No Pen

The bell rang. A loud, sharp noise that shook me from my reverie. I was having a good daydream though, and I was more than a little upset that the bell had interrupted it. The school day was over, and it was Friday. Which meant it was now the weekend.

What on earth do you do on weekends during a pandemic? Everything was closed and no indoor gatherings. Which meant my friends could not come over. That sleepover that I had been wanting forever would have to wait. Weekends had been reduced to me counting down the days until school started again on Monday. The school that I despised so much was also the only thing keeping me sane.

I hid in my room for most of the weekend, only coming out to scrape together some food from our meager fridge and cupboards. My siblings and I had a game night when dad was at the pub on Saturday night, and I let little Hunter win. He needed a win in his life. He was only 7 but he had experienced a lifetime of hurt already.

The buzz of my alarm was what woke me. It took me a second to realize what day it was; Monday. I moved sluggishly, dreading the possibility of running into my dad. However, he was still on the couch, snoring loudly. He must have come home late last night, and he smelled like booze. Even though I was terrified of him, I still draped the blanket over him that was laying next to his sprawled-out legs. He never covered himself up, especially when he came home at odd hours of the night. He looked so peaceful when he wasn't yelling at me.

One thing that remained constant in my life, despite the whole world being turned upside down, was breakfast on school days. My mom always taught me that learning can not happen without a solid breakfast in your belly. Education was so important to the whole family; the whole family except me. However, her many tidbits of life advice stuck with me many years after her passing, and I could not miss breakfast. I did not have my license yet, something that was a sore spot to my dad, so I gobbled some breakfast and then left to go catch the bus. I had time to make myself some scrambled eggs that morning; the neighbor must have brought them over. She was sweet on my dad only because she didn't know about his drinking. The eggs were not sitting right in my stomach though. The door slammed on my way out. The cool, smooth metal reverberating off of the frame. I did not mean to slam the door; it was something that I was sure my dad would bring up later.

I had forgotten my mitts that morning, so I rubbed my hands together in a feeble attempt at warming them up. The air was frosty, and I could see my breath. I wished the bus would come sooner so I did not have to wait my usual 20 minutes before the bus came. Music pounded in my ears from my headphones. Headphones that I desperately needed to replace. Slowly, a crowd formed around me. It was the usual people, the baker from down the street on the way to his bakery, the young single mother in a rush to get to work, the teenager always bringing her gifts to show his affection for her to no avail. I do not know why he had not given up already, she was never going to accept any of his tokens of affection.

I listened to my music loudly, so the bass muffled any conversation around me. Although I was a bit annoyed by the company, the strangers around me had become part of my morning routine. As my phone inched minute by minute toward 8:30, more and more strangers gathered around me, like I was the beacon of light, and they were mosquitoes. At 8:32 exactly, the bus slowly came to a crawl in front of the crowd and the door hissed open letting out a burst of warm air from inside that beckoned me. I waited my turn and then stepped inside, flashing my bus pass to the gap-toothed bus driver inside. It struck me as odd that it was so bitterly cold outside, and yet the man only wore a short-sleeved shirt.

It was as soon as I got comfortable in my seat and ripped my backpack off that I remembered the bundle of pens that lay on my bedside table that I had meant to bring today to school. Just because I did not like school does not mean that I did not like to be prepared. As my mom used to say, unpreparedness and tardiness are the most disrespectful things in the world. I think she over-exaggerated just a little bit to us kids, but it stuck with me even to this day. My heart started beating out of my chest as I started panicking. My professor was the strictest man I had ever met and there was no way I was going to go back home and meet the wrath of my father. Even though as an introvert, it made me cringe, I removed the heavy bass from my ears and I called out to the back of the bus, “Does anyone have a pen I could borrow?” This goes to show how desperate I was.

I heard nothing but the rumble of the heat coming out of the vents. The silence was deafening and I felt my face flush with embarrassment. However, just when I was starting to lose hope, I felt a tap on my shoulder. I had not noticed her, I was too focused on the thought of replacing my headphones and despair at having to brave the elements, but she sat there, an elderly woman with a wrinkled, veined hand extended as if she was still tapping my shoulder. She dug into her massive handbag and pulled out a pen. “Here you go,” she murmured. I had to lean in to hear her and she offered the pen up to me like she had no idea what that simple act meant to me.

I put the pen in my bag and thanked her profusely. How I had never seen her before on this bus baffled me. Considering I had taken this bus every week-day for the past three years of my undergrad. As the doors of the bus opened letting cold air in that made me shiver, people gradually left, and I was left alone with my pen savior. I must have had an out-of-body experience when I asked her why I had never seen her on the bus before. I had never had that much courage to talk to a stranger in my life.

It was hard to hear her, she spoke so quietly, but she spoke so eloquently that I was mesmerized while listening to her. She spoke about her late husband, her ungrateful children, and the doctor just recently confessing to her that he was not going to let them renew her license. I was so enthralled at hearing her speak that I nearly missed my stop. I wished her a good day and as I was leaving, I mentioned to the bus driver to look after this old woman who had become my sole friend in a matter of minutes.

“Which old woman?” he asked, seeming confused. “You have been the only person on the bus for the last 5 stops.”