bead bracelet

He waits for the bus in the terminal. People there look at him, they stare, they judge. He had just finished his act and all he wants to do is get home and read and eventually succumb to his beauty rest, awake for a new day and a new task. The bus arrives and he shows the driver his slip. The driver nods and he walks to the back of the bus, not sitting directly at the back but behind a young woman who is about his age and she looks at his reflection in the window. She wants to see if he's looking at her. He is, but he blocks her gaze with dark sunglasses. New sunglasses, Twenty dollar sunglasses he bought when he was on his date with chopsticks and tequila shots and kisses and grabs and caresses. But now he is on the bus, and the date is over and the acting night is complete. He wears a bead bracelet given to him by an old Asian woman in the market months ago. She made him sign something, but he didn't know what it was. Today he decided to wear it, after months of looking at it on his desk. The young woman opens her purse and takes out a leather case, a wallet. She looks through her bills, in front of the young man, knowing his eyes see each fiber. --120 dollars-- All 20 dollar bills. The man is poor, but he could woo this young lady perhaps. But how. He has had enough talk for the day and enough thinking for the month. Does she want sex? Or love? He reacts fast and takes off his bracelet. He holds it over the seat like a used condom and asks "Do you want this?" She looks away and says "No" abruptly and he reprieves and says "Sorry". She says "it's okay" and after about three stops, the young lady leaves the bus. What did he do wrong, he thought. Isn't that what people our age do? And then a revelation. He wraps the bracelet around his left ring finger, over and over, until it is tight on him. He looks at his palm with a overlapping bead bracelet ring on his finger. A tear hits the dirty bus floor.