Page 35 - Julie Thorley Nine Lives book

7. Nine Pence
A fteen-year-old girl reminds a bus driver of their last encounter.
‘Travel in style. Free wi- on board. Hand-stitched leather seats.’ You’d think they were advertising a luxury limousine
service, not a shuttle bus from the suburbs to the city centre. The smokers may have gone, but there’s still the litter and the grime, and that fusty, dusty smell. The bus is the last resort.
This is your space, where you have the power to refuse admission or to eject those who don’t stick to the rules. Take a moment to look behind you. Who’s travelling with you today? It looks to me like the usual mixture of pensioners too scared to bring the car into the city, a few foreigners who don’t have a British driving licence, a handful of harassed parents juggling bags and buggies, and that odd man travelling purely for the want of something to do.
Your space; your responsibility.
It can’t be easy to be a bus driver. I’m sure you get loads
of abuse from drunks and people who are simply having a bad day. There’s probably been many a time when you’ve caught the rough edge of someone’s bad mood, just because you happened to be there. I’m looking at your sad, lined face and your de ated posture. Is that the inevitable fallout from the job?
Or is it because of me? Do you even remember me and what you said the last time I tried to travel with you? Think back.
Would it have been so dif cult for you to give me the bene t of the doubt? I was fteen. A child. I’m sorry I didn’t have any ID on me, but I’d never been asked before to prove that I was
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