The Race

[jack_babalon]

7:52am.
Pleasantdale Rd. across the street from Valley Bluff Dr.
Suicide traffic. No light. Just cross & pray. Rush hour rocketing by, stuck in the middle of it navigating my way to the other side in a series of small steps and sudden dashes. Yuppy tanks & sleek bubble-rides whiz by me, doppler roar in the ear and the sun in my eye. I barely dodge a beaten down blue pick up truck with a small battalion of laborers packed in the back. They wave at me as I leap back. "Aloha" and then I see an opening, but I gotta move quick. Football blitz, I sprint between across the brief opening and hit the mud in front of my bus stop with a skid.
8:02am
One mob.
Two factions.
Both waiting for their bus. Both Buses late.
The first faction is a rabid pack of sugar induced preteens. They break up and form into little groups. The boys run around the bus stop, chasing each other and hollering back and forth. A small mob of the boys have taken to pulling empty soda cans out of the waste bin and tossing them under the wheels of passing vehicles. Whenever theres a crunch and rattle of direct hit a cheer goes up. The girls circle their wagons. Snap gum and holler on the phone. Nervous laughter and little shuffle dances to the music of their candy colored Ipods & Walkmans. They number around 30 or 40. Me? I'm in the other group. The Stoic & the Silent. The morning commuters. Standing around with the stone faced Sisters dressed up for the boardrooms and cube farms of Corporate America. Next to me a man mountain, still as a statue, stares ahead with a squint under the shade of his dented yellow construction helmet, next to him there are two skinny Brothers speaking in their native tongue, a soft melody of a language that sounds vaguely french, pretty words I can't understand contrasted by the frantic gestures of their hands motioning to the horizon and tapping the backs of their wrists, where watches would be, and shrugging with frustration to each other. Both camps are getting restless. Any minute it's gonna blow. We'll step out there and form a human wall and back up the traffic all the way to the next county over. A chain of will. Child & Adult. Black & White. Student & Worker. None will pass. And the mean busy faces behind the windows will not blur by us. They will not see us as funny little targets darting out of the way of their TV screen world. Where a steering wheel is a kind of PS2 controller. They will hang up their cell phones. They will lean into their horns with all their junk food induced weight. They will curse us and all those who bore us, and all those to come. Finally they'll unhook their seatbelts. Open their doors. Then, heresy of heresy, walk, yes walk like some kind of caveman or something, up to us and they will see it. The sun shining off the defiance in our smile.
8:06am
Finally. After squeezing as much of an eternity as you can in a handful of minutes the 124 shambles down the horizon corner of Pleasantdale. The white top, the orange numbers become clear as it turtle crawls towards our stop. The skinny little brothers nod to each other, a belated satisfaction on their face. The Man Mountain turns. Just his helmet, and just a few degrees. Just enough to offer his own slight nod of approval. The Sisters roll their eyes at each other shaking their heads, one of them is already on hold with MARTA customer service. I'm the only one of the commuters to break the silence with a loud sigh that segues into a "Finally!!!".
But then it happens.
Right around the #124 another bus appears. A #2 pencl yellow school bus sails around the bend, flashing white strobe lights to herald its approach. The kids now go quiet and form up. "Oh My God" I mutter as it hits me. We're absolutely, positively, 100 & 20 percent fucked if their bus beats ours. And i'm not the only one. Man mountain lets out a small grunt that sounds like someone woke a bear up with a pointed stick. One of the skinny Brothers says the first word I can understand: "Shit"
and we all nod with him, our gazes narrowing on the two buses descending on us. It's on. You can see it from here. You can see it in the kids eyes and you can see it in ours. The #124 still has the lead, it picks up a bit of velocity but the school bus is in the next lane closing the gap, suddenly a bike breaks between the two and rockets down ahead of us. "C'mon you sonuvabitch you can do it you can do it!" I chant under my breath, but then it happens the #124 pulls to the side for another stop a 1/2 mile ahead of us and the school bus takes the lead. The #124 recovers quick and comes racing after the school bus but it's too late, the school bus switches lanes and cuts it off then it slows down to a coast and pulls in. The bus driver waves smuggly at us. The door pops open and as the kids line up to enter. They laugh loudly. Some of them point at us and laugh louder. One kid who got on first taps on his window, we all look over, and he shoots us the bird. That's when Man Mountain finally laughs. A quick bark of a snort that loosens the rest of us up and we all kinda chuckle to ourselves. The #124 pulls in right behind it. We walk on over through the mud and board slowly. We take our seats and watch the procession of children finally dwindle down. A mother hugs her little boy. Big face and big eyes looking up at her smile. Backpack open and a coat thats to warm for Spring. He turns and looks over at us, like he might make a break for it and hop on our bus instead. Then he shakes his head to himself and does what he has to do. Just like the rest of us.
This has been twenty some odd minutes of a Thursday morning in Doraville.