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A Short Story

Love Lost
-- by GP Randel

   The four-oh-one was on time. The driver jerked his head back in recognition when he saw me, a reflexive action, something he probably did a million times a day. A cloth covered the fare box, and his hand rested on it. If I had not been carrying a bus pass, my day would have been lucky.
   "Just come on up, folks. Don't bother about the money, ma'am. It's free, today. Ask me no questions, I'll tell you no lies," he said in his thick, latin accent. I thought about where he might be from, I was sure it was not Mexico. In L.A., people are from anywhere. I guessed Central America.
   The woman shrugged her shoulders, found a seat behind the driver and sat down. I took a window seat near the front where the seats are further apart. Where I got on was near the beginning of the line, so the bus was still nearly empty. I pulled out a book and started to read, but the words on the page were not the ones registering in my brain.

* * *

   "Really, David. You can't tell me you didn't see this coming." Molly wore a tight, sleeveless, knee-length red dress and black heels. Her shoulder-length dark brown hair was tied back, revealing her smooth, creamy white forehead. Diamond studs in her ears flashed as she moved her head, accenting her liquid gray eyes. Her sexy mouth was set off with deep red lipstick. She always looked great.
   "See what coming?"
   The pause which followed made me sick to my stomach. My heart began to pound. I wanted to turn and run.

* * *

   "When I grew up, my parents rented a house right on the beach at Malibu. The owner of the property offered to sell the place to us, but my parents turned him down. They've regretted it ever since. They're in Florida, now. They want me to go back there and check it out. I've got plenty of time on my hands, now that I'm retired. Yeah, long about May I think I'll make my way on back there."
   I looked up from my reading. An older, lively black man had gotten on the bus, taken the first seat opposite the driver, and struck up a conversation with him.
   "When I get there, first thing I'm going to do is buy me a newspaper and check out the classifieds. If you want to find out about a town, read the classifieds. It's all in there. I always read the classifieds, first thing."
   The black guy was making the most of it. This was probably his main entertainment of the day. I tried to return to my book, but ended up looking out the window. The bus was creeping through Chinatown on its way to the Pasadena Freeway. I wondered how old his parents in Florida were.

* * *

   "For two years you've been writing your book, and I've been supporting the two of us. You've changed, David. We used to do things together, go places together. You used to care about what happened to us. I've watched more and more of your energy get sucked into that book."
   Molly eyed me up and down. It was true. She had me. The worst part about all this was that I could do nothing about it. For once in my wasted life, I had to know what it felt like to finish something I started.
   "I'm tired of making excuses! It's to the point where I'm afraid of telling people, 'David's a writer' because I dread what comes next: 'Oh, really! What has he written?' because that's when I have to tell them that you do occasional pieces for the Santa Monica Outlook. Do you get my drift?"
   Molly was being generous. That small-town rag had not called me in over two months. The two of us had had this conversation many times, before. For a while, I had managed defending my writing to Molly.

* * *

   I looked over at the old man. The big bus inched its way through rush-hour traffic on the old Pasadena Freeway.
   "When I retired, I wrote a letter to the United Nations. I told them I was tired of living in the United States. I asked them if they could recommend some countries to me. They wrote me back."
   "They wrote you back?" The bus driver sounded incredulous.
   "Yes, sir. They came up with some names. Let's see, there was Trinidad, Aruba, Puerto Rico, I said no to Puerto Rico because it's too much like the United States, and Barbados."
   I was glad for him. He had paid his dues, so why not? If a permanent vacation on a Caribbean island was his idea of retirement, more power to him. At least some of us could look forward to that. The rest of us had more immediate concerns.

* * *

   "David, I'm sure you know I've given this much thought," she had said. "We need to separate for a while," she had said. "It will give us both time to think, and it will give you time to decide what you want to do with your life," she had said.
   I looked down at the gold band flashing on her finger.
   "Molly, you know we belong together. Jesus!" I sounded pathetic, but I meant it. That's why I was not at my desk at this moment. That's why I had been out running around these past three months. I had left more applications at more places than I wanted to admit. I had hit every newspaper, magazine, ad agency and web site design house in town trying to nail down something, anything.
   "David, you're a bright man. If you really meant that, you would have done something about it a long time ago.

