Grey

I walked out of the door earlier than usual, hoping for something, anything to be different. Nope, just the same as yesterday, gray skies reflecting dully from murky, grey puddles. The steady, misty rain covered me in the damp as I trudged towards the bus stop. My early start was supposed to get me to there in time to find a bench seat but no luck. The seats were all occupied by grayish lumps of sweatshirts. Each sweatshirt nodded to me wordlessly before retreating back into their headphones and coffee cups.  I had long since given up on either as gateways out of the colorless fog that my life seemed have become. The bus arrived announcing itself loudly but even that noise was muffled by the dead air. In the half light of the numerous burned out bulbs I stumble down the aisle and into a graffiti covered seat. My eyes linger on the numerous badly formed grayish, black tags scrawled on and around the seat. Who would really believe that the colorless, talentless graffiti that matches God’s colorless, talentless sky wrote the story of my life?

I used to read books on the bus and ignore the world just like all the other grey sweatshirts but now I people watch in the lame hope of seeing something different. The last time something different had appeared was a man with a tan in pastel colors who had ridden the bus for three stops the week before Halloween. Now it is the first week of December and my difference high has long faded and I desperately need another. Then it happens. The first thing I notice is the bus driver smiling, an occurrence that has never happened before. The second is a burst of yellow as she shakes out her leather overcoat before swiveling her eyes around the bus looking for a seat.  As she walks down the aisle my eyes are almost overwhelmed by the sheer difference of her, not a speck of grey is evident. Instead she is tightly bundled in by a lavender turtleneck sweater over crisp black slacks all made the more extravagant by her beautiful six inch Miu Miu heels. My eyes never leave her as she casually sits down in a seat a few rows in front of me. 

I have a new mission today. No longer am I going to school, now I am hers. I watch carefully, waiting for the moment where she makes her move to escape the blankness of the bus, to return to the wonderland she has appeared from. I have no intention of allowing her to escape alone though. She is my escape pod, my opportunity to find the rabbit hole to an interesting existence. There, she is moving. I slowly slide out the back door of the bus, carefully keeping her in sight but not following so close that she will become aware of me. I hate to have to keep my distance but my fear that she will disappear is stronger.

As we walk, together but not, I glance around to see if the world is changing around us. It’s not. We are on the north side of Downtown, walking under the monorail track surrounded by washed out red brick buildings and washed out grey people. Both of us are oblivious of the ghosts around us. Maybe we are in some sort of alternate, colorful universe, rendered invisible to all of the grey sweatshirts, only visible to each other. She is a half block ahead of me when she dips her hand into her blue and white checkered Louis Vuitton bag and comes out with a shiny brass key. She quickly inserts the key into an incongruous red door and disappears inside. The last glimpse I catch is of one of her large platinum hoops streaming behind her ear as she flits through the door.

Is this the end? It can’t be because the world hasn’t changed. I walk slowly to the corner and peek around to see if there is a side door. No door, a strange euphoria falling over me as I realize that there is only one way in and out. I look up and down the street finally spotting a bench conveniently situated twenty steps from the only door to her building. She has to come out eventually.

Two hours later my euphoria is a distant memory and I am starting to doubt if she will ever emerge. I stroll casually towards the door with an idea to try to get in by ringing all the rooms until someone buzzes me in. I stop in front of the phone and glance at the list hoping some spectacular name will scream out at me “I’m her!” Before I even read one name the door opens and another grey sweatshirt comes trudging out bumping into me briefly before turning out into the sidewalk. I turn from this disappointing reminder back to the hope that the apartment list represents but then whirl back towards the sweatshirt as I notice the sparkle of a platinum hoop jutting out of the hood.

I chase after her hoping I am wrong, it can’t be her, I need her to be different. I catch up to her at the corner where she waits for the light to change. My eyes pierce into her hood trying to convince my brain that this is a different woman.

“Can I help you?”

I just stare at this creature that can’t be my dream girl. The light changes and she starts to cross the street. I grab her by the back of the hood, pulling her up short and uncovering her honey blonde hair. I notice that the honey blonde is sprouting out of the brown roots that are showing badly.

“What the fuck dude? Let me go you freak!”

I have to be sure that this isn’t her so I rip the sweatshirt up and over her head revealing the lavender turtleneck. My vision blurs and takes on a reddish tinge as I hug her close and start to walk out into the road. She roughly pushes me away and runs off leaving me surrounded by a dark grey army of silent sweatshirts who are all staring at me. She was my hope but I guess hope doesn’t belong here.