Stephen Dixon - What Is All This? - Uncollected Stories

I walked back to the bus, door opened, and I stepped inside. “Please.”

“Forty grens,” he said, driving off.

“I beg you to take me to the stop near my home. I’m not well.”

Then you’ve got to get off. Sick people can be infectious and therefore a living threat to all passengers and personnel.”

“But my wife and child have been waiting two hours for me. They usually pick me up at work, but my wife is ill today so I had to return home by bus for the first time. Look, I’ll give you the entire five tavos for the ride.”

“You trying to make me lose my job, besides getting me thrown in jail? Bribing a public officer, the Book of the State says, is a crime punishable by a minimum of three years imprisonment and the subsequent loss of all statesman rights for not less than ten years after release. I’m sorry, but my duty is to report you.”

“I wasn’t bribing you. I was giving you the money to hold, with the provision — which I thought you’d understand intuitively — that you send me the change when you’re able to, though with all expenses deleted.”

The Book of the State takes very seriously such an offense. It says that the giving of any amount excessive of regular fare to state public officers on state public transportation systems should be constituted a bribe.”

I reached for the lever that opened the door, but he swatted my wrist so hard my hand went limp. “Look what you’ve done,” I said, showing him my hand, which was already beginning to swell. “I need that hand for my job.”

“You were trying to escape. You’re really in for it now, brother, so just sit quietly in the back or you’ll be charged with crimes too numerous to memorize. But they’re all here,” and he pulled a leatherbound Book of the State out of his back pocket—“the rules and punishments and all in simple plain language for nobody to misinterpret.”

I sat in back of the bus. We drove for miles and I never saw another car, person or lit store along the road. I saw the first star of the night and made a wish. “Dear God,” I said. “Let me be with my family who need me as I need them. I know I’m not considered a religious person anymore, as I guess most people aren’t. But I do love my family, offend no one intentionally, speak the truth more than most, and up till now have had relatively little to complain about. Grant me this one wish.”

“What are you running on about back there?”

“Quite truthfully, I was wishing.”

The Book of the State,” he said, holding the book up, “—the good book expressly prohibits wishing on public systems if it interferes with the driver’s capability. My advice is to remain silent or your family will only be a pleasant part of your past.”

We approached the corner where I normally would have got off. My wife and child were there, both of them dressed warmly I was glad to see. I’d told Janet not to pick me up at the stop — told her to drink plenty of fluids and I’d see her at home a bit after six. But here she was, puzzled and sad as the bus drove past with me in it. She waved and shook her head to indicate she didn’t know what was going on, and I blew her a kiss which met the one she blew me. “I love you,” I wrote backwards in my condensation on the window. By the time I put the exclamation point on my already runny message, my wife and child were just dots in my sight.

“Nice looking frau,” the driver said. “Some boobs. Things like that really get to me — right here,” and he pointed as he laughed. “And some ass. I’m a big ass man and I saw it as we were driving up and she had her back to the bus. You’re a lucky brother, all right. What does she call herself?”

I was so distraught I began to cry.

“Can’t take a little bugging, eh? Can’t take other men even thinking about your wife, that it? Think she can only be yours, legs and neat ass and those beautiful boobs just waiting for you. You’re an evil man. Selfish, insecure, dissolute. Good things should be shared, the Book of the State says.” He stopped the bus to turn to a page in the book. “Right here it says that, and stop bawling and listen. ‘No person has a permanent right to anything. All things are to be shared by the total state. The total state is defined as “everyone within the state who hasn’t lost his statesmanship on his own or through his associations.”’ The Book also says that ‘family life, if not in the best interests of the state, can be temporarily disjoined or everlastingly dissolved if…’”

I stared out the window at the carless streets and sidewalks without pedestrians. Where was everyone? Home, enjoying dinner, happily by themselves or with one another.

All I could be secure about was that my family was always safe on these streets. Then I saw another bus behind us, filled with passengers. It pulled up alongside our bus and the two drivers saluted. I tapped on the window at the people getting off the bus, but nobody seemed to hear me. I rapped on the window, banged it with my fists, then put my foot through it and screamed through the hole I made “Please, help me get out. I’m being held prisoner by a maniacal driver. My wife and child are sick and need me at home.”

“We’re all getting sick,” a man said, walking away as he spoke. The flu and fallout’s going to get us all.”

Two young men stopped at the broken window. “Nasty mess,” one said, and the other laughed at his friend’s remark.

“Tell the driver to let me off,” I said. “I didn’t do anything.”

“You make that mess?” the same young man said. “Nasty, nasty,” and the other laughed again. The Book of the State says explicitly,” and he removed the book from his pocket, thumbed through the index and then turned to the page he wanted while the laughing man said That’s a very nice copy, George; real nice.” The Book says that the state, and I quote, ‘shall not take lightly any indifferent, capricious or premeditated destruction of state property, be it public land, buildings or vehicles.’” And flipping to the index again and then to another section inside the book; “‘A vehicle is considered part of the state, and thus public, if it meets any of the following sixteen criteria. One, if the state had acquired the vehicle since the Five-Seventeen Turnover. Two, if the state acquired and then lost the vehicle during the interim of the Preliminary Advance and the initial Letdown. Three, if the state—’”

“I’m being held prisoner for no possible state reason,” I yelled.

He turned to the index and then to a page in the book. “‘Prisoners, suspect or convicted, who try to cajole or coerce a statesman by looks, words or material enticements, shall have all statesman rights annulled for himself, if not previously done, and his immediate loved ones,’” and the other man kept nodding. “Furthermore, an immediate loved one is defined as…it says here someplace,” and he returned to the index.

“You ought to get a book with a good thumb index like mine,” the other man said, and he showed him his own book.

The first man found the right page and resumed his reading. “‘An immediate loved one is defined as a person who has had a close living association with the offender for two or more months preceding the time of offense, or is a direct genetic offspring of the offender, though not necessarily living with him at the time, or an indirect blood association of the offender, though not necessarily living with him at the time.’ Now, an indirect blood association isn’t easy to define verbatim or otherwise,” and he turned to the index.

I gave them the back of my head and they got the message and walked away. A woman came by. She was young, and by her looks she seemed gentle and understanding. I pleaded with her to speak to the driver to let me off the bus. “I’m innocent,” I said. “And I’ve loved ones who depend on me.”