* * *

   Outside, the sun was setting beneath huge, puffy, orange-pink clouds. I had not noticed that the bus had filled up and that a large man in a hat and overcoat sat next to me. The retired guy was still going off.
   "I put in some time down at the church, you know, helping out wherever they need me. One of the girls in the office there told me I was so sweet and asked me if I was from the South. I said, 'Sure, sugar. South Central L.A.'" He slapped his thighs and laughed aloud, exposing deep wrinkles at the corners of his eyes and milk-white teeth. I looked around. It was like sitting in a movie theater. Everyone was watching the show. The man next to me chuckled.

* * *

   "Molly, look. I'll get a job teaching high school if that's what it's going to take to keep us together." I hated to say it. The thought of teaching screwed-up teenagers who would just as soon shoot one another, or me, as not, honestly scared the life out of me. That was not what I wanted for myself, and I was convinced neither did Molly. I could end up like some other authors, who spent their lives teaching before they made a ton of money writing autobiographies, and then go on talk shows and actually say on national television that the reason they started writing after they retired was that there wasn't ever any time to write while they were teaching high school English. I would always write no matter what, but just hearing someone say that only confirmed my fear of the kind of people that taught high school. Molly looked at me as I walked into the kitchen.
   "Dinner's in a half-hour," I said.

* * *

   "I don't know about that Internet. It's like a whole other world out there. People don't even step outside their homes anymore. All they do is hunch over their computers like zombies day and night. And that Carpal Tunnel Syndrome? I read where it's a whole lot worse than they let on. It's practically an epidemic, like AIDS. I sure am glad I'm retired."
   Our resident social commentator had finally come full circle. Between him and Molly, I had made it from downtown to Pasadena in no time at all. I got off at my usual stop, and walked the six blocks to our apartment. It felt good coming home. She'd be glad to hear I got a job subbing for LA Unified, with an option to go full-time in the Fall. Maybe we'll celebrate by going out for coffee at our favorite place in the theater district, rekindle the flame. Then later, I'll make love to my beautiful wife. I was going to show her that she made the right decision in marrying me. I was going to knuckle under and teach, and by God, I was going to get published. She deserved that.
   When I got home, the first thing I did was head for the kitchen. I prepared her favorite: lemon chicken with wild rice, asparagus spears on the side. Then I set the table for two, just like I had done for the past three months since I had taken over the dinner duties while I was out looking for work. Molly would be coming home soon. It was going to be all so romantic. I could hardly wait to see the look on her face, the gleam of the candlelight in her eyes when I told her our good fortune. My wife, my sacred blessing on this Earth.
   I looked at the clock on the kitchen wall. We had bought it together and I had put it up right where Molly wanted it. It was red, with large, garish white numerals and hands. It had a second hand. Why does anybody need a second hand on a kitchen clock? I hated that clock. I hated having to look at that clock and watch the minutes tick, tick, tick away. They were ticking away now, coming up on the six o'clock hour. Six o'clock, straight up and down. The two hands became one for those few seconds every evening. I put the food on the table.
   "I hope you like the chicken, Molly. I know how much you love asparagus spears."
   I ate. Then I sat in silence till the candle had burned down to the holder. In the dark, I gazed at Molly's plate. Didn't she like the chicken? Or was it the asparagus spears? Maybe she just wasn't hungry. We had both been through a lot, lately. When my head started nodding to my chest, I got up and made my way to the bedroom. I took off my clothes and left them where they fell. Then, I walked over to the dresser and slid my hands along the surface until they clasped the top drawer handles. They felt cool to my grip. Slowly, I opened the drawer and looked inside. The emptiness mocked me, laughed at my weakness like it had every night for these past three months. I quickly shut the drawer and fell onto the bed. The familiar tears were a comfort, but they couldn't stop the nightmares. I forced myself not to think. I felt my consciousness slipping away as three words echoed into my fast-approaching sleep.
      Trinidad. Aruba. Barbados.