The 24 on Sherbrooke

The 24 does Sherbrooke end to end, and if you get on at the right time you can have a double seat to yourself most of the way east.

I've got one. She's got the one across, and she's got Le Mythe de Sisyphe open on her lap in the Folio edition with the cracked yellow spine.

She isn't reading it. She's holding the edge of the page between finger and thumb and moving her thumb.

The bus takes the curve at Papineau and everyone leans and comes back.

Outside it's the run of dépanneurs and phone repair and a church that's a climbing gym now. The windows fog at the bottom and stay clear at the top, so the city comes through as a band across the middle.

She looks up. We look at each other for about a second and a half, which is over the limit.

We both go back to the window.

At Frontenac she gets off. She leaves the book on the seat and I think she's forgotten it, and she hasn't, she's six feet up the sidewalk and doesn't turn.

I don't take it. Somebody at Pie-IX does — a guy in work boots who picks it up, looks at the cover, and puts it inside his jacket like it was his the whole time.