Destiny on the Number 78 Bus
- Grace Davies - poetry
- Aug 21, 2020
- 4 min read
Updated: Sep 29, 2024
The written short story is underneath the video of it being read out loud.
Her name was Abigail Jones. She was intelligent and educated and full of unused potential. A girl of her position and her era wasn’t to pursue such frivolities as education and a career. She was to obtain a job; support her parents; contribute to the family. That was until a suitable husband came along and took her off their hands. Then she could cook, clean and conceive and what use would be conjugating Latin verbs be then?
The first time he saw her on the top floor of the red double decker bus, it may have been the number 78, she was wearing stiletto heels, as red as the bus paint and as tall as a pair of stilts, a purple polka dot dress that cinched at the waist, flared at the skirt and a gossamer shawl, like dragonfly wings. Her hair was swept up in a chignon and her smile was full of irony. He approached her amidst the chatter of elderly ladies, the laughter of teenagers and the screams of a toddler tantruming, and made some lame remark, which was met with a raised eyebrow. He tried again.
‘So...what are you doing on this fine evening?’
‘I’m going to church, would you like to join me?’
And he was done for, forever.
Until he’d met her, this Abigail Jones, he’d believed himself to be worthless and had acted accordingly. That muggy night on the number 78 all that changed for good, if not for always. At least it did in part. He would still carry his worthlessness, like a brand from the key he’d worn around his neck as a child, burned into his skin, he’d never take it off. However, she’d made it a lighter weight to carry, made the chain looser, so that he was no longer choked by his own insecurities. Abigail Jones was not only his love but also his saviour, quite literally.
On that night, to church he did go and later to the dance hall and the soda bar. Her laugh sustained him, her smile guided him like a missile system and her innate goodness showed him how to be.
The day that they were married the birds sang in the trees; sparrows, skylarks and an unseasonable Robin, his back brown, his breast red, his tale a dart. The sun shone and the breeze felt cool on their faces. She wore a cream dress, simple, elegant, lovely. On that day, his life became full of beauty and truth. There were hard times: the still born, the children’s rebellions, the struggle for money. Through it all he had her, and she was everything.
Their house was always full of the fragrance of flowers, the sounds of laughter and rock and roll. She was continually singing, they would jive in the living room. Their children almost died of embarrassment the day that their parents finished a particularly vigorous dance routine and turned to find the Postman applauding them at their front window.
He crafted majestic furniture for their home, a grand oak dining table accompanied by eight chairs, one of which was her chair alone. Her chair had a back with tete- a-tetes carved into the wood, her favourite flower, each small trumpet delicately rendered. He made a coffee table to centre the room, with a top that would lift off like a tea tray and he made a rich mahogany writing desk, just for her.
Theirs' was a house of lengthy busy meals, oily engines, sticky hands and dirty paws. She was open to everyone and a flow of life travelled through her home, like blood pumping through veins. Until the day it didn’t anymore. Death is insidious, it creeps in at the edges, like a fox stalking a chicken house, returning again and again, looking for weakness. He wanted forever, but forever was not to be. What she left was a waiting shell.
After she’d gone people would stop him in the street and say something along the lines of,
‘You never knew me, but I knew your wife, she changed my life, she saved me.’
He would smile and make pleasantries, express his sorrow for their loss. Then he’d return to his living room with the purple and lime green couch, she’d insisted that they buy it in the last months, a final fuck you to death, and his lovely oak table, smooth and hard, with its 8 chairs. Seven chairs would be filled again with laughter and chatter or with bodies at least. One chair, the one with the tete-a-tetes, that would now remain a vacant chair, unused, a gash around the table, forever.
My debut poetry book - Shadows of the Invisible - A Journey Into Identity, is currently available on amazon - free on Kindle Unlimited - also available in paperback - click on the link below for this evocative poetry collection.
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