The Light in the Window
The light is beginning to slip from the sky. I wait at a pause in this winding road for the bus to approach. The bus is late and I am very aware of its absence. Five, ten, fifteen minutes. Impatience courses through me: there are people standing on either side of myself, chattering merrily. I hear only snatches of what they say.At last it comes barrelling along, headlights now streaming through darkness. I sit in the middle near the door so I hear it slide open and closed with a loud burst of air. There is something about riding the bus at night, in equal part comforting and disconcerting.The girl in front of me is talking with great eagerness to her companion. He reaches his arm around her shoulder. Her blonde ponytail wags as she speaks, words rising and falling to my consciousness in their high, earnest tone. Now their heads are close together. And I am behind them and alone.
There is laughter and lively conversation. Is it always this loud on the bus? The sound expands inside me and yet I am so far away. I hear everything from a distance. The voices have melded together to reach a pitch, a frequency that runs through my veins, meaning nothing but lingering there.
Everyone is talking and the seat beside me is empty. I have my earphones in and the white wire is twisted as it runs down to the source of the music flowing through it. Sometimes I leave them in after the music has faded and gone. Why? Perhaps I feel safer that way. There is no loneliness that cannot be shrouded, shielded by the expression that you are alright and content in your aloneness. These earphones are a layer of protection; often I see other passersby thus confined to their separate worlds. But now they all seem to be talking and together, and though I am alone, I really am listening to music and it is pouring forth and it is louder and louder, and yet it cannot shut out the sound of voices.
I never listen to music this loud. They are competing, the music and the words. I feel the din is clamouring for my attention, and yet I am dispensable within it, so unnecessary. I could be extracted from this scene and placed anywhere else. My presence might be easily erased. But how can this be when it is so large and swelling within my self?
I like to look out the window as we pass. There are little houses along the river, rising from the ground. It is a favourite pursuit of mine to glance into these houses for the light shining through the glass. Some of them are dim, but others exude warmth: little squares of gold are cut into the night, and though I want to hold onto them longer, I cannot. The bus rolls forward relentlessly, allowing only a glimpse of each life before it is gone and I, distant onlooker, am removed once again, somewhere else.
I rarely see anything other than a fleeting glow. However, occasionally there are brief pictures captured by my gaze. Someone is walking through the room; there are people sitting in the kitchen; the television is playing but no one is watching. At one point, I see a black cat perched on the windowsill and this is most exciting.
Eventually I reach my desired stop and step down onto the sidewalk. The bus rattles on without me. The noise has continued past my notice and I am no longer a part of it, if I ever was. I take out my earphones and it is suddenly still.
At first I walk, but I am late and so I begin to run. I run and I run faster across the leaf-strewn sidewalk as my backpack flaps behind me. I see no one else and maybe there is no one, because it feels as though there is only me and I am flying and the world is dark but unthreatening.
The old church rises up before me. I raced to arrive in time for the evening mass, but when I pull open the heavy door, emptiness greets my entrance: echoing loudly with the silence. Is everyone gone already? Could all traces of life really disappear so quickly? There is no other explanation than this: I am too late. All my hurry was in vain. I close the door and turn away slowly, onto the empty street.
The aloneness begins to deflate within my spirit. I walk back and see the disappearing end of the bus. I have to wait 20 minutes for the next one and by the time it comes, the inside has hollowed out. It is much quieter now. Soon I am home, after an hour of riding the bus, interposed by a brief bout of cardiovascular exercise.
Nothing has happened. And I have been nowhere, not really. Yet can this be? I have been so many places and the happenings float through my mind in aimless fragments.
It is completely dark as I look out of my room from within. Now I am the light in the window. I wonder what they would see in a glimpse of my world. I wonder how I would see myself. The streetlights are stretched across the road like a sparkling shore. At last I flick the blinds, extinguish the light, and sleep.