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The Heroine of the 250

I think one of the qualities we all admire is courage: seeing others able to do things we dare not even try, let alone accomplish. Sometimes, we wonder why they do it in the first place -what could possibly tempt them to act, if doing nothing would likely go unremarked? Is there a threshold unique to each of us whose breach simply cannot be ignored? Cannot go unchallenged?

It goes without saying that our past -our upbringing- follows us like a shadow we drag from place to place. While often suspected, like a disability it is seldom mentioned by strangers for fear of causing offence. Bus riders know this; we each wear our own idiosyncrasies like scarves, but depend on others to pretend they haven’t noticed, pretend that their eyes are so absorbed in their phones they are hardly aware of any commotion in the aisle or  silent mischief elsewhere on the bus. It is part and parcel of rider-hood: the undeclared fare we pay for public transit.

I was on the bus a few days ago. I had missed the quicker #257 Express to the Ferry Terminal, and had settled for the slower #250 that winds its way along Marine Drive, stopping frequently when passengers or traffic demand. It is a far more scenic route, and because of its patient meandering, ends up gathering an interesting potpourri of people and ages. The bus and its aisles periodically clog and unclog depending where it is along its journey and that day was no different; the variety of people are what makes the slow journey so interesting for me.

I found a seat right behind the reserved section whose retractable seats face the aisle to accommodate people with strollers, or wheelchairs, but that day there was only a young girl carrying a bouquet of flowers and a head full of golden curls occupying one of the unretracted seats. She looked about 11 or 12 years of age, with nothing obvious to suggest she needed to occupy the special seats: she had no bags, no backpack, and certainly no granny cart filled with groceries. Just an armful of flowers and a smile as her curious eyes vacuumed the bus for friends.

Eventually the bus began to fill up, and a bearded young man with a large backpack and travel-dirty clothes got on. He seemed ill at ease and I could hear him asking the driver in hesitant English, if he was on the correct bus for the ferry terminal. The driver seemed impatient with him and after a few questions, waved him to move further back in the bus. It was obvious that the man hadn’t understood what he’d been told, and that the driver was in a bad mood -you could tell by the jerky way he was using the horn and swerving the bus into traffic out of each stop before people had a chance to stabilize themselves in a seat, or find something to grab.

The bearded man sat down in the reserved section and pulled out his phone, but although he seemed to be trying to satisfy his unanswered answers, his face still looked worried. The young girl noticed that and put her flowers on the seat so she could cross the aisle to help him.

“Ferry Terminal?” she asked, speaking slowly.

He nodded his head and smiled.

“You’re okay,” she added. “This bus goes to Ferry Terminal.”

He seemed pleased at that, and she went back to her original seat.

Passengers got on, passengers got off, and I soon lost track of the changes, but evidently the flower girl had not. She watched the continuing turmoil with interest from behind her flowers as if she hoped someone she knew would happen by. Several young students struggled past us, trying for the back of the bus where I imagine their friends were gathered; some no doubt entered by the rear door as well. In Vancouver, students under 12 years of age no longer have to pay, but the rest all have special cards they tap on the machine at either door.

As the crowd began to thin again, I could hear giggling somewhere behind me and the bus suddenly veered over to the side of the road and stopped. The driver was obviously angry at something, and turned around in his seat. “You two, come here,” he yelled, and pointed his finger at the back of the bus. “Now!” he yelled again when nobody responded.

Two young girls slowly made their way to the front as the driver continued his rant. The taller of the two smirked at him as they approached the front, but carefully -the man seemed almost out of control.

“Get off the bus,” he raged, and opened the doors even though they weren’t at a bus stop.

The bus went silent, and eyes stared at each other in shock; no one dared to say anything. It’s hard to know how to react to something so unexpected; it’s easier to wait till things calm down, but in the awkward stillness I could almost hear their fingers tapping on their phones.

But not the little flower girl. She carefully placed the flowers on the empty seat beside her and strode purposefully up to the driver. “You shouldn’t have done that,” she said to the driver in a loud voice. “Both those girls were under 12. They didn’t have to pay, you know,” she added, standing defiantly at the front beside the driver’s seat, her arms folded across her chest like she must have seen her father do when he was cross. “They’re in my school!”

The driver seemed dumbfounded at being scolded by a child, and was silent for a moment. “I…” He hesitated, obviously embarrassed. “I saw that they didn’t pay… and…”

“And you were wrong,” flower girl said and turned to walk back to her seat.

Suddenly the bus erupted in applause, and the girl smiled sweetly as she sat down again, not entirely sure why people were clapping.

There seemed to be a sea-change behind the wheel at the front. The driver, a large and muscular man, got up from his seat and stood at the front of the bus to face his passengers. “Sorry about that, folks,” he said loudly enough that his deep voice would be heard at the back. And then, as if that absolved him of any guilt, sat down again behind the steering wheel and started the bus on its winding, but this time more careful journey to the terminal.

I glanced at the flower girl, who was now sitting quietly behind her bouquet shaking her head and rolling her eyes. Her father wouldn’t have let her get away with such a meagre apology, I could almost hear her think.

But the rest of us were proud of her, and when she got off shortly before the terminal she used the front door so she could walk past the driver. He said something to her that made her smile and she waved as the bus pulled away. Many of the passengers waved back.

I remembered something my father used to tell me when I was about her age, and beset by bullies in the school yard at recess: It’s not the size of the dog in the fight, it’s the size of the fight in the dog…

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