The 2:22 to Nowhere

The first thing he noticed was the overhead light. Fluorescent, humming slightly and the exact shade of beige that only government buildings and hospital waiting rooms could manage. Then the smell hit: over-worn upholstery, faint antiseptic, and something oddly sweet, like wilted flowers left too long in water.

The second thing was that he was on a bus. A very old bus. Not a public transit bus or a tour coach, but something in-between. The kind of bus you see parked behind a shuttered funeral home. Brown vinyl seats. Curtains that hadn’t been touched since the Reagan administration. And no windows showing anything outside, just darkness.

He sat up. His mouth was dry. His head felt like it had been filled with static and cotton. Across from him, a man in a lime green sweater was reading a newspaper dated 1974.

“Excuse me,” he said.

The man looked up. Nodded once. Then returned to his paper.

Okay. Cool.

He turned in his seat. The bus was full. Not packed, but occupied. Maybe twenty passengers. All of them looked a little wrong. One woman wore a wedding dress, tattered at the edges. A boy clutched a box wrapped in police tape. A man with no eyebrows rocked back and forth gently, whispering beneath his breath.

A sign above the driver read: PLEASE REMAIN SEATED WHILE THE BUS IS IN MOTION.

The driver didn’t turn. His hands were locked at ten and two. Black cap. Brown gloves. Perfectly still.

He stood up.

“Sir,” came a voice behind him. A woman. Early thirties, sharp eyes, maroon blouse. She sat like someone used to waiting, calm and collected.

“Yeah?” he said, surprised to find his voice still worked.

“You shouldn’t stand yet. It hasn’t been decided.”

“What hasn’t?”

She glanced out the window. Still black. Not a speck of light, no stars, no moon. Just absence.

“Where you’re getting off.” she said, finally.

He laughed nervously. “I think there’s been a mistake. I shouldn’t be on here. I don’t remember boarding.”

“No one does. Until they do.”

That wasn’t helpful, he thought to himself. He looked at his clothes. Work pants, button down shirt. Tie askew. Blood on the collar. He touched it. Not fresh. Dry. Flaky.

He swallowed hard. “Is this a joke?”

“It would be a cruel one,” the woman sighed.

The driver pulled a lever. A hiss echoed through the interior as the bus lurched slightly. Outside the windows, the endless black began to shift. Not light, just shapes. Silhouettes, each moving slowly. Crawling? No, writhing. Something in the dark that didn’t like to be seen.

He turned back to the woman. “Where are we going?”

She folded her hands on her lap. “That depends. What did you leave undone?”

A chill ran down his back. Not from cold. From something older. Something deeper. A feeling like a name you almost remember. He sat down. Hard.

The bus rattled over something that wasn’t a road. The light overhead flickered once. Then again. Then steadied. The boy with the box was crying now. Quietly. The kind of cry that kids do when they know it won’t help and that no one is listening.

He looked for a phone. A watch. Anything. But his pockets were empty. Completely empty. Not even a wallet or a piece of lint. He stood again. The woman didn’t stop him this time.

He walked up the aisle. Each step felt wrong. Like the floor wasn’t quite solid. The rocking of the bus didn’t match the sensation underfoot. He reached the front.

“Driver?” No response. He reached out to tap the man’s shoulder.

“I wouldn’t do that,” said a voice to his left. It was the man in the lime green sweater.

“Why not?”

“He doesn’t like to be touched. He’s union.”

Emerson blinked. Wait. Emerson? Was that his name? That felt right. Or at least, familiar.

The man smiled and returned to his paper. The headline read: Ford Pardons Nixon.

He turned back. The bus continued forward. The shapes outside the window began to clear. A streetlight, flickering. A chain-link fence. A motel sign with half the letters burned out. This wasn’t some dreamscape. This was everywhere and nowhere. A collage of American after-hours: the lost freeway rest stops, forgotten suburbs, the parts of town you only see when you’re too tired to care.

He looked for an emergency stop cord. There was none. Just a lever by the front labeled: PULL FOR RELEASE.

He did. It came off in his hand. It wasn’t metal. It was wax. Emerson stared at it, detached and in his hand. Warm and soft as if it had just been shaped. A slight indentation of his fingers already forming along its side, like it had been made for him.

He dropped it and it hit the floor with a squelch and didn’t bounce. Instead, it began to melt, fast, pooling into the seams of the rubber flooring like candle tears on a church carpet.

He turned to the driver again, now more wary than afraid.

“Hey,” Emerson said. “Listen. I think there’s been some kind of mistake.”

The driver didn’t flinch. Didn’t blink. Didn’t even breathe, as far as Emerson could tell. Just stared into the black horizon ahead as the bus lumbered forward on wheels that made no sound and hit no bumps.

