Cemetery Backyards

One Bus Ride

The bus is a stressful thing, I think. It's filled with kids who hate you if you take to long to get your seat because you're counting things, and has a terrible amount of stairs.

Three stairs.

Three stairs.

Three stairs.

A terrible amount.

Three stairs.

As I make my way to the bus stop, Mikey walks beside me, patiently waiting for me to step back and forth over each crack so my moms spine won't snap in two and she won't be paralyzed for the rest of her life and hate me.

My brother is a great person.

I think as he stands patiently beside me, pausing every few inches.

My brother is a great person.

Mike gets up every morning an hour earlier than he has to so he can walk with me to the bus stop. Never once has he complained about having to walk with me. I think, maybe, my brother got all the good traits that were supposed to be in me. He probably stole them from me. But it's ok, I'm not angry.

As we walk, and stop, and walk, and stop, and walk, and stop, and walk, and stop, and walk, and stop, and walk, and stop my brother talks at the speed of light. This time its about soccer.

Mikey loves soccer, and he's really good at it, too. He plays on a travel team and makes scholarship money. He wants to play professionally one day, I think. Mikey loves soccer.

"...and we have a game this Saturday. If we win, we get to travel all the way to La Rõsa and play the tournament! Are you gonna come, Vic?" Mike asks. It's a rhetorical question, he knows I will. But I answer anyway as I step back and fourth over the cracks.

"Yes, yes, yes, yes."

When we get to the bus stop I get out my notebook and a pen. Nothing can go uncounted. So I mark a new day at the top of the page and begin to count. Mike knows what I'm doing, and he helps. I count everything he says four times over, anyway. Just to be sure.

"There's eight birds on the power line" He offers.

I count again for him and then jot it down.

"And two yellow lines on the road, just like yesterday" He notes

I know it hasn't changed, but you have to check. So I count them some more and then write it down.

We do this until the bus gets to our stop. By then, the page is full of random numbers of things, and that makes me very happy, knowing that nothing will disappear into oblivion, sucking itself into the space-time continuum and opening a black hole for all of creation to be sucked into.

As we get on the bus I (once again) note the amount of stairs and I think again about the number three and how if I associate with the number three I'll get hit by a bus and my guts will be smeared all over the pavement and some child will probably see my intestines and be scarred for life, so I take a step on and off and on and off before I actually climb the other two stairs and it counts for five stairs and not three and I won't get hit by a bus and my guts won't be smeared all over the pavement and some child probably won't see my intestines and be scarred for life.

I also write down the number five in my notebook.

I also write down the number five in my notebook.

I also write down the number five in my notebook.

I write down the number five.

And then my breath stops as I notice the only empty seat is on the third row and I think about how if I associate with the number three I'll get hit by a bus and my guts will be smeared all over the pavement and some child will probably see my intestines and be scarred for life. I start to panic in my own head and breathe heavily as I imagine the look on some little girls face as my bloody insides are smeared on the pavement and she's clutching her mother and she can't look away and she'll never be the same and she'll probably shoot herself because she's scarred for life and oh god, oh no--

And Mikey notices and he says "Vic, it's ok, just sit down." but I can't because if I associate with the number three I'll get hit by a bus and my guts will be smeared all over the pavement and some child will probably see my intestines and be scarred for life. I shake my head back and forth quickly, and my breathing gets heavier and I can feel people staring and mumbling to eachother as I whisper "No no no no" under my breath ten times and then it all gets a bit better because someone says a wonderful phrase:

"He can have my seat."

I look up to see a kid that I've never seen before standing up from his fourth-row seat. He throws his things in the seat in front of his and climbs over the seat to sit down. His hair is a jet black, and sticks out in all directions. He has a blue headphone in one ear, and leaves the other one dangling like a rock climber from a precarious rock face. I sit where he once was, and wipe the tears I was unaware were forming from my eyes and I barely even hear the sound of my brother saying "thank you" over the pounding of my heart in my ears.

After I've calmed down a bit I begin to count things on the bus. I quietly keep my head down and jot down numbers until my eyes fall on the guy that gave his seat up for me. His blue rock climber headphone is now tucked back into his other ear and for some reason the curve of his jaw and the contrast between his hair and his skin and his dark eyelashes and broad shoulders make my stomach tighten up and I stare and I stare and I stare and I stare and I stare and I stare and eventually he looks up and briefly catches my eyes and a light pink color swirls onto his cheeks as he gives me a half hearted grin and a small wave.

I notice he has two dimples.

Two dimples.

Two dimples.

Two dimples.

I look away without reaction and write the number two so large that it takes up a whole page in my notebook. And I don't know why it seems so important to me.

It just does.