Everywhere You Don't Belong by Gabriel Bump

Author:Gabriel Bump [Bump, Gabriel]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Algonquin Books
Published: 2020-02-15T00:00:00+00:00

Sunset

Paul said to look scary so people wouldn’t sit next to me. We were standing downtown waiting for the Megabus. To our right a man in a wrinkled blue suit crouched down and hugged two children. He was crying. The children were too. A woman stood behind the children; her arms were crossed and she was tapping her foot. After a few moments she pulled the kids away. She turned her head when the man in the wrinkled blue suit tried to kiss her forehead. The woman and children left, disappeared behind an office building. The bus was already fifteen minutes late. I only had a duffle bag. Paul and Grandma were going to mail me everything else. Microwave, Emmett Till poster, waffles, toaster, et cetera.

“At least you’re not like that guy,” Paul said, loudly enough for the man in the wrinkled blue suit to hear.

Paul had spent the whole morning trying to cheer me up. I told him I wasn’t sad, which was true. He insisted I was in denial. Grandma couldn’t bear my leaving. She protested, was still in bed when I left. After I bent down and kissed her forehead, she rolled over, pulled the sheet up to her nose, turned her back on me. I heard “I love you” when I closed the door. Or “Fuck you.”

The ground shook my feet.

“Here it comes,” Paul said.

The Megabus driver slammed on the brakes. He hopped out. He was wide-eyed and shaking.

“Let’s do this,” he said. “Let’s take y’all to another planet.”

“It’s not too late,” Paul said as he hoisted my duffle bag in next to the other luggage. It was too late. He wasn’t crying. I could tell he was trying his best not to. He probably thought his crying would make me cry. It wouldn’t have.

“Remember,” he said, “fart or burp if someone tries to sit next to you.”

He didn’t stay after I got on. He crossed the street and disappeared.

I-55 takes you from Chicago to Missouri, takes you through parts of Chicago I forgot existed: the Mexican neighborhoods that were once Polish neighborhoods, the Polish neighborhoods that were once swampland, the large chain auto parts shops that were once mom and pop auto parts shops. You have to take I-55 to get to Brookfield Zoo. Brookfield was out in the suburbs. I heard that zoo was nicer than ours.

I-55 ended in St. Louis. Almost everybody got off in St. Louis.

We got on I-70, which cut straight westward through the gut of Missouri. The bus drove into the sunset. In Chicago, I’d never seen a sunset. The buildings blocked the sun as it dipped below the horizon.

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