Emerson backed down the aisle, trying to stay calm, which was hard given the circumstances.

The man in the lime green sweater chuckled without looking up. “Everyone tries the lever. Don’t feel bad.”

He looked at the woman again, the one with the maroon blouse. She was still sitting, arms crossed, watching him like a disapproving librarian.

“I want to get off,” he said.

“Of course you do,” she replied. “But it doesn’t work like that.

“Then how does it work?” he said in a huff.

She hesitated, then gestured to the other passengers. “The way it always does. You wait. You watch. And eventually, your name gets called.”

“By who?”

She tilted your head toward the ceiling, “You’ll hear it.” The bus lights flickered again. This time, when they came back, they were dimmer. And something had changed.

A woman near the back, one Emerson hadn’t noticed before, was gone. In her place sat a steaming cup of coffee and a page torn from a yearbook. The cup was half full. The photo had a name scribbled under it, ‘Maureen L., Class of ‘86.

He looked around wildly. No one else seemed to care. The boy with the taped up box kept cradling it in his lap, whispering to it like it had answers. The man with no eyebrows was no mouth a song of some kind.

Emerson sat back down. He felt cold again. Not chilled, but hollowed out, perhaps. Like parts of him were slowly being siphoned off while he wasn’t looking.

The woman next to him, Maroon Blouse, sighed.

“You don’t remember yet, do you?”

“Remember what,” Emerson said, feeling himself getting annoyed.

She didn’t answer. Instead she reached into her purse and pulled out a roll of mints. Offered him one. He took it. Peppermint. So sharp it nearly made his eyes water. She popped one too.

“That helps. A little. With the fog.”

“The fog?”

“The forgetting. It’s worse for some than others.” she said, gesturing out the window. The black was now a dark gray. A gas station floated past, disembodied and flickering like it had been recorded onto a VHS tape and played back a thousand times. A dog stood near the edge of the lot, staring straight at the bus. Flickering red where its eyes should be. Smoldering and crimson, and hungering with anticipation.

“What is this place?” Emerson asked.

Maroon Blouse turned to him fully now, her own eyes sympathetic.

“It’s the 2:22,” she said.

“Like the line number?”

“It’s the time.”

“What time?”

“The time you left.”

Emerson’s throat tightened. “Left where?” He wasn’t sure he wanted the answer.

She gave him a soft smile. “That’s the question, isn’t it?”

The driver pulled the lever again. This time the bus slowed, hissed, and tilted slightly to the left as if kneeling. The door hissed open. And for a moment, just a breath of one, light poured in. Real light. Golden. Warm. The kind that filters through leaves in a memory.

A man near the front stood. He looked confused. Then peaceful. He nodded once to the rest of the bus. And then he was gone. Not walked out. Not stepped off. Just…gone.

The doors closed. The light disappeared. The bus resumed.

Emerson shivered.

“What was that?” he whispered.

“Someone who finished their route,” Maroon Blouse said.

“And the rest of us?”

She stared ahead. “Still riding.”

Emerson rubbed his eyes. When he pulled away, there was wax on his palm. His seatbelt was gone. In its place, a coiled ribbon of dried flower, yellow and crumbling. He opened his mouth. But before he could speak, a sound echoed from the ceiling speaker.

“Emerson Morris. Please prepare to disembark.”

Everyone turned. Every single passenger watched him. Their faces were expressionless. Not cruel or kind, just expectant.

Emerson felt his pulse throb in his ears.

“But I..I haven’t done anything,” he stammered.

Maroon Blouse reached into her purse again and handed him something. A matchbook. From Bar Lucille. Downtown. A jazz bar. He hadn’t been there in years. He opened it and read the note scribbled inside.

“Call her. Before midnight. - L” it read.

“Who’s ‘L’” he asked.

Maroon Blouse just looked at him, her expression unreadable. The bus slowed again. And this time. Emerson wasn’t sure if he wanted to stay seated. Finally, the bus hissed to a stop.

This time, the outside wasn’t black or gray, it was pink. Not the soft blush of morning. No, this was a harsh, electric pink. Bar sign pink. Cheap motel neon pink. The kind of pink that doesn’t invite you in so much as dares you to stay.

Gary stood slowly, still clutching the matchbook. He turned to Maroon Blouse. Her face was softer now, not as guarded.

“What happens if I don’t get off?” he asked. She didn’t answer directly. Instead, she looked at his hands. The matchbook was melting. The corners softened like chocolate. The ink beginning to run. The scribbled note inside, was blurring.

“You only get one stop,” she said. “And not everyone gets one at all.”

Emerson turned to the aisle. The other passengers were watching again. All of them. Still as statues. The boy with the box. The man without eyebrows. Even Lime Green Sweater had folded his paper.

