The Bus Connection
The company I worked for ran on booze. Every party blurred into another round, and every team building ended at a bar. I played along because it was the currency of belonging. I could drink until my edges smoothed, sleep badly, then show up the next morning and that endurance passed for competence. After one of those nights I left fired up, not sloppy but alive in a way that felt like light coming from inside me.
There is a phenomenon I have carried all my life. My internal weather dictates how the world responds. When I am depressed, strangers recoil and treat me like static. When I am manic, people lean in as if caught in a current. I used to dismiss it as delusion. That night on the bus, glowing from drink and something more, I could not. The feedback loop was too real.
The bus smelled like vinyl and sweat. People stared at their phones. It was the kind of quiet where everyone was alone together, sealed off in their own screens. I felt like the only one awake inside that hush, the only one scanning for something beyond.
And yet ahead of me, a woman kept locking eyes with me. Not a glance, but held looks that lingered just long enough. Each time she looked away, she smiled. Each time she came back, the smile was a little wider. By the third time, she dropped her head too quickly, caught in her own embarrassment. She was flirting, plain as day. And it repeated for the whole ride until it was the only thing I could see.
When we pulled into the park and ride, the shuffle began. She angled herself so she ended up beside me as we stepped off into the night. I could feel her looking at me, waiting for me to bridge the distance.
And still I said nothing.
Because what if I was wrong? What if the glances were coincidence, or politeness misread by a man who wanted more from them than was ever there? What if I spoke and the spell collapsed, leaving me exposed as a fool? The glow can make you magnetic, but it can also make you reckless. I did not trust myself enough to risk it.
So I kept walking. I got in my car, and I drove home.
Discover more from toxic, quixotic
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Those moments of uncertainty when someone looks your way are never simple. Is she curious? Should you respond? Have you read it right? Life makes this exquisitely difficult, yet film and rom-com tropes have taught us to expect it to be straightforward. In truth, nothing about those moments is simple — they are fragile, ambiguous, and hard to navigate, which is precisely why they matter. I myself have never known how to navigate them, and so I’ve found myself shining in my own solitary light, suspended in ambiguity, serially and endlessly alone.
🙏
It seems only those who carry the glow can see it in others. That recognition is rare, and the rarity is its own form of solitude.