Tomorrow never comes

“Soon we will be there.” Said Charlie. I didn’t hear him at first because the back of the bus launched us into the air and we all squealed with delight.

Riding at the back of the school bus on the 401 was the greatest thing a small town elementary student could do. All those cracks filled in with asphalt on the highway that rose with the summer heat was great for launching the back of the bus in the air. The driver drove the bus so fast. There was nothing better.

“What did you say Charlie?” I laughed as I righted myself.

“Soon we will be there, and then we can see the tower, and then the dome and then we will go to the zoo, and then see elephants and then tigers, and then….” His sentence was cut short as we all flew up into the air again; squealing and laughing as if nothing else in the world mattered.

I noticed that Charlie wasn’t laughing. And that being thrown in the air did nothing for him. He sat stony faced and every once in a while repeated, “Soon we will be there.”

The bus hit the last bump and we all fell onto each other. Some were exaggerating the effect that the bus gave us, but we all laughed and enjoyed every second of it. To our dismay the bus turned onto the off ramp and we were no longer going fast.

There was a sigh mixed in with the giggles as the joy of being flung into the air was still coursing through our bodies. I turned to look at Charlie and saw that he wore the same face he had on before.

“Hey Charlie, wasn’t that fun?” I breathlessly asked.

“Sure, great, but not as great as China town, you know that Chinese immigrants helped make this country and some of the families still live there and we will see it soon, and the food is good, and …” He was interrupted by Miss. Jarvis.

“O.K. class we are almost there. Now make sure you have your water bottles and your buddy. This is a big city and we don’t want anyone to get lost.”

Just then we were passing the area that looked like China town. I couldn’t read any off the signs, “Hey Charlie is this China town?”

“Yeah but soon we will be at the dome, you know that is where we will win it all, and everyone will be happy because we will be….”

The bus stopped and we all got out to look at the buildings around us. One of the jokers looked up and pretended to fall backwards as if he couldn’t see the top of the buildings. We all laughed. Miss Jarvis started talking about when the dome was made and how it was made and why it was made and other things along those lines.

“Wow, Charlie. This place is great.”

“You think this is great wait till you see the tower. It is over half a kilometer tall. If you drop a penny….”

“All right class lets go.” Interrupted Miss Jarvis.

We all loved the sports paraphernalia in the dome and stopped to take pictures. Charlie would barely stay at one spot long enough for a picture. He would talk about how great this one thing was and then when we would see it, he was already talking about the next thing. It didn’t take long for us to make it to the tower.

In the tower and some of us were brave enough to stand on the glass floor. It looked like a life time of distance to the ground below us. Charlie didn’t even notice.

“You know there are pandas at the zoo.” He said.

At the zoo all the girls cooed at the pandas. “They are so cute,” most of them said. The boys ran to the tigers and the loins. Charlie told me about the owls in the bird sanctuary.

While eating lunch Charlie was talking about the play that we would see that afternoon.

Right before the play I asked him, “Are you having fun Charlie?”

“Oh, yes.” He said. “This will be a great play, there are so many famous people in it, and there is a dog, and the story is good, and there will be singing, and…”

“I know, you told me during lunch. But are you having fun? You are always talking about what we are going to do.”

“Uhhh, yeah, because it will be awesome.”

“Yeah, but you are not really see what we are doing now.”

“What do you mean?” He asked and before I could answer Miss Jarvis gathered us together.

During the play Charlie leaned in close to me and said, “I can’t wait till we ride the bus home.”

I barely heard him, but nodded anyways. The play was really good.