Noah Cicero - Best Behavior

The bus driver called for us to get back on the bus. There was still seven hours to go, seven long hours.

I found a seat in the back again.

In the back there were two white women, one in her twenties and one in her forties. The one in her twenties sat with a tall black guy in his twenties. They didn't have headphones or a book to read. The woman in her twenties whispered to the man in the backseat.

A black man in his late twenties dressed in baggy clothing talked on his cell phone.

I sat on the bus for an hour in silence listening to music on my headphones when the woman in her forties said, “Hey?”

I didn't respond at first and then she repeated it, “Hey, you!”

I looked over and said, “Yeah.”

Her face was tired. Her skin was pale and ghostlike. Her hair looked dirty, it was brown and straight. Her body had a little fat on it but not too much. She wasn't attractive. She was more of those people that Jesus talked to on The Mount. Those miserable people that walk the earth in unhappiness. Not knowing what happiness is, happiness not even occurring to them as an option.

She said, “Her and I just got out of prison.”

“How long were you in?”

“Four years.”

“That's a long time.”

“I know sweetie, it is. That guy my girlfriend is sitting with just asked her to have sex with him. He just got out of prison too. We're all riding home together on the bus.”

“I wasn't in prison.”

“Where were you?”

“Youngstown.”

“I'm from Allentown, that's like the same place.”

“We both have songs.”

“Yeah, yeah sweetie. Billy Joel wrote ours, who wrote yours?”

“Bruce Springsteen.”

“I think I heard that in a bar once,” she said.

“It's a good song.”

“Have you ever been to Allentown?”

“No.”

“I think I drove through Youngstown once. But I can't remember.”

“There's no reason for you to remember it.”

“Yeah, ain't like its Disney Land.”

“No, Youngstown isn't Disney Land and Allentown isn't Epcot Center,” I said.

“Where you going?”

“New York City.”

“What you doing there? Going to the Statue of Liberty, seeing a play on Broadway?”

“I'm bored.” I could have said I was a writer, I was going to get interviewed by a magazine, but I doubted she cared. I doubted I even cared. Boredom was the truth. I was being sincere.

“It's boring in prison.”

“Seems like it would be.”

I imagined her sitting in a cell. An old white woman, missing teeth, laying on her bed staring at the bunk above her. Waiting for time to pass. What a strange punishment, forcing a fellow human to lay in bed and wait for time to pass. Knowing when they got out a period of years had been stolen from their life. A person is living out their life in the world; their life doesn't turn out in a way that is conducive to behaving in a way that is permitted by the social contract established by its citizens whose lives turned out better. They commit a crime at a certain age. A court and its lawyers decide that they must leave society. That society would be better off without them. That must be a horrible feeling. Society notifying them that they are not wanted. Society does not want them so much they must be put in a cage in a large facility. They must be guarded by people carrying large cans of mace, sticks, and outside people with guns wait for them. Barb wire electric fences line the facility. They are pulled into the compound wearing hand cuffs chained up like an animal. Some humans decide that fellow humans are no good, so terrible they must be treated like animals.

The human made into animal sits inside her cell. She waits there like an animal. Fed like an animal, clothed like an animal, housed like an animal. They are so much like an animal they cannot even house themselves. They cannot control themselves like animals. The court decided that the woman across from me was at some point so horrible, she was not in control of herself to the point that she needed to be treated like an animal.

She didn't seem like an animal to me. She looked like a human. She had the form of a human. She talked, perhaps not perfect English, but it was common American English. Society had cast her out, had exiled her. That must have felt horrible to be treated like an animal.

She stopped talking after a while and we both went to sleep.

Several hours late the bus stopped for us to eat. I woke up and went outside to smoke.

The convict was there smoking.

The sky was overcast. It was cold. We were wearing winter coats. Her coat was given to her by the prison. Her outfit wasn't worth five dollars.

I was lonely so I stood near her and talked.

“It's so nice to be walking around,” she said

“What did you do to get in?”

“Writing bad checks.”

“Four years for bad checks?” I said.

“The government don't like it when you write bad checks.”

“Yeah, that's private property. Property is important to them.”

“Well, I mean it's a long story. I wasn't always like that. I went to college for a while when I was younger. I had kids. I was married.”

“You were married?”

“Yeah, to a guy named John. John was a wonderful man. He worked at a warehouse and worked hard. He earned good money. We had a house and money to spend. We got along great. Even though we had kids it never drove us apart. I saw some of my friends get married and have kids, and it fucked up their marriages. Either the wife or the husband really didn't actually want kids. And they go away. But John was good. We both wanted our kids. We still had sex all the time. We still would sit up at night and talk about stuff. You know what I mean, like deeper stuff.”

“Yeah, I've done that. It means a lot to talk to someone in the middle of the night about deeper stuff.”

“Yeah, John was a good man. He would always know what to do. He could fix things. If the house needed shingles replaced, John wouldn't waste any time, he would go up there and fix those shingles. If something was broken on the car, John would be out there the next day to fix it. He was strong too. He would pick me up and flip me on his shoulder and carry me around like I was a sack of potatoes. And the whole time I would be laughing. You know, just giggling. John was a good man. He didn't make me work too much either. I always had a job working register 20 hours a week to get grocery money. But nothing serious. I enjoyed working. I liked seeing people besides the kids and John a little bit every week. But it was important for me to see John every day. It was so important for me to get to touch him. I would do so many things for him. I would always make sure he had his favorite soda, Mountain Dew. The man had to have Mountain Dew. He loved mint chocolate chip ice cream. I always get that for him. He had to have chipped ham, never sliced, always chipped. See sweetie, I didn't have a great childhood. I can't really say my parents ever loved me. But John did, he loved me. He cared about me and I cared about him. But one day John came home and said he was dying of cancer. He was only 34. That was too young. We had been together for 12 years. Our oldest was 11. It didn't take long and he was dead.”

“He died?”

“Yeah, like, he was gone. I watched him die. He was so sick in that hospital bed. They pumped him full of morphine, he couldn't feel it. But I could. I could feel his pain. I was scared. Then I was really scared when he left. I didn't know what to do. I started working 40 hours a week at a Wal-Mart and started doing drugs with the younger girls. I didn't know how to live without John,” she started to cry. “I started doing drugs. And before you knew it I was writing fake checks to get money to buy drugs. When the police came for me I was coked out of my mind. They put me in a cage and I kept screaming for John. John never came through. He was dead.”