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The bus ride to Vegas is an energetic one - at least for the first three hours or so. After that, everyone settles down into their seats quietly to soothe the headaches that they all have. Some pull out headphones and their favorite music tape, others read magazines or books, and the rest stare out the window to watch the world go by.
Not long after, almost everyone is sound asleep - everyone except for Carmen. She has a pair of seats in the back to herself, which she’s grateful for. This whole time, she’s mostly been observing the other girls and cataloging the various landscapes that they roll by.
Carmen very much loves her life right now. In her opinion, she hit the jackpot. Here she is, on a bus filled with her best friends in the entire world, on her way to get famous doing the thing that makes her happiest.
The only thing that could make her happier right now is stopping to pee. She’s been holding it for almost an hour now, and she’s about to burst.
Finally, she walks all the way up to the front, quietly passing the other girls while trying to not let the jostle of the bus make her pee her pants.
Carmen asks nicely if they can stop to use the bathroom soon, and, although the driver rolls his eyes, he agrees. She thanks him and takes a seat closer to the front.
Eventually, they pull off the interstate and into the parking lot of a shady gas station, but Carmen will take what she can get. She rushes off the bus and into the store, spotting the restroom sign and making a dash for it.
She does her business, washes her hands, and starts to leave, but she catches the eye of the guy behind the counter, who looks very annoyed that she wasn’t going to buy anything. With a sigh, she walks to the candy aisle and grabs a bag of butterscotch candy.
She drops it on the counter and gives the guy two dollars. “Keep the change,” she smiles. He nods back at her without a word, and she hurries back to the bus.
“Thanks,” she says as she takes the steps. She starts walking back down the aisle to her seat and suddenly sees that, in fact, not everyone is asleep - Bash is still wide awake, staring out the window with a glazed-over look on his face, Rhonda passed out beside him.
“Hey,” Carmen whispers at him as the bus starts back up again. “Bash.”
He snaps his head over to her and flashes her a delayed, but disarming, smile. “Hey.”
Carmen raises her eyebrows at him and says, “Wanna come back here with me?”
Bash looks like he maybe wants to say yes, but then he looks like he maybe wants to say no, so Carmen lifts up her bag of butterscotch candies with a little grin and continues, “I have candy.”
Bash’s face takes on his trademark, magical look and he shrugs with a chuckle, “Sure, yeah, okay.”
Carmen grins as he carefully climbs over a fast-asleep Rhonda and follows down to the back of the bus, both of the flopping down in their seats as the bus gets onto the on-ramp.
“Gimme those.” Bash nudges her with his elbow and holds his hand out like a child. Carmen chuckles and hands the bag over.
Bash lets out an embarrassing sound when he pops on in his mouth. “I haven’t had butterscotch since I was a kid.”
“They were always my favorite,” Carmen says.
“Mine too!” Bash grins. Carmen takes the bag from him and gets a candy of her own.
They sit quietly as the bus speeds back onto the interstate, tasting the sweetness of the butterscotch and watching the smaller, more compact cars race past them in the left lane.
“So,” Carmen says, “how are you?”
“What do you mean? I’m great!” Bash exclaims. “ GLOW is going to Vegas and we’re gonna be a success!”
“Well, yeah, that’s amazing,” Carmen replies, “but I’m talking about you . Something seems . . . off.”
Bash’s grin falters a little, but only for a moment. “Nah, I’m fine.”
Carmen regards him curiously but ultimately lets it go. Bash seems relieved.
Then, he says, “So, heard any hot gossip lately?”
Carmen gives him a humorous, almost incredulous, look. “I never hear any ‘hot gossip.’”
“Eh, worth a shot,” Bash shrugs.
“But . . .” Carmen grins a little as Bash turns to her excitedly. “I have noticed something going on between Sam and Ruth.”
Bash’s eyes light up. “Yes! Me too! That’s totally happening!”
“But what about Russell?” Carmen reminds him conspiratorially.
Bash clasps his hands and puts them to his mouth, his jaw working the butterscotch as he nods seriously. “You make a good point.” He seems to think on it for a moment, then says, “Okay, here’s what’s probably gonna happen. Ruth and Russell will be happy long-distance for a while, but they’ll start to grow apart as Ruth and Sam grow closer , until finally, the whole thing with Ruth and Sam comes to a head, and Ruth and Russell break up in a big storm of confessions, and Sam and Ruth live happily ever after.”