“Why now?” Emerson asked. “Why this stop?” No one answered. Because it wasn’t a question. It was a choice.

The doors opened with a breathy huss. Outside, a sidewalk glistened. Wet, but rainless. He stepped off.

The moment he did, the air changed. It fizzed against his skin like soda water, humming faintly. The door closed behind him. The bus didn’t roar away, it was simply gone. Emerson looked down. The matchbook had hardened again. One match missing.

The neon sign across the street buzzed faintly: Bar Lucille. The glass door was cracked open. A curl of saxophone music drifted out, sweet and slow and bent in all of the right places. He pushed inside.

It was just as he remembered, and not at all. Blue velvet booths. Red glass candle holders. The scent of citrus peel, spilled gin and unspoken truths. The bartender polished a glass. No one looked up. Except her.

She was at the end of the bar. A silver dress shimmered around her. She stirred a drink with one of those thin black straws, ice clicking with a tempo too slow for the music.

Emerson sat down beside her. “...L?” he asked, already knowing the answer.

She didn’t look up. “You’re late.”

“I didn’t know I was coming.”

“That’s the problem with people like you,” she said, finally meeting his gaze. “You never know until it’s too late.” Her face, it wasn’t familiar. But his heart skipped anyway. She had the kind of face that meant something, like a song lyric that touched your soul.

“You called once,” she continued. “At 11:57. Two rings. Then silence.”

“I got scared.”

She sipped her drink. “You think that’s new?” The saxophone wound down into a minor key. Somewhere in the distance, thunder cracked.

“I thought about calling back,” Emerson said.

“But you didn’t.”

“I didn’t know what I’d say.”

Her eyes glittered, cruel and kind all at once. “That you were sorry? That you didn’t mean to leave like that? That you didn’t know how to say goodbye? We’ve heard all the hits before, Emerson.”

He swallowed. “I wasn’t trying to hurt you.”

“That’s what they all say. But you didn’t try not to.” The silence that followed wasn’t uncomfortable. It was familiar. The kind of quiet that settles after the last big fight, the one no one wins. Then she stood, she reached into her purse and pulled something out. Another matchbook. This one charred.

She handed it to him. “Strike it if you mean it,” she said. “But only if.”

Emerson held it, trembling. “Mean what?”

She stepped away, toward the stage where the saxophone wailed.

“That you’d do it differently. That you’d call before midnight.”

He stared down. Inside the matchbook the note had returned, clearer than ever: “Call her. Before midnight. -L.”

He looked up. The bar was empty now. No bartender or patrons. No music, no saxophone. Just him.

The door behind him opened again. Another hiss. The bus was back. Empty and waiting. The overhead lights buzzed impatiently. Emerson struck the match.

It flared to life with a sharp hiss, burning too bright for something so small. Emerson blinked. The bar was gone. No velvet booths or gin-soaked ghosts. Only white light, sudden and sterile. He was back on the bus. Only it wasn’t the same. The aisle was longer. The windows no longer showed black or gray, now they showed moments.

Snapshots. Moving, looping and living. To his left, a window played a scene of him standing on a beach at dusk, phone in hand, thumb hovering above Call and never pressing it. To his right, a hospital bed. An older woman, his mother? No, her. L. Holding her hand was a younger version of him, hollow-eyed, present in body but nowhere else.

The windows weren’t watching him. They were remembering him. He staggered forward, and the floor responded with strange elasticity. Like he was walking through decisions not yet made. The bus was full again. All the passengers now wore his face. Not masks. Each one was him, at different ages. Different regrets. The college dropout. The boyfriend who ghosted. The guy who stopped painting. The man who never forgave his brother.

Emerson passed them all. Each version looked up. None smiled. He reached his seat. Maroon Blouse was waiting. Only now, she wasn’t a stranger. She was the voice in his head he’d always ignored. The part of him that whispered “Not like this.”

“Did I do it?” he asked.

“You lit the match,” she said. “That’s the start.”

“And now?”

She tilted her head. “Now we see what you’ll burn down to build something better.”

The driver pulled the lever one final time. The bus shuddered. Overhead lights flashed red, the tone of an unanswered phone call came over the speaker.

Emerson remained, standing in the aisle as the roof of the bus slowly peeled away, revealing sky. Deep indigo melting into gold.

The bus dissolved away into scaffolding, then beams of light, then nothing at all. He was standing on the pavement now. Concrete. Rain tapped his shoulder. Cars passed.

He was outside Bar Lucille. It was 11:47 PM. In his hand, the matchbook. Unlit. His phone buzzed in his pocket. No wax. No static. Just a screen and a choice. Emerson stared at it. Then he took a breath, lit a match and dialed.

One ring.

Two.

A voice answered. Sleepy. Soft

“...Hello?”

He didn’t hang up this time.