The Last Stop

Old Wu had been driving this route for sixteen years.

The Number 7 bus ran from the city center terminal to Locust Tree Village on the northern edge of town. Forty-five minutes each way. During the day, the passengers were mostly villagers heading to the city markets and young commuters. By the time the last bus rolled out at half past ten, there were rarely more than two people left on board.

But no matter the weather, one passenger never missed it.

An old woman. In her seventies, her graying hair pinned back neatly with a black clip. She always got on at the second-to-last stop—Cotton Mill Dormitory—rode one stop, and got off at Locust Tree Village. Then she'd disappear down a narrow village lane. Old Wu had no idea which building she lived in, but from behind, he could tell she walked slow but steady.

Three years. Spring, summer, autumn, winter. Not a single day missed.

She never spoke. A slight nod when boarding, two coins dropped into the fare box, then she'd sit in the third seat on the right, face pressed against the window, staring out until her stop. He'd tried a few times—"Watch your step, ma'am, it's windy"—and she'd always offer a small smile but no words. Eventually, he stopped trying. Some people ride the bus not to get anywhere, but for those minutes on the road when there's nothing they have to think about.

On the third evening after the Start of Winter, Old Wu pulled up to the Cotton Mill Dormitory stop and hit the brakes on instinct. The doors swung open.

Nobody got on.

The platform was empty. A few dry leaves skittered across the pavement under the dim streetlight, spinning in the wind.

He waited a few seconds, closed the doors, and kept driving.

The next night. The night after that. The night after that. A full week passed, and still no old woman.

It bothered him. When you drive a bus long enough, you don't learn every passenger's name, but you learn their rhythms. What they do, roughly who they are, and the exact moment something is off. In sixteen years, he'd seen plenty—people moving away, people landing in hospital, people who simply never appeared again. He never asked. Asking didn't help.

But this time, he couldn't let it go.

On the eighth night, after clocking out, Old Wu didn't go straight home. He rode his scooter from the Cotton Mill Dormitory stop down the village lane the old woman always walked.

Locust Tree Village was a half-demolished urban fringe settlement. Most of it had already been cleared for redevelopment; only a cluster of old houses still stood, inhabited. The lane was narrow, "DEMOLISH" painted in red on the walls on both sides. He pulled up to a three-story building with a light on the ground floor and a door left ajar.

He parked and knocked.

A woman in her forties answered, wiping her hands on her apron. "Can I help you?"

Old Wu didn't know how to begin. He didn't know the old woman's surname, her given name, which room she lived in. All he could say was: "I'm sorry, does an elderly woman live here? Seventies, graying hair, who takes the Number 7 last bus every night from Cotton Mill Dormitory to Locust Tree Village?"

The woman froze. She glanced back into the house.

Then she wiped her hands again and said, quiet: "You're talking about my mother."

"Is she—" Old Wu started.

"She passed last week," the woman said. Her voice was even, like she'd had to repeat it many times. "Stroke. It was quick. She didn't suffer."

Old Wu nodded. He had nothing to say.

The woman looked at him and, unexpectedly, smiled—her eyes glistening. "The night before she went, she told me the driver on the last bus was kind. Said he always waited until she was steady before pulling away."

Something tightened in Old Wu's throat.

"My mother took that bus every night for no real reason," the woman went on, folding her cloth. Her voice dropped. "My father used to work at the cotton mill. He'd come home on the Number 7 every evening, and when she was young, she'd meet him every day at the Locust Tree Village stop. After the mill closed, after he passed—it's been almost twenty years now—she still took that bus. From the stop where he used to get on, to the stop where they used to meet."

She sniffed and laughed, almost to herself. "I told her so many times—Mom, you don't have to go out every night, it's freezing. She said those forty-five minutes on the bus were the most peaceful part of her day."

Old Wu said nothing. He thought of her profile pressed against the window, her small nod, the thin fingers dropping coins into the box.

"Thank you," the woman said. "Thank you for always waiting."

Old Wu waved it off. He felt he shouldn't have come. Some people's habits carry someone else's entire life inside them, and he shouldn't have pried it open.

As he rode away on his scooter, the ten-thirty last bus pulled out of the Locust Tree Village terminal—empty, its headlights sweeping a white arc through the narrow lane.

Old Wu honked twice at the light.

It was the first time in sixteen years he hadn't seen the old woman on the last bus.

But he knew that tomorrow night at ten-thirty, he'd still hit the brakes at the Cotton Mill Dormitory stop, open the doors, and wait a few seconds.

Just in case.