Seven Minutes on the Bus

The bus from New Westminster grumbled to a stop in front of a pack of blue-shirted deaf children. Their leaders (also deaf) escorted the children onto the bus – single file – with the elegance of panthers through the field of people.

One child, closely resembling a ten-year-old Freddie Mercury, sat down at the back of the bus sitting sideways so that when the brakes squealed inertia pulled at his thin little body like seaweed under ocean waves. He scanned the crowd; his eyes moved like oil on water. Without sound, faces must be far more telling. Two blue-shirted girls stood facing him and grabbed his attention with a fluid hand gesture. They began to sign, to speak, simultaneously. The boy didn’t seem phased by this. The girls looked like they were tying intricate knots. Their faces were calm, pleasant like that of people who haven’t been eroded by cursing and rude comments.

The bus slowed down again, the brakes screamed - the passengers grimaced from the high pitch sound – then hissed to a stop. The field of people tumbled off the bus and floated away like plucked grass.