my first short story: the last bus...

I was sitting there, all alone, on a bench very far from home. It had turned out that, that evening I had to take the bus home. It was long past dinner time and the average household would be watching the late-night reruns of their favorite soap operas. The problem with this bus stand, there was only one bus on this route and it seldom came. It was also the only portal of public transportation in that remote area. Households were only a handful and there were no shops nearby too. There was not a soul in sight and the last one I had seen was a beggar on fifth avenue. I was thinking of a lot of things that night. Essentially, I was thinking about the things I had lost and the circumstances where I had been a ‘failure’. And I was very good at that. I was an extremely talented failure. Quite literally. My late mother had been an elegant teacher of English in an established school in the city. She had been prolific in her work and she had gone to all ends to make me a worthwhile child acknowledgeable to her blood. No, she was not authoritative. By any means, she was not that. She was, in truth, extremely loving and only cared too much for the sake of my career. And which mother would not be so. But the love she has shown me is different. Like a talisman, it still drives the very life and soul of me. But, as I was saying, I was talented, thanks to the timeless efforts of my ‘time run-out’ mother and I knew so, due to the constant verifications and testimonials given by my dear relatives, close friends and the very caring tutors I have been under. So there I was, a “very talented failure”, sitting on that bench waiting for an uneasy contraption run by an organization I thoroughly hated to the core. The problem with me, I let my ruminations run amok. As I was saying, I was thinking of the times I had failed and it was a very long list. Do not think me to be a ‘schmuck’ of some sort, but that was and still is one of my favorite pass-times: Degrading my own self-esteem. I reveled in that avenue of entertainment. And it gave me great pleasure, I have absolutely no idea why, to make me feel like I was nothing more than a dung beetle’s morning breakfast. It could not have been a manufacturing deficit but I guess I picked up this attitude of mine somewhere down the line. There was this time in primary school where I stood on stage and just could not deliver my well practiced lines: “good morning! I am a policeman…!”. Since then, I have misplaced my favorite pencil, lost my bicycle, sneezed in the middle of class to form a stalactite of phlegm hanging from my nose and have dramatically missed the rung of a ladder just by an inch only to break one of my front teeth and fracture my right arm. And I have still not worked out how I managed to chip my front teeth when I fell only on my back. Fortunately, my mother had had buck teeth and this genetic trait, that had also passed down to me partially, had in some way counter-acted the chipping of my front teeth during my glorious and yet foolish efforts to be Spider-man. Since then, I have been on my infamous losing streak. Favorite pen, a friend’s phone number, a wad of loose cash, my 150 page math notebook (I had to write it again in an evening’s time for the strictest tutor of my life, bless her), and a lot of other ‘odds and ends’ shall we say. But, life’s beauty is that, it offers second chances. Opportunities to hold onto missed opportunities. Blessed interventions, to correct our nonchalantly committed mistakes. Yet, I could not forgive myself this time. Why had I not seen it coming?? My friend, who I had fought with over a trifle, had been looking for reconciliation and I had had to be too much of an egoistic git to go on and hug that guy, who had been, incidentally, my best friend since my primary classes. These are the times we fail. Fail to be humans and so humane. These are the times we forget that we were all born human beings, unlike our sympathizing imaginations that suggest that some of us (note: only at times), were born of alien beings. And some of us take the liberty of naming the species to which those alien beings belong. But seriously, life offers us theses second chances. And when we lose them, we know we deserve a spanking, irrespective of our ages.And these last chances have always kept coming. And all of us would have seen a lot of them in the short span of life that we have enjoyed. Like the millionth time ‘last warning’ we have heard from our professors. Like the loving hugs that we have received from our mothers, even after the sound thrashing and other lively fireworks. Like that last question on a questionnaire that gives us that bargain to pass. Like that tail-ender who would save the team from a disgraceful 2 digit total. Like that unused pocket that would mysteriously and magically hold a hundred bucks in it right when you needed it. Like that last bus that would come, out of nowhere, like a blessing from god, even after the last bus had already gone. So there I was sitting there, thinking of ways to make up with my friend, when I noticed that the local mosquitoes were having quite a feast at the ‘talented failure’ diner. It was then that, that scary thought struck me: What if there was no more a last bus…??