THUGLIT Issue Two (8 page)

The man's shoulders tensed and he turned around with a guilty look to put his nickel in the fare box. Red shook his head.

"What?" Cap asked.

"Sir? Our route?"

"Just trying to be professional."

"Jackass."

"Hey, it wasn't my idea to steal a bus just so we could be civil fucking servants."

"It'll work out. We'll drive this load of idiots around and then kick them all off and strip this thing down to nothing. We'll have the cash box and the scrap iron."

"We can't just kick them off. And what about the horses?"

"We'll figure it out, just calm down."

“Nothing bad can happen to Edward and Jonathan, Red.”

“Who?”

Cap looked sheepish.

“You named them, Cap? Never mind, of course you did.” Red rubbed his eyes.

"Ain't they ever gonna stop?" A scruffy-looking man said to his neighbor on the bus.

"No, sir, they have not yet and I've half a mind to write to the
Tribune
about this. Perhaps the publisher, Mr. Horace Greeley—a personal acquainta
nce I might add—can put a right
to this traveling menace." He checked a gold pocketwatch with a flourish. At the back of the car, the shine flashed in a young man’s hungry eyes.

"Well, I don't know any Horace Whathisface, but I tell you, this ain't right. I haven't seen one of these since I was just a wee slim girl," the portly woman said.

A filthy man with a crutch clambered aboard and a bump in the road stumbled him toward the hungry-eyed boy who caught him and put him back upon his balance.

"Thank you, lad. A kind soul you are." The filthy man took a tin whistle out of his pocket, but nobody saw the young man point out the gentleman with the pocketwatch.

"Ladies and gentleman, I am only a poor veteran of the war. I lost many a friend and my leg too at Antietam." The man rasped and began to play a melancholy refrain on the whistle, his cane sliding and tapping out a backbeat. A few of the passengers murmured to each other under their breath; things like: "a likely story—too old—poor man—get a jo
b." Most avoided eye
contact, but a few dropped pennies into his palm.

The bus hit another bump, this time more of a crater, and the beggar crashed into the dandy with the watch. Squawking, he shoved at the beggar who made a point to touch him as much as possible while he regained his balance.

“Terribly sorry, sir. Terribly,” he said before fleeing the bus with far more agility than he'd looked capable.

"What was that all about?" Cap asked as he and Red watched the beggar running away with his cane tucked under his arm.

"No idea," Red answered.

Seven in the morning became eight and began creeping up on nine. The city was awake and their strip of Sixth Avenue began to get lively.

"I do believe that I have been robbed!" cried the dandy and pointed at the youth
at the back of the bus.
"You."

"Me? I haven't moved from this spot. Ask your neighbors." He pointed to the fat woman and a gentleman ignoring the entire bus behind a copy of the
Tribune
.

"Maybe," the youth added, "you should keep better cover, you got valuables round your person."

Sputtering and collapsing, the dandy's face changed expressions several times until it settled on helpless disappointment. "It was a gift from my mother."

"Well that's what you get for showing it around on the bus, dear," the fat woman said, but patted his knee.

On the driver’s seat, panic rose.

"What the fuck did you turn here for?" Red raged as they turned onto 24th Street and headed to Broadway.

"What? It’s a straight line downtown. That's where we're going aren't we?" Cap said.

"Yeah. But not on Broadway you fucking eejit!"

"It'll be fine. It's early morning. Besides, I like Broadway. It's nice."

"It's nice? Are you soft? It's crowded as fuck. Turn around. Back up!"

Cap looked at the Clydesdales huffing and wheezing between the struts.

"Red, we can't turn. We've just go to keep going. It'll be fine."

"It fuckin' won't! Watch."

They neared t
he corner of Broadway and 24th S
treet. At nine in the morning, the city was in full swing, and as the bus neared the turn, Cap and Red's situation surpassed their worst nightmares. Previously, Cap's worst nightmare had been losing his hat and Red's had been something that's near indescribable and probably impossible anyway. Broadway teemed with people crashing, cursing, flowing and stomping in a multi-hued blur—and into these rapids, Cap and Red encountered the hell of the right turn.

"Turn, turn, turn!" Cap screamed at Red.

"Me? You've got the rei
ns. You turn!"

Cap looked at the rei
ns and the hands holding them as if they belonged to somebody else. "What the fuck do these do?"

"They turn the carriage, ya eejit," Red yelled.

Red had to help, but they got the Clydesdales moving in a merging sort of shuffle. Traffic waited for them, not out of courtesy, but because dozens of pedestrians and carriage drivers were staring at the 20-year-old transit relic pulled by the two wheezing draft horses.

They soon got over their shock and began shouting.

"The fuck are you doing? You can't just turn like that!"

"Hey asshole, what're you blind?"

"Stop, hey! Wait. Fuck!"

"Where the hell did you learn to drive?"

"I haven't seen the likes of this since I was a wee slim girl!" the portly woman scoffed and a small voice that seemed to come from nowhere whined, "I want my money back."

After several minutes of endless agony and fresh hell, Cap and Red managed the turn and once jammed in beside other drivers, they forgot their panic after seeing the advantage of size. Ignoring everything but the direction they wanted to go, and gentle urging for the horses, it became a much smoother trip.

"Excuse me," a voice came from inside the bus.

Cap and Red ignored it, concentrating on the road.

"Excuse me!" the portly woman called again.

