antidote
of bus rides and green coats
they’d met on the bus to downtown. it was arok’s first day at the office on floor 40. it was sara’s first day at the lab 18 floors below.
she thought he was a regular, and asked for his directions.
he acted all smooth; the perfect expert.
of course, they both missed their stop.
of course, along those years, she never failed to bring it up to tease him again and again.
of course, along those years, whenever he walked through downtown, he swore he could catch a glimpse of that green coat streaming in the air as if it was its first time running to work again.
and there it was again. vivid in arok’s eyes. streaming around the corner just east of keystone tower. a deep green windbreaker that almost shimmered in the light. the weight of its silver zipper bouncing the fabric in unexpected angles. the smile that went with it.
how could he not see them all?
he remembered that after that first run to work, they had bumped into each other again at the bus stop in front of their office tower.
“hey, i’m new here and obviously bad with directions,” he had joked, “and for some reason, you look like you know exactly which bus i should take next.”
“i can’t say i’m an expert, but i do agree that you obviously don’t look like one,” she had retorted, eyes rolling.
“i wonder why,” arok had replied in feigned shock.
an awkward silence later — “i’m sara by the way.”
“and i’m the idiot that made you run to work this morning.”
“oh maybe that’s why you look a tad bit familiar,” she laughed back.
and so they were fast friends. same bus, same bus stops, same office, same 9-to-5. and so day after day, for the twenty minutes to downtown and the twenty minutes back, they talked. because it was convenient. then they talked even when it wasn’t convenient. she even hung around in the elevator all the way up to floor 40 sometimes just for the extra minute. and it was then when he would spin around and wave her a good day, while those doors closed upon her and that green jacket.
today, though, arok took the bus to downtown and there was no sound of that silver zipper jingling in the air. and when he rode to floor 40 and looked back, there was no green jacket sleeve waving back.
it wasn’t like they couldn’t talk anymore. they tried. but it was now an awkward nine hour difference. someone was either at work or asleep. or stealing time. nowhere as convenient as those bus rides, even if sometimes he let the bus pass because she wasn’t there yet.
his days attacking the keyboard to ship yet another feature were as exciting as mud, knowing that there would be no surprise visit at lunch hour on her floor. no talk about bears or sea cucumbers or nintendo wiis or whatever else stupid topic it was on the bus ride back. no bits of candy she would nab for him from her lab’s pantry.
it had been two months this way. for some reason, her pharma lab decided that her talents would be best used in europe. and off went sara to some swiss city that was painfully far from their good old californian downtown. sure, her weekends were nothing but instastories of train rides and european cafes and full smiles. but even if she texted him paragraphs of whatever new thing she was up to next, all that excitement couldn’t quite reach him.
that, of course, arok kept to himself. a dull burn stewing in his chest. a mild irk sparked behind his eyebrows.
he wasn’t jealous of her. of course not. why would he hold anything against her?
he was jealous of the trains and the cafes and the other smiles.
was she, too, jealous of the bus and the elevator and the office building?
but arok stopped himself there and went back to typing up an email.
though he understood nothing about it, sometimes sara would talk about her lab job. and since he had such a fantastic first impression of being such an expert know-it-all— so fantastic that they got lost on that very first bus ride — he never pretended to understand all the medicinal and chemical terms she would throw at him.
arok even had a full chatpgt tab dedicated to him asking mostly stupid questions just to understand what she was saying.
but one morning, he didn’t have to use it to understand her med-speak. he was just heading to work and she had just clocked out of a seemingly endless day. he called just as he had gotten on the bus, and he swore he could see that green jacket up against the window beside him — as it should be. but alas the chair was empty.
he had called sara telling her he thought he was sick.
of course, sara being sara barraged him with questions of detailed symptoms, to which he answered he had no problem at all and was just fine.
“so if you’re perfectly okay, are you trying to tell me you’re that kind of sick right now?” sara caught on.
arok replied, “yep, that’s the one.”
“anything i could do to help you with that?”
“i’m afraid there’s no cure,” he said matter-of-factly.
“no,” she agreed, “but you could remedy the side effects,”
“not if you’re not here,” he pointed out.
“of course not,” she laughed, “i’m the poison.”
“no,” he disagreed, “you’re the antidote. but this antidote’s got some mean side effects.”
“sure”, she agreed, “but then it may be unwise to overdose.”
“yeah, you’re right. i may be relapsing.”
solid laughter. but he got distracted and missed the stop.
“hey, you made me miss the stop!”
“that’s just divine justice,” she said, “but that’s bad timing, cuz now you’re missing two things.”
“haha, very funny sara,” he waxed sarcastically, “gotta jump off now, though. see you when i see you.”
“get well soon,” she ended, “or not.”
arok chuckled as he got off the bus at the next stop. and though he still had time to spare, just for the heck of it, he decided to run.
of course, he wasn’t planning to get well soon.
of course, he knew they both had plenty enough on their plates so as not to need to bother too often.
but of course, as arok ran to work, he could still see that damn green coat.
if your absence makes my world quiet, how could I not miss you loudly?
some people have unexpectedly shown appreciation for my downbad yearncore short stories, so here’s another one for all y’all sentimental freaks hahaha -rr
