NINETY-SEVEN:MichaelMichael Delaney used to be fat. Not puppy-padding fat—bursting-frankfurts-in-a-boiling-pot fat. He remembered gym class and swimming lessons. All the thin guys could be divided into one of two groups: those who looked but didn’t comment, and those who looked and commented with enthusiasm.Tubby Bitch.Fat Mumma.Fanny Tits.The silent ones were the worst. They just stared.Fat kids are like alcoholics, he now knew. They always have excuses.“I’m not big, just big boned,” he said. Michael could fool himself but he couldn’t fool the skinny kids. “I’m fat. Butterball fat,” he would tell the person staring back at him in the mirror, smart enough to know that no fat kid ever got thin unless they started calling themselves what they really were.“I’m Santa-Claus fat. I’m I-make-you-sick fat. I’m I-make-myself-sick fat.”He was something else also, but that was harder to say.Another memory: crying after swimming class, hating having to strip down to his Speed
“PART TWO:On the Bus“ . . . there are no accidents. Nothing happens unless someone wills it to happen.”—William S. Burroughs”NINETY-SIXTrees along the highway like the skeletons of contortionists hired to distract commuters from the rising temperature outside. Bushfires devastated coastal New South Wales earlier that year, resulting in the death of four people. Over three hundred houses were lost. Many thought it nothing but blind luck that James Bridge escaped damage. Its townsfolk sat drinking beer on their front lawns, watching the skies roll brown as others less fortunate burned to death. Denial was the best distraction because bad things didn’t happen in places like this. Not in The Bridge.Airwaves still brimmed with news of Anna Wood, the Sydney girl who died in October from water intoxication after taking Ecstasy. There was a sense that something bad was seething in the cities, something which was yet to touch
NINETY-FIVE:The Gun7:40 am, November 12th, 1995A few hours before picking up her final passenger, Liz put a gun in her mouth with hands so sweaty the handle went slick. She gagged and forced vomit down. Throat aflame. Teeth clattered against the barrel of the Kel-Tec P11 9 mm pistol, a sound telling her brain, Wait a minute—I’m not dead.Yet.White noise. Liz tried to blink the noise away but every time her eyes closed, her vision worsened.***Outside, her father, Wes, tended to his garden. His trowel stabbed the earth and sliced a worm in two, matching halves arcing in silent agony amongst the weeds.Her brother in the shed plowed at the punching bag strung from the rafters on a chain. Jed’s knuckles started to bleed.Reggie, her mother, was in the living room of their house. A half-finished bundle of crochet sat at her feet. Needles imbedded in red yarn.On the other side of James Bridge, ten-year-old Suzie Marten woke to the sound of her mother coming home after a dogw
NINETY-FOUR:Reggie and JedHeavy bones wrapped in fifty-five years of worry. Reggie Frost clutched at her nightgown, startled. “Shit, Liz! Do you have to sneak around like that? You scared a decade off my life.”She smiled, making for the kitchen where her daughter stood. “You’re a bit blurry. I just put my eye drops in.” She stopped at the sink and watched the mess come into focus. “That bloody father of yours. He never washes his dishes.” A sausage finger scratched at the plates. “He knows I hate having to scrub itty-bitty pieces of cornflakes off with the steel wool.”Reggie threw a dishtowel over the edge of the sink and turned, intercepted by her daughter who crossed the room to kiss her on the cheek. A surge of warmth on Reggie’s skin, gone as quick as it came.“Bye, Mum,” Liz said, voice soft.A smile played at the corners of Reggie’s mouth as she watched her daughter stop near the open window and glance outside. The family dog, a large, black Rottweiler named Dog, yapped
NINETY-THREE:The Last PassengerTen minutes past eleven.“No charge today,” the driver told Michael. “Everyone’s riding free.” She avoided his stare, knuckles tight on the wheel.“Thank you,” he replied before continuing up the aisle. Loose change jingled in the pocket of his jeans from squirreling it away. He became very aware of how little oxygen was inside the bus. Everything struck him as thick. The metal handlebars he grabbed to keep his balance were almost too hot to touch. No air-conditioning, just a caged fan above the driver—no use to anyone, really.As Michael was about to drop into a seat in the first half of the bus, he made eye contact with two young women further up the aisle on the opposite side. The older one smiled at him.“Our lucky day, see?” she said.“Sure is,” he replied, caught off guard by her American accent.***Diana’s smile faded. Next to her, sixteen-year-old Julia shied away and watched her reflection in the window.***Sarah Carr toyed with th
NINETY-TWOThe voice of the teenager dripped into Liz Frost’s mind, a splattering of acid. Somewhere inside, the wet nose of The Beast turned towards its host, ruffling leathery wings. She slammed the brakes.“You went straight past that stop,” called the older of the two girls in the same seat.“There’s a—” started the young man close to her. He held a book in the air.Liz could tell he was about to say “a guythere” because she could see him out there on the path in the rear-vision mirror, approaching the bus.This new passenger appeared strong and athletic, lost in his early thirties perhaps, it was difficult to tell. Close cut hair, and a goatee masking someone younger. The wind plastered his plain gray shirt against the pad of his belly.Liz opened the door with hands that wouldn’t stop shaking.
NINETY-ONEJack Barker hated going unnoticed. In fact, there were few things on this planet that fueled his anger more.The bloody driver went straight past my stop. What am I invisible?He forced himself to calm down, pushing the heat back with each stride towards the bus. By the time the door opened, Jack almost had control of himself again. Almost.Once inside, he reached into his denims for change, wishing he’d worn shorts; it was too hot for pants like these. The veins in his forearms filled with blood, rising up through his skin like a string of cursive letters, reading, You need to get fit again, buddy. He gasped.Jack lifted his gaze to meet the driver’s.‘Death’ was the only word he could think to describe her.Like she hasn’t slept in years. Jesus.“What’s the rush, luv? You in the Grand Prix, too?” he said, shaking his head. Jack’s voice was a deep drawl. “It’s all right though.” He paused and glanced down the length of the bus to find everyone looking at him, clay p
NINETYPerspiration welled in the folds of Steve’s gut. The bus was fitted with large, inoperable side windows; above each were sliding glass panels a child might get a head through if they were dumb enough. They were all open however, and whatever air could get in the vehicle was in already.Steve imagined sitting at the Maitland Golf Club bar, a schooner in hand, talking to mates over the whirr of Formula One cars. “I can feel a XXXX comin’ on,” was the catchphrase from the advertisements—and the old line had never been more inviting.The fantasy dissipated as his gaze passed over the emergency escape window near the kid from the stop. Next to the window was a small box where a BREAK IN CASE OF EMERGENCY hammer should have be tied. Yet was not.Tears in the seating, scuffs on the handlebars. Alert wires sagged in long, thin smiles. Graffiti scratched into the glass on Steve’s right. Peeling warning stickers covered the walls, a faded cardboard advertisement for Wrigley’s Extra Su