Mindy And The Bus Stop...A Short Story

Another Wonderful Weekly Writing Prompt

We're back with another incredible picture. This story for me went a little long and I'm thankful for that. Lately I've been done using only a couple of hundred words. I had to edit this one down.

Again, for those unfamiliar with the prompt, here are the rules:

1) Use the photo and the 5 words provided in your story 

2) Keep your word count 500 words or less.
3) You have until next Tuesday to link up your post.
4) Link up with your blog at Carrie's site: HERE via the inLinkz link.
5) Have fun, don’t stress, let those creative juices flow.

And here are the five word:

Cork

Violin

Seesaw

Toilet Paper

Composer

So, let's do this!

Mindy And The Bus Stop

Melvin's feet shuffled along the uneven sidewalk, his thoughts wandered far from the busy streets of Colorado's largest city. More than half a century earlier he walked the same path, though nothing existed  in this part of town but a trail leading from the school to his family farm. Now humanity infected his childhood world like a fungus growing uncontrolled in a once beautiful paradise. 

The grocery bags (plastic, not paper...) dug into Melvin's wrinkled hands as he carried his newly purchased items to his small apartment. He cursed both bags, but the one containing the toilet paper proved more awkward than the one with the canned fruit. Only half a block until he reached the bus stop. Maybe then he could relax and sit on the bench, as long as there weren't any of those idiot skateboarding teenagers just waiting to cause trouble or any cork-sniffing yuppie bank employees pretending to "save the environment" by riding a bus once a week.

Still, the arthritis in his joints or the pain in his back caused by the heavy grocery bags began to melt away when he thought of Mindy and he hoped she would be at the bus stop and not taking another sick day. Melvin worried about Mindy, especially lately. He remembered the first time he saw her, a young office assistant siting by herself on the bus bench. Usually Melvin never talked to anyone he met "outside." Can't trust someone under 50, he said to his buddies at the VFW. They all agreed and laughed as they drank on Tuesday nights. But Mindy, well...she was different.

"Springs coming early this year, don't you think?" Melvin remembered the first words he spoke to the girl dressed in clothes guaranteed not to draw attention. She looked so lonely, he thought when he first saw her. She wasn't beautiful, but there was something in her, something he thought his own daughter might look like had she lived to adulthood and not died in childbirth with her mother decades earlier. He also remembered the look of shock that someone would talk to her, an unprovoked conversation. Melvin saw a seesaw of emotions in the girl's green eyes.

"I hope so," she whispered and turned away. "I've always loved the spring in Colorado." The unlikely pair--two people separated in age by fifty years--began a friendship, one both not only appreciated, but needed. Melvin rounded the corner where an abandoned video game kiosk stood as if waiting for the wrecking ball, the grotesque faces surrounding the rotunda dome seemed to scream for their own destruction. The old veteran knew he would soon know if Mindy were there. A smile crossed his weathered face as he saw her there, sitting, waiting. He sat down and rested.

Mindy saw her friend and quickly turned off her iPod.

"What are you listening to today?"

"It's Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto."

"Mendelssohn, eh? He a good composer?"

"He's wonderful," she said.

Word Count:498