The Bus Driver Chapter 3:             Joe gets laid

"Arrgh! Scruff! Get OFF!" Joe opened his eyes to the eager dog's face close to his and wiped the saliva from his mouth and cheeks with his hands as he spluttered and shouted disgust at his best friend.

As he sat up Joe caught sight of himself in the mirror. His sticking out hair and bristly face emerged from the peachy robe incongruously and his expression changed from righteous indignation to guilty chagrin. Groaning and rubbing his eyes, he slipped the robe off and dropped it into the kitchen bin. Into the same bin went the aromatherapy bath oils as Joe tried desperately to reach equilibrium. But it was not happening so he shrugged his shoulders, dressed and went to answer his dog's urgent desire to go for a walk.

Outside it was cold, grey clouds floated above like scum floats on a dirty river. Joe's stomach felt empty and he shivered as much out of distress and confusion as from the unseasonably low temperature. Images from the dream rose in his consciousness and disappeared like popped bubbles as they collided with Joe's pragmatic, habitual awareness. He succeeded in squashing all memory of the previous night's pleasure as he reasserted his no nonsense attitude. Pulling it on and adjusting it for comfort, as if easing into a comfortable old sweater. The grey, cold environment was comfortable reality for Joe, dependable, understandable and familiar. He had learned early in life to welcome disappointment and frustrated ambition as reassurance of predictable continuity. Firmly based in this familiar fortitude Joe felt like himself again.

Scruff also felt that life had at last returned to normal, although he felt sure something was missing- he was not clear what it was- just an empty spot that used to be filled. It was an echo of his distress all those many, long, dog years ago when his mother's absence was filled by Joe, Susan and the boys' adoration and care. Only this time the hole was not being filled. Nevertheless he scampered and yapped around Joe's legs as they took their familiar walk together as if nothing was missing. Things became even more right and good when they returned and breakfasted on delicious meaty gravy and biscuits. Scruff did not know what Joe was having but it didn't smell very satisfying, so he ignored it as he licked and worried the bowl clean.

In fact Joe was eating the dry, tasteless, grainy stuff that Susan said was good for his health. Reminding himself in her absence, that at his age he just couldn't be too careful about how he treated his body, he added some honey to make it more palatable, but it just didn't seem to do the trick somehow. Sighing, he threw the remainder of the mush into the bin with the gown and bath oils, wincing when he glimpsed them. Shrugging his stooped shoulders he prepared to visit the doctor.

"Hello Joe" the doctor said as Joe obediently assented to the invitation to sit. "What can I do for you? I haven't seen you since you gave up smoking, haven't started again have you?"

"No- no Doctor, haven't had one for nearly three years now" Joe said remembering the months of cajoling and nagging that finally drove him to seek the doc's help to quit and the further months of craving and frustration that finally subsided into just another note in his general state of dissatisfaction.

"I-I've come to- because I er, well you see doctor, the thing is.....Susan's left me" He almost blurted the last phrase out as if it was highly shameful, which it was on one level, he thought, but why should he be ashamed? He had done nothing to cause it.

The Doctor surveyed Joe noting the stooped shoulders and the pleading, lost look in his eyes. His condition resonated with the Doctors own experience; still raw and inexplicable beneath the smooth exterior, almost two years after his own wife upped and left.

"The best things you could do now Joe would be get yourself back to work and keep occupied. How are you sleeping?"

The pleading look in Joe's upturned eyes said ‘not yet doc. please! I can't face it yet'.

Looking down intently at a stain on the carpet, Joe replied:

"Sleep's ok, it's the waking bit that's hard"

"Right Joe, I'll give you a sick note for a week, come back and see me next week and we'll see how you've been getting on. I'll give you some tablets, they will help, just ‘till you get back to normal" He was already writing the prescription and Joe didn't have the energy to tell him he didn't want drugs, so he just grunted, took the papers and thanked the Doctor.

Later, after a microwaved, frozen dinner, Joe decided to do something he hadn't done for over ten years; he shaved, showered and went to the pub.

The place was busy and noisy, it being Friday night, there was karaoke; not a favourite of Joe's but he was unconcerned. The lager and noise merged pleasantly to surround him with hedonistic comfort. He mused about his new found freedom and wondered how he might enjoy it to the full. The possibilities seemed boundless to his clouded sensibilities and his confidence grew and blossomed.

"Hiya!" said a woman flashing a smile and leaning herself unsteadily in Joe's direction. "You ‘avin' good nite?" Her shoulder length, bottle blond hair had a grease shiny, black and white stripe down the middle; like a miniature road way running from brow to crown. A scrawny orange body was judiciously exposed via a white satin, cropped top above a flat, slightly wrinkled when she leaned; belly. Sturdy legs emerged from white satin shorts, ending in white, gem encrusted boots.

