Waiting on Main Street
A humor short story
Elgin Ashton approached the bus stop on Main Street. He was a diminutive man of about fifty years with a kind face marked by intelligence that was emphasized by his small round spectacles (not glasses). He wore a black overcoat, a black hat, and carried a massive black umbrella that was almost as tall as he was.
Elgin settled on the bench at the bus stop, sheltered from the brisk spring wind behind the three-sided glass enclosure. Since he had called it an early day at the office that day—as it was Friday—the clock was just striking three on the quiet street in downtown Florence.
There was some sleepy car and foot traffic making its way up and down the road but only what you would expect for a Friday afternoon when everyone would like to be going home or to their favorite drinking establishment rather than remaining at work for another hour or two.
Elgin checked his watch and settled in to wait for the bus which was never on time but never quite late either. It ran just enough behind to keep you on your toes checking your watch but not enough to keep you waiting, if you follow.
He watched the traffic passing beneath the two and three story buildings across the street which housed small law firms and business offices. A title company on the third floor here, a hip urban bistro-pub on the ground floor there.
Elgin’s gaze wandered even higher to the open sky with great swaths of cloud hurrying across it in the breeze. He checked his watch. Seven past three. Only three minutes late so far.
Down the road he spotted the blue and white bus making its way up the street. He stood up in anticipation of boarding, eager to be off, to be home even though he was quite at peace sitting and waiting. It wasn’t impatience, just the desire to be out of the liminal space between work and home—there was nothing to look forward to other than the waiting itself while waiting and waiting offered little return on investment.
He watched the bus approach, fingering his bus pass in his pocket, anticipating where it would stop and where he would get on, which foot he would set on the bus first.
As the bus pulled up he was startled to see from his periphery a horde of white collar workers, the men in khakis and polos, the women in dress pants and blouses, swarmed around him and beat him to the bus.
He tried to move forward but was blocked by a huge blue polo chatting to a white blouse. He stood on tiptoe to see over the woman’s shoulder. To his dismay the interlopers were filing onto the bus from the front and middle doors. He was dismayed not only because they were taking up all the space on the bus but they were doing it wrong—the front door was for passengers entering while the back door, the door in the middle of the bus, was for passengers exiting.
Elgin pinched his nose against the excessive cologne of the blue polo and tried to judge from the remaining passengers and the space on the bus whether or not he would be getting on this one.
He was not optimistic.
He sat down on the bench and watched as the blue polo and the white blouse squeezed onto the bus bound for who knows where. A company outing to the local water treatment plant? Or perhaps they were all headed to group therapy to help combat the melancholy of working wherever it was they worked.
Elgin cursed silently and hoped the bus would break down.
Hold on. I don’t have anywhere to be. Is it so bad to be stuck here for a little bit longer? Maybe they’re in a big hurry. I should be happy for them that they’re getting where they need to go.
Elgin adjusted his spectacles (not glasses) and checked his watch. Fourteen past three. The buses usually came about every twenty-five minutes so it wouldn’t be a terrible wait.
Besides, the sun was shining and the robins and chickadees and cardinals and blue jays were tittering in the boughs of the trees that lined the street. Not so bad after all.
Three-thirty was soon approaching and even though no one had yet joined him at the bus stop. Elgin craned his neck eagerly to see if the next blue and white bus was approaching. He thought he caught sight of it down the street so he stood up, straightened his hat, and turned to grab the umbrella from where it was leaning in the corner of the bus stop shelter.
He turned back around and as if from thin air an entire marching band in scarlet and gold uniforms had materialized on the curb complete with shouting band leader yelling down a crackling megaphone. Apparently the Janesville High School marching band had taken a wrong turn on their way to the game at Florence High and transportation was desperately needed.
A veritable sea of brass separated Elgin from salvation at the road’s edge. He knew now how Moses must have felt when he came to the Red Sea and saw it stretching out before him and knew Pharaoh was nearly upon them. However, for Elgin there was no miracle as the blue and white bus pulled up to the stop and no parting of the Red Sea. Rather, the Red Sea flooded onto the bus occupying every inch of seat and standing room leaving Elgin dumbfounded.
