The Midnight Bus

The Midnight Bus
One.

“…And the sound of the gentle pendulum coaxes you slowly awake.”
I opened my eyes and blinked. “I told you it wouldn’t work.”
The doctor laughed. “Indeed. Hate to burst your bubble, but you’re actually one of the easiest people to hypnotise that I’ve ever worked with.”
Damn. I wasn’t expecting that. I had somehow thought that my unwillingness to participate would make me harder to hypnotise, if not impossible. Evidently not.

Latent rage, the doctor had called it. Apparently, intense human emotions, such as love, sadness and anger, can manifest in physical ways if they are not dealt with properly by the mind. I found this a little amusing because in general I looked at things in a kind of distant manner. But doctor knows best. Walking down the filthy cement steps to the train platform I pulled out a cigarette and stuck it in the corner of my mouth. As I fished about in my pocket for a lighter I saw ticket inspectors ahead and smoothly changed my course to the toilets.
I pulled a handkerchief from my pocket and wrapped my hand in it. I used this hand to push open the toilet door. Inside, the blue light bounced off grimy walls patterned with inky abuse and obscenity. Jenna was a lying crack whore who would give head to anyone; Peter was a cheating bastard who couldn’t do The Job. In small cursive script by the mirror was written, “There are people all around me- but I am alone”. Poor depressed soul. I went into a stall and shut the door, careful not to touch any part of it with my own skin.  “Stand before you flush- this toilet sprays!”  was cheerfully scrawled on the back of the door.  I wondered how a person (and why a person) could flush while sitting.
I lined the closed toilet seat with a few layers of paper. Actually, many layers of paper. Then I sat down and regarded the walls.
Toilet stall walls are always so interestingly random. It seems there are few people who can resist imparting their own pious wisdom before leaving. One person had written about their boyfriend’s unusual sexual practices and received many replies, while next to it two lone people had carried on an intense discussion on racism, perhaps following the course of several days or weeks. It touched me. After today I would be gone from this place, probably forever. I wanted to leave behind something of myself.  Something witty and intelligent. I considered. I lived and died by suicide? No, too done. Besides, I’m not suicidal at all. There was a derogatory remark about our nation’s leader. Besides this I could write “It’s not the secrets of the government that’s keeping you dumb”. It’d have to do, although it was highly unoriginal. I patted my pockets. There was the outline of my empty lighter. There, my cigarette case. But no pen. I felt sad.

The ticket inspectors had gone. I checked the other end of the station then leaned against the sheltered seats. I removed the chewed, unsmoked cigarette from my mouth, tossed it into a bin and inserted a fresh one. I was reading the times for the coming trains when a voice beside me said
“Got a light?”
and scared me half to death. I have exceptional hearing and it is not often someone can approach me without my being aware of it.
I casually cocked my head to the left and found myself nose-to-nose with a ruffle-haired young man.