"My name's Ruth, what's yours?" she asked. Her black fringed, cornflower blue eyes seemed to contain deep black mysterious pools. The accentuated dilation of her pupils was facilitated by the half ecstasy pill she had taken for the purpose of lending her gaze that sexually receptive look.

"I'll have a pint of Stella- ta" Joe laughed as she stared with incomprehension. "You asked me what I want to drink didn't you."

"Silly bastard!" she giggled and pushing her small chest out a little more she suggested he buy her a drink and reiterated her desire to know his name.

"Name's Joe, what you ‘avin' then?"

"Malibu and pineapple please", sure of her catch now, she chatted and wriggled expertly, as she observed Joe's interest increase.

He took her back to his place, alcohol fuelled; raw desire drove him past the point of no return. He wanted to shag the shit out of her. He wanted to bang her fucking brains out. He was steaming and he was gonna damn well blow!

Sex with Susan had become something like a religious ceremony and although he had retained his devotion and faith, the services had got more and more boring. Yet he never failed in his attention or in producing the right amount of enthusiasm. With Ruth it was more like an ‘eat as much as you like' deal to a half starved man.

Just as he was about to come he heard, or felt; the two senses seemed to merge; Omnicia's voice:

He filled with clarifying, exquisite peace that left him again as he relinquished his seed; silently, like a stream of hot, useless tears.

He felt numb and cold. Closing his eyes, he wished his interior world could be annihilated as easily as sight of the external world was extinguished. He wanted sleep to engulf him now but Ruth had other ideas:

"Mmm, fantastic, really great" she reached to stroke his cock admiringly but Joe blocked her hand with his so she just said: "ok baby, fancy a smoke? I'll save ya two's"

Joe grunted, wishing she would go away but tempted by the tobacco smoke, he took the offered cigarette and drew on it deeply.

"I've got some weed if you fancy a spliff" she said with a grin that struck Joe as almost child-like, but irritating child-like, like when they know they are pushing the limits and going for it anyway. She rummaged in her bag and finally pulled out a small, plastic packet containing stuff that looked to Joe like herbs. Before Joe's numb and weary mind could formulate an appropriate response, she began ripping cigarettes open and sticking papers together.

"I don't touch that shit" Joe finally managed to growl but she ignored him. She started chatting about her ‘boy':

"Yeah, just me and my boy" she reminded Joe of a boxing coach inflating the prowess of his featherweight champ.

"Oh he's a great kid, ya know, and smart! Fuck, he can give ya answers to questions you'd a never thought up. Yeah," she gazed adoringly into the distance as her fingers expertly formed the white cylinder.

Dangerous? Joe worried, trying to remember what he'd heard about the drug that she was so nonchalantly preparing. Something about psychos (image of Norman Bates) and jumping out of sixth floor windows.

"He conned his Nanna out of two quid last week!" she laughed proudly as she recounted her son's undeniable qualities. "She didn't know what was happening ‘till the dosh was spent on comics and sweets! That's ma boy" She lit up the spliff and took three deep draws on it before handing it over.

"Its good stuff" as she said this little clouds of smoke emerged with each word as if to punctuate the veracity of her statement. Joe looked at it and thought: ‘Oh what the hell! In for a penny, in for the fucking proverbial' and he took a deep drag.

Even before he exhaled the drug was filling his blood and brain. Everything inside and out became sparkly and fuzzy, all the cold hard thoughts, bed knobs, wall and doors- all became benign, soft, yielding and just absolutely as they should be. Ruth had put one of Susan's CD's in the player; world music, pan-pipes and percussion that sounded like two cocoanut shells banged together, as he has always thought. But now the strains of the melody filled his fuzzy senses with pleasure and he lay back in complete relaxation.  

On waking with the early light, Joe massaged his forehead as the nights adventure reminded itself to him. The woman was nowhere to be seen and Joe jumped up and out of bed as he remembered that his wallet containing sixty quid was lying on the dresser where he had placed it before undressing and availing himself of the good time. ‘Shit! She's gone and probably so is my money' he thought. However the wallet was still there and so was the money, well most of it; there was a note inside:

HAD A GREAT NITE TA. HAD TO GET BACK FOR MY BOY. BORROWED A TENNER WILL GIVE BACK TOMO.

LOVE RUTH XXXX

Joe sighed; he had no desire to see the woman again. Then he decided the chances were that he wouldn't see her or the tenner again, the thought cheered him and he decided he had got off quite easily really.