This morning, an old couple in the bus station. He’s wearing pinstripe trousers & black shoes, shirt & tie & one of those rainproof coats like football managers wear. Steely grey hair brushed straight back. She’s wearing a shapeless purple anorak over a cream cardigan, black trousers, black shoes. She has dyed her hair black, & the roots are showing white. Her hair looks like she has slept clumsily on it, a big white flat patch with the edges sticking up like a forest clearing. She has a crutch on one arm & a canvas shopping bag that says BAG to the FUTURE. They must be going grocery shopping. He will walk the aisles in his shirt & tie. Until then they wait for the bus, they sit & stare along parallel lines into separate spaces, or gaze at their shoes & they say
not
one
word
to each other for twenty long minutes as the buses come & go & the guy on the opposite bench jingles his change
over &
over &
over again.