Not one to give up easily, he thought he might try reasoning with the band leader who was the last to board. Elgin sprang forward and tugged at the scarlet sleeve of the red-faced mustachioed band leader. Apparently this was the wrong move since the band leader whirled around in surprise, hitting the siren button on the megaphone which sent Elgin fleeing for cover like a startled jackrabbit.
By the time he had recovered the bus was gone.
Elgin fumed. He picked up his umbrella from where it had fallen on the ground, walked up to the edge of the road, gripped the handle on the umbrella tightly, and planted the point into the crack in the curb.
Here I stand and here I remain. No one’s getting on the bus ahead of me this time.
Time ticked by. The sun seemed dimmer, the sky less pleasant, the birds less cheerful. It was seven minutes to four—the next bus would be there any moment.
Across the street, the dive bar two doors down from the hip urban bistro vomited a howling pack of college students onto the street, each of them in various states of inebriation. They stumbled across the street weaving between cars. One short guy in a checkered shirt waved the others on while a tall bearded fellow smoking a cigarette simply stopped in the road with one hand up attempting to stop or otherwise annoy the drivers.
Elgin watched this display in disbelief but, at the same time, in the sure conviction that these hooligans would not be getting onto the bus before him.
Sure enough, the drunk students spouting some nonsense about the death of some unnamed author—they kept saying ‘the’ author but didn’t say which author—lined up behind Elgin to wait for the bus.
It wasn’t a long wait, thankfully, for they smelled of beer and American Spirits. Salvation in blue and white rolled down the road toward him.
A shout. A slight bump. A Panzer struck Elgin between the L2 and L3 vertebrae sending him sprawling into the gutter on the far side of the road.
“Sorry,” someone shouted.
From the gutter, Elgin watched the bus stop and then pull away.
“That’s it,” he said, dusting himself off and resuming his post on the curb, so close to the edge he was almost in the street.
Four twenty-one. The next bus would be there soon.
He looked around anxiously, wondering from which direction the next threat would come.
Sure enough, a tired middle-aged woman with curly brown hair approached leading a pack of elementary school children followed by another tired looking woman and yet another group of children.
“Does this bus go to Rochester?” the first woman asked him.
Elgin’s eyes darted wildly. “No, wrong stop. This bus doesn’t go to Rochester. You want the one five blocks that way,” he said, pointing down the street.
“But the sign right there says Rochester,” she said, whining.
“Oh.” Elgin thought his rage could have given him the strength to tear the sign out from the concrete and smash it to pieces. “Well, I guess—”
“There’s the bus. Okay, kids. Form a line. No pushing.”
They didn’t listen.
Tiny children swarmed around Elgin, elbows whirling and tiny feet stepping all over his patent leather shoes. The road seemed to be receding and Elgin found himself cornered in the back of the bus stop shelter behind a mass of children.
The next bus pulled up. The doors opened.
“That’s my bus,” he said, but no one paid any attention.
Suddenly, he remembered his Sean Connery.
Elgin brandished his umbrella. Holding it in front of him, he opened and closed it rapidly as he advanced toward the bus, making clucking sounds like one would use to scare a flock of birds.
The Red Sea of children parted, the two teachers staring at him dumbfounded, and Elgin Ashton practically flew onto the bus.
The bus driver stared at him in the rear view mirror but said nothing.
“We’re gonna wait for the next but, kids,” said the teacher. Whines and complaints all around. “I said, we’re waiting!”
The doors closed. Elgin smiled to himself.
What a beautiful day.
Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction, strictly a product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance, perceived resemblance, or similarity to any other fictional works, to actual events or persons, living or dead, and any perceived slights of people, places, or organizations are products of the reader’s imagination. This fiction is the result of a partnership between a human writer and the character(s) he accessed with his creative subconscious as he raced through the story with them. No AI of any kind, generative or otherwise, was used in any way to write this story.