*Note to the reader, this is an on going story as close to real time as can be, then posted on facebook for a friend inspired by her commute to work. A bit of an experiment and with very little editing, I hope you enjoy
Chapter 1
The sun was already up when Frank Odder stepped up into the cab of bus 1134. Pre inspection complete he logged minutes into the company iPad then started the engine. The cleaners were just packing up, they're running late today he thought. He was watching them in the mirror and was about to say something when the rear door opened and a man in a dark blue suite climbed in and carefully scanned the body of the vehicle front to back then front again. A chill ran down the back of Frank’s neck raising the hairs.
The man reached in his pocket and drew out a piece of paper. Frank thought he was going to take notes but instead the man crumpled it in his palm then walked towards him.
He pretended to shift his attention back to his own notes while the man in blue selected a seat and began wiping it down.
Not paper he mused, more like one of those Lysol wipes. But why would....
"Don't we have somewhere to be, Mr. Odder?
Startled Frank dropped his iPad and it hit the floor with a dull thud.
"Yes sir, sorry sir but I thought you were a supervisor and would be getting off?"
"I am merely an observer my good Mr. Odder, and I shall be accompanying you this day. Let's proceed shall we?"
"Right away sir."
Frank engaged the transmission and pulled out of the warehouse. As he pulled on to the street he glanced back at the man. He had turned towards the rear of the bus but noticed he was seated opposite the seat he had just cleaned.
Frank pulled onto 32nd avenue and steered it eastward. He checked his mirrors again for traffic this time but glimpsed the man again and was sure he saw him grinning.
Chapter 2
It was business as usual for the better part of the day. "Mulder" (from x-files, if I need to explain any more then you should probably stop reading now) Frank's pet name for the man in the blue suite sat in the same seat all day occasionally glancing up at the people getting on the bus but nothing more. He caught him scribbling on a small soft cover notepad, the kind police detectives use in those TV shows back in the day. In hindsight he should have known, "I should have seen something", he would later repeat to himself or anyone listening as he retold the events of that day.
At the final stop on his route, Frank pulled the bus against the curb as he always did, engaged the parking break, left the diesel to quietly rumble on as he pulled out his clip board and began marking his hours, adding notes and running through the checklist for the official hand over to Ted.
"Ted was one of the good ones" Frank would tell reporters after it all happened. "Reliable, always friendly...he would even get out if someone needed it. It's a damn shame, a damn shame."
Frank was busy writing and didn't notice that an older lady had stepped onto the bus. She trundled past him only to drop ungraciously into the very seat "Mulder" had wiped down in the morning. He did however look in the mirror just in time to see her pull a cloth up to her face and wipe the days grime vigorously from her face.
Frank quickly shifted his gaze to Mulder who was now leaning forward in his seat busily returning something to the inside pocket of his suite jacket.
Frank assumed it was the notepad.
He was smiling broadly, enough to show off his baked bean covered teeth before leaning over the isle to say something to the older lady that only she could hear. They laughed together as Mulder stood, leaned forward again to say something else quietly then abruptly turned and vanished off the vehicle.
Frank never saw him again and no one at the city ever admitted to knowing of him or about any kind of supervision scheduled that day.
Frank lifted his head to the sound of a knock on the cab door window and chuckled at Ted Lansing's goofy smile.
"Better get a move on Sonny Jim! Big boss will be watching" he said while making an exaggerated gesture towards his Mickey Mouse wristwatch."
"I have no doubt about that buddy" laughed Frank carefully placing the clipboard back into the sleeve beside his seat.
Neither of the men paid much attention to the few passengers that waited on the bus as they began to catch up on the day.
Two teenagers sat side by side at the back, fixated on their individual smartphones...together but apart.
A worker wearing his safety vest and sporting a very stylish tool belt sitting beside his green hardhat was also oblivious to everything around him while he reviewed notes on his ipad.
A young girl had her nose pressed against the glass trying to get her mother's attention to look at the man in a dark suit standing in the middle of the tracks of the East bound line.
"I don't see anything sweetheart; you must be seeing a reflection in the window or something." She said dismissively.
A girl wearing a Wonder Woman t-shirt sat reading a book, occasionally peeking out at the old woman from behind her long red hair like an actor that views the evening’s guests through a long velvet curtain on opening night.
The old woman’s eyes were closed and she was muttering quietly to herself in a sort of rhythmic chant when a young boy name Jeremy Decker leapt up the stairs.
Jeremy was a regular on the route and would help out when something was really too big to handle alone. Ted saw him get on and gave a small nod to acknowledge that he had seen him. Jeremy waved his pass back as a courtesy, more out of habit than anything else. He had been riding the same line with Ted since he'd started working at the food bank downtown 2 years ago.
"There's so many good people there" he would say when the two men spoke. It just feels good to help, you know what I mean?"
He was carrying a large brown paper bag full of day old bagels to hand out to some of the homeless and an old black leather sketch book in the other.
