The Bus Ride (465 hits)
Category: Quotes & StoriesRating: 1.56 on 9 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by Sarah Prejean <derivablezero.at.gmail.com> (View user info) at 2005-05-24 20:20:51 EDT
It's a horror story. Freud said, "The id doesn't care about reality, the needs of anyone else, only it's own satisfaction." Here goes:
He sits in the third seat behind the driver, on the right. His legs are crossed beneath him, his eyes are blank, his hair is effortlessly average and it all compliments the buttondown plaid shirt (if anything could compliment plaid). I think I've seen him before. On his shoulder there's a black bag: it's the same as any other black bag worn by any other boy on any other bus. It is overstuffed with something that does not seem to carry the weight of textbooks. It doesn't seem to be lumpy enough for clothing--but that doesn't matter. It's probably just any other bag.
The bus makes seven stops, until it's just the boy and me left on it. He's still there, with his plain old hair and plain old bag. I think he's testing me. He wants me to crack. I bet he has a bomb in that bag. I casually move from the back of the bus to the front. As casually as possible, anyway, when I'm the only one left. The driver pulls to my stop and looks at me. I don't move. He asks, "Getting off here?" and neither of us say anything. The driver groans, his jowls shake, and he drives off to the very last stop: the only place that either of us can leave unless we were going along for the route all over again. I wonder if he doesn't get off here, one of us is crazy.
The next stop, the driver scowls backward with an attitude that could cause me to kill him; the boy doesn't budge. I rise from my seat, wondering why the hell I didn't get off at my stop. I've left myself with a three mile walk home, as opposed to the usual two short blocks. The boy grins at me, clutches his bag. I step off the bus, head home.
It's so quiet, I can hear my own breathing. I can hear the grass crunching beneath my feet. I can hear the bus driving away from me, and I'm not sure if I can hear it or not but I bet the boy is laughing at me and his little bag. Maybe he's the bus driver's kid. Maybe it's father son day at work. What a loser he must think his father is. A bus driver. I laugh to myself about it. It's hot out, so I roll up my sleeves and keep walking. There are bugs everywhere, floating around my head. Trying to get into my ears and nose like they're expecting air conditioning in there. Summer wouldn't be so bad if it didn't last from March until October. Maybe it was an ice pack in the bag.
I put my key in the lock, turn to the left, and it jams. The fucking key is stuck. I shake the doorknob, work up more of a sweat than I have going already, and curse. A lot. My neighbor walks across my lawn, through my lawn, and I could kill him. That asshole, crushing my grass. "What's going on John?" he calls jovially. What the fuck does he think is going on? Does he think I'm just playing around with my doorknob for the fuck of it? What kind of sick asshole is this guy anyway?
"My key's stuck in the lock," I say with a half-smile. I am hiding my frustration.
"Oh, well you could call those people who unlock the doors for you." Sure. I'll just telepathically send my thoughts to the lockpicking business and they will zip over here in their little van and unlock my door. Instead of telling him this, I ask to use his phone. He smiles a near toothless grin and says, "Of course, John. Anytime you need."
I go with him, walking on my driveway and then the sidewalk while he walks right through my grass, again. I step off the sidewalk an walk on his lawn. I wonder how he likes it.
"John, could you not step on the grass, please?"
I picture myself wrapping my hands around his neck and choking him until his fat face turns blue and the rest of his teeth roll out of his mouth.
"Sure, sorry." And I return to the sidewalk.
I use his phone, and walk back to my house to sit on the front step and wait. I'd rather sweat my balls off than sit in his house and have to suffer through conversation regardless of air conditioning or cold water. The van pulls into the driveway, half an hour later. My shirt is soaked with sweat, sitting on the step beside me. My shoes are on top of the shirt and so are my socks. A tall man gets out of the driver's side, and I see someone get out of the passenger's seat.
The average boy gets out and walks around the side of the van, and I glare at him. That little twerp with his fucking black bag is trying to drive me crazy. The man walks up and says "John Stevens?"
"That's me." I don't let my gaze leave the little shit by his side. The man shakes my hand and says "I'm Billy Chronos. Which door is it?"
"The front door."
He walks to the van and gets out a little red box, and the boy stands still. He's grinning at me like a fucking idiot.
Billy Chronos unlocks my door and the boy goes on the other side of it to make sure the lock is secure or something. I pay them fifty dollars. Fifty fucking dollars to unlock my door. The man gets back in the van and leaves. He has my fifty dollars in his pocket. His life isn't worth fifty dollars.
I walk into the house and sit down on the couch. The house is cool, the cushions feel nice. I lean back and rest my head on the arm of the couch, and close my eyes.
Not before I see the boy standing near the door. Holding his black bag. Unzipping it.
I jump off of the sofa and stand before him, staring. "Why aren't you gone?!"
He doesn't answer me. I'm stuck with a deaf mute retarded grinning child in my house who does not belong to me. He just keeps smiling, then turns the bag over. Small doll heads roll out onto the floor. He's a sadistic, deaf mute retard. I walk up to him and reach down to pick up one of the dolls' heads. It's soft, warm, and bleeding on my fingers.
Shocked, I turn it over. It has the bus driver's face. I scream, and the boy giggles. I slap him, and he says in a voice that sounds vaguely familiar "Quit hitting yourself!" and giggles some more. I pick up the heads, one by one. I recognize three different bus drivers, my fifth grade teacher, my neighbor, Billy Chronos. And there are tens more on the floor.
For the first time, I look at the average boy in the face. I realize I am staring at myself, years ago. It's like I took a step back in time to realize that as a child I was a serial killer. I've never been so scared in my life. I'm so fucked, I'd be better off dead.
The boy wraps his hands around my neck and I can't fight him. Everything goes black.
User Reviews
Submitted by gld1320 (user info) at 2005-05-25 14:11:14 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
enhh
Submitted by CaptainThorns (user info) at 2005-05-25 14:08:26 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by JonnyX (user info) at 2005-05-25 13:58:26 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Wazza (user info) at 2005-05-25 02:34:09 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Good story.
Submitted by ThineJericho (user info) at 2005-05-25 02:24:35 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
This was a fun read.
Submitted by thecaes (user info) at 2005-05-24 23:19:10 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Oooooh, very interesting. Billy Chronos, eh?
Submitted by Zackstersmackster (user info) at 2005-05-24 22:53:16 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Cool!
Submitted by shitfuck (user info) at 2005-05-24 22:11:11 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Yes!
Submitted by nitty34 (user info) at 2005-05-24 21:31:15 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Not bad...
But death stories are so overdone.