bus terminal gothic
-It's dark out. It'll be dark again long before this day's over. -"Where's the bus?" a customer asks you. But the bus tracker program hasn't been working for hours. Was the bus ever anywhere in the first place? You're not quite sure anymore. -A man you've never seen before is now suddenly asleep on the benches. His loud music echoes as his long legs sprawl about a series of sunflower seeds and tobacco, his many pieces of luggage a hurricane around him. He never entered at all, and he will never leave. He's always been here. -Pacing, small talk, fidgety fingers, discomfited silences: the many ways one deals with the blaring passage of time as they while away the ultimate preoccupation of nothing whatever. -The internet is slow again; you can now hear the approaching engine over the downpour of rain. A woman stands casually at the counter to buy a ticket for this bus, due to leave in two minutes. Her glassy eyes look at nothing in particular, then suddenly meet your own. You both regard each other briefly, but it is too late: she is already far away from here, on the other side of the country. -A pedestrian knocks at the window every single day without fail and waves at you with particular enthusiasm; you have no idea who they are. -You and the taxi driver nod in mutual familiarity; you both know precisely what it's like to occupy large gaps of time deep in thought and passing fancy. The rush of traffic becomes a trance, the distinct awareness of self both silent and palpable.