He walked past the older lady, briefly thinking he would ask if she wanted one but decided against it. There was something going on that he didn't want to disturb. Instead he sat in a single seat across from her and stretched out the pad over his knees then began to sketch her.
The red haired girl looked over at him, "I want to see that one when you're done Jeremy! I think there's a good story there"
"I don't know about my drawing but I think you're right about the story."
They both laughed comfortably but neither broke eye contact with the old lady.
Something was about to happen that would make their lives look like they were living inside a Stephen King novel.
Sometimes when Jeremy drew people, it felt like he could actually hear their thoughts but he remembered how his mother told him never to tell anyone.
"They just wouldn't understand," she said.
Rita was already back into the novel so she didn't notice when Jeremy had actually stopped. She didn't notice the moment when his eyes had rolled back into his skull and exposed only the whites. She only noticed the violent movements of his right hand, charcoal streaming black lines across the page and a line of drool streaming from the corner of his mouth.
What she couldn't know was that Jeremy was hearing the old woman’s mutterings inside his head like a loudspeaker cranked up to 10.
"We are just beneath the north most cloud, STOP,
We are just beneath the north most cloud, STOP,
We are just beneath the north most cloud, STOP,
We are just beneath the north most cloud, STOP,
We are just beneath the north most cloud, STOP,”
Thinking he was having a seizure, Rita leapt out of her seat to help but cried out in pain, instantly falling back into her seat. Her hair had wrapped itself around the hand hold of the seat like a vine.
The words stopped suddenly and Jeremy realized he was just staring across the aisle at the old woman.
She was now staring back at him intently; her brows furrowed and eyes dark.
"Why doncha take a piture, it'll last lunger!" She screamed.
Rita sat forward, her hair loose around her, a raw pain burned around her scalp. Jeremy looked over and mouthed three letters, W.T.F.
Rita looked behind her, no one else seemed to notice, and did she dream it?
The man with the vest glanced up but the two girls at the back of the bus were still locked on to their phones and the two drivers were still talking.
The young girl was sitting down in her seat. “He’s gone Mommy," she said
"Who's gone honey?"
"The man in the dark suit."
Rita looked at her watch, 3:30:35. It could have only been seconds, at most but it felt much longer. She turned back and looked at Jeremy again; he was staring back, tears streaming down his cheeks.
"We are just beneath the north most cloud"
"What? What does that even mean?"
"I have no idea," Jeremy paused, his mind was racing "It's what I heard her say... in my head" he whispered pointing a finger towards the old lady.
The bus rocked slightly as Frank and Ted switched places then the familiar phssst sound of the air brakes releasing before the doors closed. The bus lurched forward and back into traffic.
Chapter 3
Two blocks down there was already a line of people waiting impatiently for the bus to arrive; some acting as though their day would never end but for Rita, it felt as if time had stopped.
She was busy returning things to her backpack with full intentions of getting the hell away from whatever this was when she noticed Jeremy wasn't moving and was panting in short rapid breaths.
"Oh my God!" she cried. She went over to sit beside him and touched his face. He was a bit warm but not bad. His hand however was freezing; she gave it a light squeeze and felt a wave of relief wash over as there was a slight squeeze back. "Okay good, you’re still with us. Where did you go Jeremy, where'd you go?" She couldn't leave now, whatever was going to happen she realized that something wanted her to be part of it.
Jeremy was standing at the edge of a rock cut basin. Water flowing in from the ocean pulsed in an out with the tides. Over the centuries the water carved out a bowl like depression as it spun small boulders against the side of the river eroding the rock wall of the inlet. The old Indigenous hunters would gather each evening and simply scoop out the fish that got caught up in the current. Something about the shape at the mouth of the bowl and the counter clockwise movement disoriented them and they ended up swimming in circles just past the opening to freedom that was there between the rocks.
Sea foam circled along the surface in the warmer months giving it the illusion of a small hurricane.
A cloud of foam swirled around endlessly and he watched it well into the evening until only rays of moonlight glimmered on the water. It was quiet, the calmness of the water and wind in the trees that enveloped him and he felt at peace.
"Jerrraaaameeeeee. "
Out of the darkness something touched his shoulder, a hot breath beaded condensation on his neck and a putrid combination of rotted meat and sulfur overpowered his senses.
Then something else, a familiar voice and the river fell away.
"Jeremy, hey Jeremy. You ok? It's me Ted."
Ted had pulled the bus over to the side of the road just under one of the overpasses after Rita had shouted up to him.
There was a loud grown and a chorus erupted of sighs and murmurs.
"How long is this going to take?" shouted a man in a cheap grey suit as he pushed his glasses back on his nose.
"As long as it takes sir, said Ted calmly."
"That was way nicer that what I wanted to say." said Rita
They smiled as Jeremy took a gulp of air.
"Whoa, we have to go!" he breathed. "We have to go now!"
"But -- "
"No time to explain, I'm fine but we won't be if we don't get out of here."
Rita and Ted stared at Jeremy in disbelief then Rita looked up at Ted, "You heard the man, let's go!"
Chapter 4… coming soon