Westlake, Donald E - Novel 50 Read Free Page B

anonymous traffic on Main Street.
                 A
bus appeared, out there, beyond the nearer line of traffic, signaling hugely for
a left turn with a powerful and slowly blinking yellow light—the only vibrantly
alive point in all that gray outdoors. The bus's huge
windshield wipers moved vertically back and forth arrhythmically, to separate
patterns, narrow straight-standing sentries patrolling to different beats.
                 Jack
made a sound, then cleared his throat. He said,
"Yours, or mine?"
                 "What
dif?"
                 Both
stood hipshot, palms against backs, fingers jammed down into hip pockets, in
unconscious imitation of the calm insouciance of characters in westerns, but
with angular tension in their poses. More than ever, that false familial
similarity hovered over them.
                 A
break in the streaming traffic; the bus made the turn, massively,
arthritically, the fat driver visible in his rainy fishbowl, turning and
turning the huge flat wheel. Chicago , said the sign above the windshield: Buddy's bus.
                 Jack's
grin was spastic; he'd wanted it to be his bus. "Well, Buddy," he said, "you're on."
                 "Here
I go," Buddy said, looking around for his single small suitcase. He saw
it, pointed at it, but didn't pick it up yet. Just beyond the window, the bus
heaved to a stop with a great hissing of air brakes. Passengers began to
disembark. Buddy grinned at Jack. "Knock 'em dead, Dad," he said.
                "You, too, Buddy."
                 Buddy's
grin widened. "Well, sure," he said, and mimed spraying the interior
of the depot with a machine gun.
                 Ex-passengers
leaped the wet space from bus to depot doorway. Jack said, "I'll miss
you."
                 "We'll
both be around," Buddy said with a shrug. "Send my folks your address
when you get to Big Town ."
                 "Sure.
And I'll get yours."
                 Buddy
took a pack of cigarettes from his shirt pocket, shook out two, gave one to Jack. Jack brought a Zippo lighter from his
trouser pocket and started to light Buddy's cigarette, but Buddy took the
lighter out of his hand and lit both cigarettes. Then Buddy held the lighter
up, flame off. He grinned at Jack and closed his hand around the lighter,
saying, "To remember you by, huh, Dad?"
                 There
was just the slightest, tiniest hesitation, and then Jack became effusively
agreeable: "Oh, sure! Take it, Buddy, sure thing. What a good idea. I
should have thought of it myself."
                 "Fine,"
Buddy said, and pocketed the lighter, as outside the Chicago bus gave an irritable-sounding honk.
                 "Well,"
Jack said, suddenly exuding nervousness, "I guess you're off."
                 "Right." Buddy picked up his suitcase and grinned
again. "Don't do anything I wouldn't do, Dad."
                 Awkwardly
trying for a joke, Jack said, "Gives me plenty of leeway, huh?"
                 "That's
right."
                 The
two friends shook hands, firmly, smiling at each other. Then Buddy stepped out
the door, ignored the rain, crossed through it to the bus and boarded,
instantly disappearing, though Jack kept peering through the wet plate-glass
window, paying no attention to the young couple in their twenties near him,
kissing farewell. The young man said a quick final word to the girl, then
turned and hurried out to the bus. The girl stood beside Jack, watching, as the
young man followed Buddy up into the bus, and the bus door closed.
                 For
a long second nothing happened.
                The bus groaned away, as though
movement was something alien to it. Jack stood where he was, but the girl moved
sideways along the window, paralleling the bus, until she bumped into Jack,
startling them both. “Oh!" she cried.