A matter of perception (short story)

The commercial bus I boarded from Costain to Palm Grove stopped twice- the first time to pick up a passenger and the second time, to drop off the same passenger.

She sat next to me, and I observed with faint feminine malice that although she was young and prettily decked out in tight blue jeans and green T-shirt, she had overdone her make-up and looked slightly ridiculous.

The bus was hot and the afternoon air was stifling. Perhaps it would rain tonight, I thought hopefully, and glanced at the cloudless sky. I was envisaging this more comfortable state of affairs when a sensation began to register in my mind. It seemed that the young lady was very cold. I could feel her body’s coolness through the layers of the brown suit and the shirt that I wore. I was puzzled. Did she just exit an extremely cold room seconds before getting on the bus and was finding it difficult to acclimatize?

I waited patiently for the afternoon heat to warm her up, but with every minute that passed she seemed to get colder.

I turned my head and studied her face for some explanation. She didn’t look uncomfortable at all, staring straight ahead like she had no care in the world. I began to wonder if I was imagining things but really that couldn’t be- especially as I was starting to shiver slightly! Should I ask her why she was so cold? Did she really need to be told that her body was as cold as ice?

I was temporarily distracted by the bus conductor who asked for the fare. With that sorted out, I turned back to the lady, this time with the intent of asking her why she was so cold.

I drew in a sharp breath when I looked at her. The tight blue jeans and green T-shirt was the same, but the lady was different. She was no longer young! Something absolutely impossible had happened in less than a minute. Where there had being a young lady, there was now an older lady! How on earth did she go from being young and trendy to old and wrinkled?

The now old lady turned at my startled movement and looked at me steadily for a while. She studied my dropped jaw, shocked eyes and trembling form. I was so afraid that I could not say a word.

Even as I stared, gripped with fear, I wondered how this scenario was going unobserved by other passengers. But as a lot of desperate people have discovered, the sad truth about life is that people no longer really look at their neighbours unless they are doing something totally out of this world. I wished to God that I was one such normal and uninterested person!

The old lady suddenly looked away and announced her intention to get off the bus at the next stop. With the break in eye contact, I released my breath, which I did not realize I had been holding, and stared firmly at my hands. They were shaking uncontrollably.

When she got off the bus, I couldn’t resist looking at her. I continued to stare at her as the bus moved till she was out of my sight.

I met the eyes of the bus conductor as I turned away. He was smirking.

“All you girls sef” he said in Pidgin English “you no see the man get wedding ring?”

“What man?” I asked confused

“What man” he mimicked jeeringly. His eyes shone with pleasure at finding a good sport in me. I could tell that he had every intention of humiliating me before the other passengers “Wetin you dey look outside the window?” he continued “No be the man wey commot the bus?”

“A man got off this bus at the bus stop?” I cried incredulously

The conductor looked at me suspiciously. It was obvious that he doubted my sanity.

“Yes madam” he answered before he turned firmly away “It was a man that got off the bus!”