lower than deep.

I grabbed an iced tea (diet, and with the classic Snapple wrapper so I can scrapbook it before it's extinct), ordered a coffee and scrambled egg whites, and stood in line next to my mother until we wandered over to the bus stop.

She stood with me until the bus, which was 20 minutes late for leaving and 40 minutes late, therefore, for arriving, pulled up and a stranger asked to see my ticket. I flashed a confirmation number, an arbitrary tattoo of my debit card's promise to make me show up. Then I hugged her goodbye, and meant it, and scrambled on board, making my way- slowly- to a booth until everyone's mother decided they should probably sit in a seat instead of staring at all of them from the aisle. Once I made it past them, I realized people had already been sitting on the bus.

"He stopped at 33rd first. That bastard." I whispered it, maybe not even aloud, and then looked out the window to see my mother's car, looking particularly miniscule next to the raised window of the bus, and kept examining it to make sure I was looking at the right license plate. I'd always been the one to memorize the numbers for us, even back when she drove the Jetta- the last VW Jetta to ever exist in a size larger than "compact." Anytime the automotive, the hotel, the AAA dealer, asked for the number, she would turn to me, and I would mutter, "mom, you've had it for years." That bastard.

She got on the highway before I had even put away my bags.