on the bus

On the bus I’d doze off, suitcase jammed against my knees, the seat next to me now occupied now by a burly male nurse in an Afro, wearing thick glasses and reading a religious pamphlet, but he put it away before I could glimpse its title or the name of the sect.

Rising, he apologized profusely—he had moved the suitcase in order to sit down—and squeezed past me into the aisle.

The bus stopped in front of a hospital, St. Aban’s, the remaining passengers mostly hospital staff: nurses, residents, medical technicians, all clad in scrubs of varying colors and moving en masse to the front of the bus.

Did I pass my stop? As the bus rumbled away, now nearly empty, I retrieved the map and directions the concierge had given me and approached the driver.

Soul and gospel music now blared from the transistor radio atop the dashboard. He didn’t bother looking at my map and directions.

“That was my next-to-last stop,” he said. “My next is the bus barn. So yeah, you missed your stop.”

When I told him the name of my uncle’s delicatessen, he nodded enthusiastically.

“Great sandwiches! It’s a shame it’s closed.”

“I don’t understand. Closed why?”

“The owner recently died.”

I was about to say I was his nephew. But I felt foolish not knowing the deli was closed or why I couldn’t find the restaurant. And D., the attorney, why had he neglected to mention that salient fact?

Furthermore, my uncle’s funeral three weeks ago was still fresh in my mind—his employees’ snubs and hostile looks (though now I knew why), the arduous train ride which necessitated another soon afterwards, the general disruption and stress that such incidents engendered.

I barely had time to mourn or process my uncle’s death.

“It would be closed now anyway,” the bus driver said. “Go there tomorrow, I hear it’s reopening. I might drop by myself.”

“Thank you, but I have my reasons.”

The bus stopped and he opened the door.

“You’re close, four bocks back then turn another two blocks right.”

I retrieved my suitcase and exited the bus. He looked at me puzzledly, shrugged, and closed the door. He’d had a long day too and doubtless was anxious to go home.


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