"Hold you forever--"
"What?" Stephanie looked up from her book, but no really met her eyes; all of the other passengers were reading their own books, using their own phones, or talking with no phone in sight. Someone played music that drowned out most of it, including the high-pitched argument to her right. The mother sitting a seat away gave her what might have been a smile over her squabbling kids' heads, but it was blank-eyed and empty.
Stephanie hadn't been able to get her usual seat; she'd had to squeeze past a businessman already sweating through his button-up and a man who smelled headachingly of pot into the last seat in the back, where the metal divider separating the upper level from the lower section crushed her bag against her legs. The children fighting over the "free" seat beside her jostled her, making it too hard to continue reading; Stephanie pressed herself more closely against the window. She felt the music vibrating the glass.
"Can someone turn that off?" another passenger yelled out over it; the safety straps securing the woman's wheelchair shook with the sound. Other passengers agreed, or seemed to, from the way they began craning around with searching faces; Stephanie couldn't hear them.
None of them noticed that the traffic had stopped entirely. No one noticed the snarl of cars at the mouth of the bridge, or the figure standing at its head. Stephanie caught sight of the man's black helm just as the sound rose to a tuneless roar and the bridge lurched. It heaved upward in an oceanic wave that asphalt shouldn't do, that made Stephanie seasick. She hauled one of the kids up from the stairs where he'd fallen. He was crying, and his cries rose to a scream she couldn't hear as the bridge flexed upward. The girl rose up with it; her mother tried to hold her, but they both dropped to the floor as the bus fell back down.
They weren't the only ones out of their places; the aisles were a mess with people. Anyone who gained his feet lost them in the bridge's next undulation. Those who tried to help other people up were more likely to join them in the next drop. Stephanie held the boy to her and kept a tight grip on the rail even as she was bashed against it again and again. The bus driver opened the doors; but the passengers who made it out--or were shaken by the bus's wild throes--were crushed under the bus by its next leap, or thrown under other cars ahead.
The vibrations crushed the metal roof--for just a moment, they all heard their screams over the all-consuming roar of sound. The safety glass in the folded, popping almost entirely out of its frame. Another drop, and Stephanie gritted her teeth against a spray of glass from the window beside her. Other windows in the bus had broken, too--broken in time to hear the metallic twang as the support cable nearest the bus snapped.
The bridge heaved upward again, further than ever before. When the bus next came down, so did the bridge. People were thrown forward as forward became down, piling at the front of the bus. The broken windshield popped free under the press of people; too close below them, the October bay stretched out deep and blue. Pieces of asphalt and metal struck the water; it geysered up to soak them through the broken windows and torn roof. The child dangled from Stephanie's hands; his mother and sister were freefalling like all the rest, and Stephanie and her kid were one railing from joining them all. His sister was ragdolling, unconscious from the trauma. Please, not dead.
The metal bar against her chest made it difficult for Stephanie to breathe; she could no longer scream. The kid's mouth was a dark hole in his face, though she couldn't hear him over the noise and the chaos. A car struck the bus and everything twisted; the kid's hands, slick with sea spray, slipped from hers. His hand caught in her hair for just a moment, but a flare of pain and a tangle of brown in his fingers, and he kept falling.
"No!" but Stephanie couldn't hear herself.
"What?" Stephanie looked up from her book, but no really met her eyes; all of the other passengers were reading their own books, using their own phones, or talking with no phone in sight. Someone played music that drowned out most of it, including the high-pitched argument to her right. The mother sitting a seat away gave her what might have been a smile over her squabbling kids' heads, but it was blank-eyed and empty.
Stephanie hadn't been able to get her usual seat; she'd had to squeeze past a businessman already sweating through his button-up and a man who smelled headachingly of pot into the last seat in the back, where the metal divider separating the upper level from the lower section crushed her bag against her legs. The children fighting over the "free" seat beside her jostled her, making it too hard to continue reading; Stephanie pressed herself more closely against the window. She felt the music vibrating the glass.
"Can someone turn that off?" another passenger yelled out over it; the safety straps securing the woman's wheelchair shook with the sound. Other passengers agreed, or seemed to, from the way they began craning around with searching faces; Stephanie couldn't hear them.
None of them noticed that the traffic had stopped entirely. No one noticed the snarl of cars at the mouth of the bridge, or the figure standing at its head. Stephanie caught sight of the man's black helm just as the sound rose to a tuneless roar and the bridge lurched. It heaved upward in an oceanic wave that asphalt shouldn't do, that made Stephanie seasick. She hauled one of the kids up from the stairs where he'd fallen. He was crying, and his cries rose to a scream she couldn't hear as the bridge flexed upward. The girl rose up with it; her mother tried to hold her, but they both dropped to the floor as the bus fell back down.
They weren't the only ones out of their places; the aisles were a mess with people. Anyone who gained his feet lost them in the bridge's next undulation. Those who tried to help other people up were more likely to join them in the next drop. Stephanie held the boy to her and kept a tight grip on the rail even as she was bashed against it again and again. The bus driver opened the doors; but the passengers who made it out--or were shaken by the bus's wild throes--were crushed under the bus by its next leap, or thrown under other cars ahead.
The vibrations crushed the metal roof--for just a moment, they all heard their screams over the all-consuming roar of sound. The safety glass in the folded, popping almost entirely out of its frame. Another drop, and Stephanie gritted her teeth against a spray of glass from the window beside her. Other windows in the bus had broken, too--broken in time to hear the metallic twang as the support cable nearest the bus snapped.
The bridge heaved upward again, further than ever before. When the bus next came down, so did the bridge. People were thrown forward as forward became down, piling at the front of the bus. The broken windshield popped free under the press of people; too close below them, the October bay stretched out deep and blue. Pieces of asphalt and metal struck the water; it geysered up to soak them through the broken windows and torn roof. The child dangled from Stephanie's hands; his mother and sister were freefalling like all the rest, and Stephanie and her kid were one railing from joining them all. His sister was ragdolling, unconscious from the trauma. Please, not dead.
The metal bar against her chest made it difficult for Stephanie to breathe; she could no longer scream. The kid's mouth was a dark hole in his face, though she couldn't hear him over the noise and the chaos. A car struck the bus and everything twisted; the kid's hands, slick with sea spray, slipped from hers. His hand caught in her hair for just a moment, but a flare of pain and a tangle of brown in his fingers, and he kept falling.
"No!" but Stephanie couldn't hear herself.
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