Carmen lifts one eyebrow at him. He shrugs.
“Give or take the happily ever after.”
Carmen laughs and nods, “That’s better.”
They giggle together quietly for another minute before Carmen finally gets up the nerve to ask him what’s really been on her mind.
“So,” she says, “you and Rhonda.”
Bash swallows thickly but tries to hide it. “What about it? I’m in love with her.” He fidgets with the bottom of his blazer. “Plus,” he shrugs, “that other guy was creepy. At least she’s married to someone who doesn’t stalk her with baked goods.”
“That’s true,” Carmen says, though she knows something is wrong about this whole situation. “I don’t know, it just seemed out of the blue.”
Bash is clearly nervous. “Yeah.”
Carmen is now sorry that she asked. She says nothing for a minute, trying to figure out a way to change the subject.
She settles on saying, “ So, have you heard any news about Florian? I haven’t had a chance to look into it any more, but maybe you have?”
Carmen looks over at Bash, who has fallen completely silent, his gaze directed at the ground and his expression pained.
Carmen’s eyebrows knit together. “What’s wrong?”
Bash doesn’t answer, and it doesn’t look as if he’s going to.
“Bash? What is it?” she asks. “It’s okay, we’ll find him.”
Bash shakes his head, his face empty. “No. We won’t.”
“Sure we will!” Carmen replies.
“Well, I already found him,” Bash says. “Sort of.” His voice cracks and Carmen gets this feeling of dread right in the pit of her stomach, an aching, guttural feeling of fear.
“Bash, what is it?”
His eyes well up with tears and Carmen knows that something is terribly, terribly wrong. Bash shakes his head harder this time and covers his face with his hands, elbows on his knees. Quiet sobs shake his shoulders.
“Bash,” Carmen says, putting a hand on his arm, “Bash, talk to me.”
“Florian - he - he -”
Carmen wants to force it out of him (that’s what her brothers would do), but she knows better now. She gives him a moment, her hand still on his arm, letting him know that she’s there for him.
Finally, he calms down a little, pulling his hands from his face and wiping the tears off his cheeks. His eyes and face are all red as he says, “I got a call - from some hospital. Florian died.”
Carmen’s stomach drops. She doesn’t know what to do with this information. It’s too much, it’s too heavy. She can’t imagine how heavy it is to Bash.
Bash wipes his nose and sniffles. “Pneumonia. Technically .” He spits that word out with such disgust that Carmen was inclined to think it actually carried a foul taste.
“And . . . un-technically?”
Bash clenches his jaw. “She didn’t say, but . . . But it was . . . AIDS.”
Carmen sinks into herself a little. Admittedly, she doesn’t know much about anything like that, but she knows what it means. She knows what it’s about. She knows what it does.
“I’m . . . Bash, I am . . . so sorry,” she says, but that doesn’t feel like enough. It’s not enough. Nothing really is, she knows.
“He was my best friend,” Bash whimpers, his voice getting all high and broken. “He was . . . Fuck!”
Carmen doesn’t know what to do, but when Bash basically throws himself on her, she wraps her arms around him and holds him, which she guesses is good enough for him. He curls into her, sobbing even more. She gets the impression that he hasn’t done this yet.
She didn’t really know Florian, not like Bash did. But she met him at that party, and he seemed nice enough. He seemed pretty enamoured with Bash, from what she could tell, and Bash definitely seemed pretty enamoured with him.
She doesn’t say anything for a long time. The bus bounces all around the interstate, and Bash cries though all of it, balled up and practically in Carmen’s lap. It’s only after the sun has completely gone down and the road is empty that Bash says anything else.
“I loved him,” he whispers. He stopped crying a little while ago, but he’s still in Carmen’s arms. She doesn’t mind. She feels as safe as she imagines he does.
“I know,” she whispers back.
“I don’t love Rhonda.”
She sighs and touches his hair softly. “I know.”
“I don’t know what to do.”
He sounds so hopeless and broken, and Carmen realizes that she doesn't know what to do either. She doesn’t have a clue. But she knows better than to say that. Instead, the squeezes Bash just a little tighter.
“We’ll figure it out. It’ll be okay.”
She knows that Bash doesn’t really believe her, but it feels like a good thing to say.
She thinks that Bash may be the best friend she’s ever had. She would probably even fall in love with him, in another life. As for now, though, she holds him as a friend and vows that she will help him be happy.
He deserves that much.