The eggs were runny, the bacon was limp, and the cardboard-like substance on my plate wasn't toast. Someone had just left bread out long enough to grow stale. I put the newspaper down and asked for the check just in time to see my bus drive by. What the hell, I ordered another cup of delicious, watery coffee and waited for the next one. I left my tip, a quarter, and paid the check after writing on it a suggestion to the waitress that she find a job in any field but food service. I made it to the bus stop just in time to catch the bus I thought I'd missed. It was running thirty minutes late.

I found an empty seat mid-way back and flopped down. I heard the bus driver say, "put that butt out."

"You got it. Can you make this smog pump move? Eh?"

The driver flipped it in gear and stood on the gas so the bus heaved forward like a jackass with a bad disposition. I looked back through the cloud of diesel smoke to try to determine if we were really moving. Alas, we were indeed. We'd gone all of 300 feet and made it to a red light, which was more of a blessing when a hot hispanic chica got on. The driver instantly transformed into Barry White. Hell I thought he was gonna get off and carry her on board. She did seem to improve the atmosphere for the next twenty minutes, until she got up from her seat and pulled the cord to get off at the next stop. As she made her exit she said, with a surprisingly heavy accent, "It stinks in 'ere!"

I couldn't help but breathe in then and I had to agree with her. It really did "stink in 'ere". What was that odor anyway? I knew it like the back of my hand but I just couldn't place it in the here and now. No, it belonged in hooches, rice paddies, and on the banks of the Me Kong. Viet Nam! Death, is it some kind of curse that once you're exposed it will follow you forever? At least I knew what to look for, but I instinctively checked my shoes first.

The people toward the front didn't seem to notice anything wrong. The front of the bus was filled with office workers, nannies, kids, and couples. As you moved back things went downhill, washed-ups, washed-outs, winos, junkies, has-beens and will-be's. Then I saw one old man on the left side who seemed to be held in place by his arm wrapped over the rail. Other than that one anchor he seemed to bounce along lifelessly.

About then my concentration was destroyed as two drunk off duty cops settled down in front of me.

"The whole time the hooker was hiding in the closet."

"Ha, ha, ha. You're killing me, the whole time?"

God that made my head hurt. We pay them with our taxes.

I watched the old man for at least thirty minutes as he bounced along. I finally noticed that lividity had begun to seep into his arm, turning it a purplish-blue. I wondered if he was a street person who had been looking for a warm place to spend the night. I don't guess he bargained on a ride for eternity but that's what he got. The most remarkable thing was that no one noticed, or maybe no one cared to. His unblinking eyes, staring off in the direction of 70 or 80 years drew, then held my attention. Those eyes looked like they had seen too many of life's trials with too little happiness to even things out.

I saw that his fingers and the bottom of his hand had already turned purple and black. I wondered, was he running away or had he arrived? I didn't know but I figured the Wall Street Journals stuffed in his clothes weren't there to insulate his portfolio, but who really knows? Would someone deny this of Howard Hughes?

People came and went, occasionally glancing at him like they would at a squashed bug that disgusted them. Oddly enough he was wearing a silk dinner jacket with a cut and fit that could only have come from an expensive tailor's shop, though the cuffs were so frayed that the underlining was showing. I guess the scent of death was masked because he had soiled himself. A common occurrence at the time of death.

I went up and told the driver about the man. He just smiled broadly and said "All right! I'm going home early today".

As he pulled over to the curb I heard him call his location into base and asked for the cops to be sent out. I wondered what the two inebriated cops in front of me would do when the others showed up. Then the driver announced that he was stopping the bus and no one could leave until the police arrived.

A chorus of curses rose as the remaining passengers complained how their day was now ruined. I guess they didn't know how lucky they really were.