Bio: Joseph Carr is 23-years old and lives in Cary, NC.  He graduated with a degree in literature from Ohio State University and will soon continue his education at NC State University.  Joseph loves to write and can only hope that he gets better.

Bus Stop

by Joseph Carr

I sit down on the bench.  The girl next to me has a prosthetic leg from her knee down.  She’s smiling at something; I can’t tell what.  Her pink dress is beautiful on this overcast day.  Smog rolls above me like fog into San Francisco Bay. 

A tall man, ornately dressed, whizzes past.  Clippity clop go his fancy shoes.  He’s digging through his wallet, not looking at anyone.  He deftly sidesteps the light pole.             

Faces from life’s milk carton swim past in their cars, floating along on the black top with their radios on.  I notice none of the cars have their windows down.  I’d drive to the country with the widows down if I could, taking in cows and pre-American fragrances with marshmallow clouds.   

A well-kempt woman walking on stilt heels, at least six inches, strolls past, her make-up caricature face glistening as sweat leaks out from behind her mask.  She looks like my mother, with her rigid nose and curly Italian mane.  My mother wouldn’t wear clothes like that, or make-up.  The woman before me is an alter-mom, crude and pointless. 

A heavyset man sits on the other side of me, barely fitting, devouring his French fries.  Ketchup rubs into his white mustache, looking like a stained rug on his face.  A glob of the stuff squirts out of his hand and lands on my foot.  I know he sees it happen, yet he does nothing to express it.  I just leave it there, an abstract spew on the tongue of my faded shoe.  His fingers look like swollen maggots, spazzing on the chunky fries. 

An older man, all in white, with glacier hair stands in front of the bench.  He looks at his watch, a very golden accessory that would flicker if the sun were out.  He humphs to himself and avoids eye contact with everyone around him.  He shakes his head “no” and scurries off, sloshing into a mound of bubble gum with the first step.  He’s cursing the gooey entrails as he passes a cottony poodle.   

The poodle licks a yarn of the stretching gum while its owner reads bus schedules.  He’s studying them like an ancient text, then turns to his right and yanks the dog’s collar.  It looks up at the man with a type of doggy-disdain, gum ensnared in its doggy beard. 

The diesel-spewing bus arrives, adorning it’s various advertisements.  I approach the door, making eye contact with the man who is pictured on the side of the bus.  He has massive, pink eyes.  I don’t know what he’s selling.  He is looking through me, like superman would, but he’s so average looking, except for the empty cataracts.  I think of Dad coming home from the Titanium plant, eyes glowing.

I let the girl with the bum leg hobble past.  She giggles, appreciating the gesture.  I look down the crowded street as the sky cuts with a machete of jungle-like rain.  I decide I will sit with this girl and say hello.
 

©Joseph Carr