The Bus Kept Going
They got on the bus at the bus stop, because that was where you were supposed to get the bus from.
The bus arrived. It was bland, as almost all buses are.
There was a few of them. Rarely does a single person get on a bus. Buses are for herds. A handful of folk, a group…an event of people.
The inside of the bus was fairly standard. The seats were very dry, their colors were faded and the plastic was extremely thick. Nothing in here can hold enchantment, not an inch of this place can retain myth. The air is recycled nothingness. A temporal void, to sit in the static of modernity is to ride this bus.
The passengers were mostly overweight. Their faces round and their skin pimply. No real style or aesthetics, simple assemblages of that which was within the windows that surrounded them.
They saw things and they knew other people saw these things, so they bought these things. T
hey all held devices, the intention of which was to communicate with other people, this intention had failed and faded before it had even begun. They communicated only the fact they could communicate. Much like thinking, once they were free to communicate 24/7 the passengers of the bus realized they had very little to communicate. The devices allowed for lots of other things. None of the things ever helped the passengers in anyway. But they still clung to their devices.
Some of them spoke to each other about items they had acquired that day. Some of them blocked their ears and listened to music. Some looked at their feet whilst the trees passed by.
None of them had any expression of merit. They couldn’t be sincere, they had never held a principle higher enough for them to be sincere, they only got the bus each day, that is what they did. That is what they chose to do, to get the bus again and again. And so they were on the bus and the bus started to move.
As the bus pulled away the town it pulled away from continued on. The passengers on the bus lurched forward. The movement signified that they were all together in…something. They paid no attention to the fact it began to move, this was normal. They paid no attention to the sounds, smell or tastes of the bus, these were normal. They paid no attention, they were a big big frown. The bus turned 3 more corners and they had left the town.
The bus continued down roads, some big, some smaller. Mostly trees went past the windows, then they were gone and it was houses, still no one looked at them, or looked up. The passengers were not in a daze, or concentrating, they were simply there. They were passengers. Sometimes the bus would go past quite big structures and some of the eyes of the bus would fixate on it for a few seconds. Then the eyes would return to the strange in-between space of modernity. The veil between narcissism and reality, their eyes fixated on the lies they had been told which they wished to achieve. Their eyes then, were fixed on nothing.
The bus kept the same speed.
The bus went past the first stop without stopping or even halting.
The bus went past the second stop without stopping.
The bus went past the third stop.
None of the passengers cared or were bothered. They were not apathetic, they were just there.
One man on the bus had a big green coat on. He really liked his big green coat. When he looked at his big green coat he was made happy by the decision he had made to buy it. He returned to this thought often. He also looked out of the window sometimes, he didn’t think of much. Dinner, work, TV – he hadn’t done or seen any of these for a while. But he thought of them a bit. He looked at the woman next to him, she looked back and smiled. She then looked out of her window and thought of bread.
The towns flew past the windows of the bus. The passengers bodies moved in the manner of modern man, in small jolts and lumbering small aches and releases. No one really moved, they just rearranged the stiffness. There was the occasional physical catharsis. A sigh big enough to ease of any especially energetic atmosphere. The passengers were against energy, nor for it, they were and were and were. Sometimes the bus swayed.
The bus kept going.
Some of the passengers mentioned that the bus had kept going and had been going a little longer than usual. The other passengers tutted or made subtle noises as to agree with the overheard statements. The consensus of the bus’ entire was that it had kept going. Subconsciously this was agreed and then the bus fell into a quick silence.
It had been a long time since the bus had started and kept going. The passengers occasionally looked up from their seats and out of the windows. Some would see towns quite like their own pass by, only to realize that it was not their town but someone else’s, someone not on the bus. And so their heads would return to their seats.
Sometimes, once every few years, a passenger would get up and check on the driver. There was no driver. But no passenger told the other passengers there was no driver. Eventually they all knew there was no driver. There was no melancholy, only an existence.
There was one child on the bus, he seemed to be upset. More often than not he would return to his seat and fall asleep.
I’m not sure why they never admitted to anything, or stood by anything. But the passengers were on the bus and they had got on the bus and it just kept going. I don’t know if they cared. I think they didn’t.