stare into each other's eyes longingly.

Every time they leaned close he could smell her breath. The smell of hunger. Then he'd pass time counting the pleats under her eyes. And then someone would holler "CUT!"

He was not going to suggest she grabbed a mint, he did not need another lawsuit on his hands.

Soon they'd moved on from simply leaning in and staring, to kissing passionately. Or as passionately as one could kiss while being abruptly stopped and started.

New recommendations were shot forth: more tongue, less tongue, tongue to the left, no...  too far! The tongue back a little bit more to the right, chin out.

When a battery had to be swapped on a camera, and the boom was lifted out of shot, he stood there awkwardly.

Sexy Sméagol was all too eager to fill the silence, to the point of obsessive prattling.  Something she was very focused on was the odd dish her Aunty liked to bring to Thanksgiving.

"It's got all these walnuts all over it. And walnuts are shaped like roast chicken, have you ever noticed that? Well my husband says he can't eat them on meat because it doesn't feel kosher. He's not a Jew, but he likes to take a bit of every religion on board so he has this fluid holistic — like — love for his fellow man. Like, he doesn't eat pork because it is halal. He has this deep personal knowledge of all kinds of people and things. He studied religion at university... But mainly he just picks things up from Tik Tok and he's transformed his whole life. But my Aunty just won't accept his world view and she keeps trying to put some walnuts in everything, because she's got this walnut tree. And she complains that I don't eat anything either, but I just don't want to because I know his soul is aching..."

What the actual fuck, Carlos could feel his soul slipping away.

He noticed Sexy Sméagol didn't breathe between sentences, like she had gills.

"It's weird though, because walnuts are also shaped like human brains, and there is this video I saw online about how walnuts are shaped like brains because they are good for your brain. Like, did you know, walnuts have all the nutrients a healthy brain needs? This video I was watching showed a dying man ate one and he instantly changed colour and came back to life! Even his skin plumped up."

If he had a dollar for every time someone tried to pass off AI slop as factual evidence, well... He could quit kissing complete strangers on set to cover his excessive mortgage. Like why did he need eight bedrooms anyway?

He tried to get a word in, to tell her it wasn't possible. But her gills were working over time.

When the cameraman interrupted her ten minutes later, to adjust Carlos' collar, she was explaining how she'd seen a video of a four day old puppy jumping to its feet and saving a rhinoceros' life.

"I've finally stopped smelling smoke," he said to Carlos.

"Cigarettes?" Sexy Sméagol asked.

"No the house bus, the fumes were so bad."

Carlos hoped the unhinged Medusa chugging off down the road didn't have a hallelujah moment.

Being stalked for the remainder of his trip — by a large bus camouflaged in smoke — might get whiffy.

Sexy Sméagol instantly forgot about the puppy and started talking about the woman in the house bus.

"I wasn't too close to her, but she seemed a little large."

"Large?" He spluttered.

"My husband always says that I barely eat. He thinks I have the same appetite as a sparrow, can you believe it?"

"Large?"

"I do eat, but it has to be when my energy cycle begins because I saw a video online of how you have to nurture it. He says he hopes plus size women becomes fashionable again, because then it wont hurt so much when I accidentally elbow him in bed. I'm a very restless sleeper. I'm not dieting though, I've just got a really fast metabolism."

As the director barked out orders to his crew and his co-star talked, Carlos' mind went numb.

Things got peaceful. All he could see were emerald eyes staring at him, surrounded with a copper dreadlocks.

"CUT!"

He looked up.

"Alessandro, your hands are obscuring her from view. "

He realised his hands had inched toward her mouth, in the subconscious attempt to muffle her.