Something Different

Something was different.

The bus stood stationary on the right side of the street. No vibration. No sound from the engine. Only the strong smell of gasoline.  

The doors were closed, trapping inside the sweaty and exhausted passenger of the 5-pm route. Noises from the street became a muffled murmur behind glass windows. The air-conditioner was off, and the driver’s chair was empty. The ticket man, always perching on the railing near the doors, also disappeared.

It was in this silence that Lan jerked back into consciousness. She had a kink in her neck and a faint red mark on her right cheek. She rubbed her eyes and stretched. Her joints didn’t pop like they did in the movies, she could never do that, but it did make her feel better. Her legs were numb, and her hard-cover dictionary was probably poking at her thighs through the thinning bottom of her backpack. She pushed it not-so-gently onto the seat next to her and crossed her legs.

‘Ugh! Annoying!’ – From the chair two rows before her, a woman bleated. She had a face that was neither young nor old – over 40 but under 45. Her skin hadn’t sagged, but it was certainly not in its prime. A pair of tattooed eyebrows – too sharp and bold to be natural – hooded her small, slanted eyes. One of her feet was on the chair, clad in one of those white socks that had a slit between the big toe and the smaller toes. Her flip flop, used to be bright green but now a dirty mint, lay upside down under her seat. She clicked her tongue and grimaced, while chewing on some oranges. Grease and spit coated her thin red lips, making them shine under the bus’s blueish lights. – ‘Stupid bus has to break down at this hour.’

Lan scrunched her nose. The woman’s voice was loud and sour, and each of her chomping on the fruits was a punch to her ears. Sending a mental glare to the loud people of the Earth, she pulled her backpack back onto her lap, leant her forehead against the glass and closed her ey-

Wrist.

There was a wrist in her line of vision.

Attached to a hand with clean-cut pink nails and a small ring on the middle finger.

An elbow, rested on the rack between the bus’s wall and the window’s glass. White cotton sleeve covered their arm, rolled up several folds on their bicep.

There was a scarf on that wrist.

Seven stripes. Six shades of pink and purple. And one white stripe in the middle.

Lan could recognize those color anywhere.

Something came over her, and Lan leaned up and tap the person on the shoulder.

‘Hey, I like your scarf.’

Lan never smelt a lily her entire life, but she imagined that was the smell of their hair.