The bus sped past her. She could see an arc of berry-red betel nut juice splashing itself against the side of the bus from the driver's window. She was disgusted for a second, but the feeling was glazed over soon enough. She pushed on to the bus stop, trying to tell herself, I'm glad I didn't get that one.
When one came, she scaled the inhuman stairs and found a seat. The weathered blue naugahide made an old squeak as she sat down. The man across from her, and the woman behind her, were both staring unashamedly. Fuck, like I'm a mounted butterfly, she thought. No, they think I'm a slug in a killing jar, she corrected herself. "What does that make you?" she muttered under breath, sarcastic as usual.
The bus clattered and hummed down the street, barely missing two scooters (and their drivers, she reminded herself) as the driver gunned it through a red light. She looked out the window -- another line of high-rise atrocities, mildewy cement and ill-fitting glass, all capped with anti-theft grates. A few struggling plants dangled precariously in some of the grates. Fucking optimists, she thought.
She turned her attention from the detestable buildings, the infuriating traffic, to her copy of today's paper. The Taiwan English News, she noted again. TEN? What does that mean? Nothing, of course. It's just that way. No one cares enoughto actually design things that way, she thought.
Twelve grammar mistakes in the first article, as well as a few simple factual errors (an AK-47 is an assault rifle, not a machine gun; Brunei is a sovereign nation). Up to the TEN's usual standards, she snickered. The guy sitting across from her stared again; she shot him her most furious, deriding glance and he immediately averted his eyes, only barely sheathing his embarrassment in self-righteous arrogance.
She looked over the day's events: more bureaucrats (low-ranking ones, of course) cited for corruption; more ridiculous government schemes (they've decided to hold a concert to get people off drugs again); more cancer deaths near a government-monopoly gas station; more poison sold in convenience-store dumplings. The usual shit, she thought absently as she wrapped the paper back up and stuffed it into the obligatory convenience-store bag it had come in.
She closed her eyes and tried to remind herself of the less bile-filled moments she had had in this country. A pleasant swim in the ocean on a black-sand beach, under an indecisively grey sky, with the nearest people at least a few hundred meters away. A winter storm, with her favorite soothing music on the stereo and the cold rain pattering down on her little haven. Until the power went out, that was one of the best, she thought. Then there was -- no, that asshole had insulted her Chinese, that time. There was that one, clear, pure moment, when she was teaching her mid-level group. She didn't even remember what the teaching point had been, just for those rare, shining few seconds, her students were communicating with her, everyone was interested, it was almost like a family.
Next she knew, she had missed her stop. She quickly got up (ignoring the guy across from her, who still hadn't gotten off and took her sudden activity as a new source of interest and superiority), rung the bell after putting her whole weight on the greasy cord, and paid the fare. The driver gave her a sneer; she ignored him. She braced herself for the high-G stop ("gradual" was certainly not a word understood by any driver here) and climbed down the twisting, narrow stairs.
Walking to the school, she saw the same things she had seen every day of work. A noodle shop, with a few bare glints of stainless steel at the stove, all else appointed in rusty iron and slimy plastic. A used bookstore, with brown leaves piled up like well-ordered lawn rakings, and fading calendar girls from 1978 smiling at their cans of pineapple-coconut juice. A shopfront with piles of paper on a desk, a whiteboard full of illegible notes, a huge pile of generic products and a single sleeping worker. A rival school, finished in dirty greys and olives, interested secretaries jostling paperwork and parents visible through the glass doors, handing over money to educate their kids who stomped in protest. She worked her way around a mechanic, squatting on the sidewalk, holding up a smoldering cigarette to look at the messy-red guts of an ancient Honda. Then she was at work.
She waved -- not at the front-desk people, who couldn't care less if she was around or not -- but at the automatic door-beam, which grudgingly allowed her in. She saw one of her favorite teachers sitting there, preparing for class.
"How's it going?" she asked, as interested and genuine as she could muster.
"Uh?" said the other.
"'How's it going' -- like, 'How are you'?" she explained.
"Oh, fine."
"Good," was all she could think of to respond.
She sorted her materials, taking a little less time today than she usually did, getting her materials together, and soon she was in class.
"How are you?" she asked the few students who had come on time.
"Fmghndu?" came the reply.
"Oh, okay," was again all she had the energy to say.
The students mechanically drew their books and homework out of their black-and-white backpacks. She noticed how drab each pack looked -- the school's perky little logo either worn to its grey-green plastic base, covered with grime or covered in graffiti. Funny that I should notice that, she thought.
"No books today," she announced with a bare glimmer in her eyes. "We're just going to talk today." The students who understood groaned, and the others followed.
"What do you like to talk about?" she asked them.
"No like.""Basey ball.""T.V." came the replies. Most of them just sat, like the guy on the bus.
"Today we're going to talk about toys, okay?" she asked, pulling out a bright-blue, transparent water pistol.
"Gun," they intoned together. Some asked her in Chinese to give it to them; most actually said "gum," some corner of her awareness noted.
"Is it a toy gun or a real gun?" she asked, giving them her full pedagogical intonation.
"Doy," said the students, their attention already drained. Some slumped further in their chairs.
"What about this one?" she asked, withdrawing a police-issue 9mm from her bag of tricks. The students gaped -- a mixture of horror and, well, she wasn't sure -- was that actual interest? "See how it works?" she asked one last time, moving the slide, putting it in her mouth and decisively pulling the trigger.
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