"Hey you two!" The shriek startled Red, who nearly fell from his seat.

"What?" he yelled back once he'd caught himself, one leg off the bus.

"I didn't know this bus was going to take Broadway downtown."

Red gave her a blank look "So?"

"Well I need to be further west."

"Okay? How's that our problem?"

"What should I do?" She tried to cross her arms but they wouldn't make it over the mountain of her bosom.

The bus lurched and swung, sending Red scrambling again, as Cap made an abrupt shift in direction to avoid a cart loaded with fruit. Red gave
Cap an
annoyed look and turned back to the woman.

"Well, I..."

"Tell that fat old bitch to get the fuck off the b
us and walk she doesn't like it!
" Cap shouted.

"Why you... I..." she sputtered.

Red grinned at her and swung himself back up next to Cap.

"Cap, you damn near sent me into the street."

"This asshole," Cap pointed with his chin at the fruit-laden cart next to them and shouted, "learned how to drive yesterday."

The driver of the cart ignored him.

"Um, Cap."

"What?" He ground the word out like he was chewing on it.

"You drive many carriages before today?"

"Fuck you. Wh
o
s
e
fucking idea was this?"

"Well, we kinda thought of it together." Red said in a small voice.

Cap turned with a glare.

"C'mon, we're almost there, right? It's okay. No need to get angry. You're supposed to be the calm one," Red said.

"We're on 20th street! We've barely moved!" Cap shouted.

"You wanted to take Broadway."

"I fucking hate you, Red."

Red sighed. "There's no talking to you when you're like this Cap."

"Excuse me," came the voice of the portly woman.

Red muttered under his breath, "Oh, not again."

"Excuse me!"

Cap and Red stared forward, determined to ignore her away.

"Dammit, you will listen when I speak!" the portly woman screamed.

Red turned around. "Oh it's you. I thought you were getting off the bus?"

"I say you can't talk to her like that." The dandy stood behind the portly woman and behind them the other passengers were all glaring at Cap and Red.

"What the hell is this?" Red demanded.

"We want some answers and you're going to give them to us." The portly woman was smug and the small force at her back nodded.

Red looked at them and frowned. "Huh." He turned back around to talk to Cap.

"Hey where are you going?" one of the men yelled.

"We've got a problem," Red said to Cap.

"Red, I got
ta watch the road."

"Got a mutiny."

"What's a mutiny?"

"It's what we got back there."

"Mutiny
s are bad? Just a moment."

Cap paused to scream obscenities at a cabbie who'd gotten too close, and the man's face went white at the sudden ferocity of the abuse. Red waited until he was finished.

"Yeah. A mutiny's bad. Cap, are you okay?"

"Well, I'm a bit fucking busy driving this fucking bus, Red."

Red looked injured. "Just thought you'd want to know."

"So do something about it."

"Like what?"

"I don't know. Just handle it."

"You sure?"

Cap ignored him and glared down at the cabbie. "The fuck are you looking at?" The cabbie snapped his eyes forward.

"Okay." Red took a hatchet out of his belt and leaned around, hanging from the side of his perch.

"Listen up you fucking eejits, you shut the fuck up and calm down. Don't make me come back there," he said.

The portly woman just glared at him but her little army shrieked like children and backed away.

"I'm not about to be scared of you and your little toy."  She pulled a pistol from her skirts and sighted at Red's chest.

"Now," she said, "you're going to turn this bus west."

"Shit," Red said in shock, "You're stealing the bus?"

"We're just going the way we thought we were going when..." Red tuned out while she prattled on thinking she'd won and it was time for a victory speech. He caught about every third word: something about municipal obligation, civic duty, Spaniards, the working people and delicious cake. There was definitely something about cake there at the end. Red wasn't paying attention because he'd looked behind them and seen something scarier than a fat woman with a gun.

"That's a problem, it is." And he swung back up next to Cap, ignoring the portly woman's squawk.

"We've got another problem, Cap."

"You don't want to get shot by tubby back there?" Cap asked him, grinning.

"Glad you're having fun. Look behind us."

"Red I can't, I gotta keep my eyes on the road."

"It's not the road ahead should be worrying you. Look."

Cap turned around in the seat and looked.

"Oh fuck," he said.

"Yeah," Red answered.

Behind (and bearing fast upon them) was a real Broadway city bus running on tracks and pulled by a spirited team of horses. The driver was standing up, and while they couldn't hear him, his expression made it clear he was screaming.

"Fuck. Cap, we gotta move!"

"I'm trying," Cap said. "Lets go, boys. Good boys. I have carrots?"

"Goddammit you bags of flea-
infested bones, if you don't fuckin' move right now I'm gonna..." Red screamed, but it dawned on him he had no idea what to threaten them with.

"Don't fucking shout at them, Red. You'll upset them."

"Cap!" Red shouted, staring with fear behind them.

"What?" Cap shouted back, finally turning around.

"Oh fuck!" they shouted together as the city bus stopped just short of slamming into them. His horses screamed and reared in the struts. One of the Clydesdales coughed.

"What the fuck are you two yelling about?" the driver yelled.

"Uh. That is..." Red started.

"And where'd you get this rickety piece of junk from? I haven't seen one of these in years."

"That's what I told them." The fat lady's voice was a bit muffled for being inside the bus.

"I want my money back," the small voice whined.

"And those horses look like shit. Where'd you get them? The glue factory?"