After a few weeks, I finally said yes to voluntarily venturing out among people. What the secret behind that rare, magical “yes” is, I still haven’t figured out. It seems to arrive only at exactly the right moment — one no mortal has any real understanding of. And so I stood at the bus stop, waiting for my connection. In my head, I was performing an elaborate dance to All About Me by Tender, which was playing in my headphones. Despite the biting cold, I felt pleasantly warm, and considering that I was on my way to a shopping mall teeming with human creatures in the middle of the post-Christmas sales, my mood was surprisingly good.
When I spotted my bus in the distance, slowly pulling in, I turned the volume down slightly. Even before it came to a full stop and the doors opened, I noticed a small group of tipsy people inside, accompanied by two or three children. It wasn’t entirely clear whether they were getting off, but once the bus stopped, it became obvious that they were. First, a man stumbled out, then the kids, until finally only one person remained in the doorway. A woman, roughly in her fifties, gripped the pole of the door with both hands and looked utterly unsure which direction she meant to go — or whether she meant to go anywhere at all. Leaning to the right, she clung to the doors as if they were her last remaining lifeline.
When I was almost certain that, for her own safety, she would end up staying on the bus, I stepped forward to board. At that very instant, she jolted in the opposite direction and lurched straight into me. Her final instinct of self-preservation was to stretch out her arm — her hand landing right on my breast, which served her as a solid anchor point. Wonderful, I thought. Right place, right time. At least she didn’t face-plant onto the pavement.
But as soon as she pulled her hand away, she tipped backward again. My automatic reflex kicked in: I grabbed her outstretched arm and helped her off the bus safely. It felt like some twisted children’s game — first, you grab my boob, then we cross-clutch each other’s arms, and finally, while you try to get off without wiping out, I step on board.
Once I was inside and the doors closed, I realised that half the bus was staring at me. Fantastic. It seems a rule of life that whenever I decide — after an endlessly long time — to voluntarily leave the safety of my home, something utterly absurd has to happen. Please tell me I’m not the only one…
