Sue Katz: Consenting Adult: China, Come Back: A True Story

As I come out of the pharmacy in Davis Square, I am astounded by the intensity of the rain. I take a breath and then sprint across the street, jumping into my car as quickly as possible. Twisting around to my left to check the on-coming cars, I am trying to pull out into traffic safely. But suddenly there is a startling banging on the passenger-side window. A young woman, her long hair dripping, is crazily pointing at the top of her head and trying to get into my car via the locked door. It’s not scary – it’s just weird.

I open up the door, hustling to toss the CD books, the bag of fruit, the extra sweater and my purse from the passenger seat into the back as she clamors in and slams her door shut. “Follow that bus!” she screams. “My hat’s on that bus.”

I don’t hesitate. This request seems perfectly reasonable in these stormy circumstances, despite the decibels and the angst. I pull out in the direction of a bus that is at least ten cars in front of me. “I’m China,” she says, gulping air after each phrase. “I left my hat on the 87 bus. I realized it just as I got out of the bus and the door closed behind me. The driver wouldn’t open back up. She pulled away as I pounded on her doors.”

China obviously makes a habit of smacking glass. “I love that hat.” Is she hyperventilating? “I know we can catch her.” In fact, the bus happens to be heading for my neighborhood, but the rush-hour traffic and the monsoon are extending the distance between us. Within minutes we lose sight of it altogether.

On her lap China is holding a dry umbrella. “Yeah,” she says when she sees me glance at it, “I didn’t have time to think or even to open this.” She is in her twenties, with long auburn hair. Clearly she’s more than just a beautiful face – she’s incredibly determined to retrieve her favorite accessory. I find this perfectly reasonable.

I concentrate on catching the bus. It has become our joint quest, China and me. By now I too am nearly hyperventilating. I press through puddles and traffic, but there is no bus in sight. Interspersed between my clutching the steering wheel as I lean forward to peer through the downpour and China’s stories about herself and her questions about my life, are her fraught exclamations – “There she is! Faster, faster!”

We get past a Volkswagon VW that, in trying to turn left, has been holding us up. “I used to have one of those,” I tell her. “Years ago. My friend Maddog was a VW mechanic and she put it together for me from a ’58 engine and a ’64 body. In the 70s, I sold that sucker for $600.”

“Do you live on Harvard Street?” For some reason I accept her non-sequitor question as if she were one of those puzzling members of my family.

“No.”

“Because once I was hit by a car and a woman your age with a VW really helped me. Her face is a blur, because, well, you know, I had just been hit by a car.” Makes sense to me. China obviously conflates her Knights in shining armor – at least those of a certain age.

I drive several miles down Broadway, not once spotting the bus. I’ve arrived at my neighborhood – the center of which may be the final destination of that elusive 87 bus. She wants me to keep going, but once I am a few blocks past my building, I tell China that I’ve done about as much as I can. My friend Mary is arriving momentarily so I’m really sorry but I have to get home. China’s head is swiveling desperately. She wants the bus that stole her favorite hat and she is not going to hear anything that might impede her search. In her mind I’ve signed on for the duration. Charming as the idea is, I keep in mind that I am not a lifer in China’s drama.

I turn into the library and do a U-turn to head back to my own place. Along the way I look for an 87 bus stop so that I can send China back to Davis Square, where I picked her up. But then she screeches into my ear, “There she is!” I gun it in order to pull up right next to the bus, which is turning left. I am in the right lane – forbidden to turn. All I can do is honk and honk, but the bus driver is oblivious.

So the race is back on. “Go straight and take the next left,” China hollers excitedly. “We’ll cut her off on her way back down Broadway.” I accelerate down several blocks, watching my own building blur by, until I can make a legal left towards Broadway. I drive up to Broadway, but am stopped by a red light at the corner when the bus whizzes by. The chase has again cranked up. The driver doesn’t stop at the closest bus stop, the next stop, or the one after that – with this rain, no one is out on the streets. She is racing so fast that the bus is listing from side to side.

At this point I am ready to speed up, pass the bus and screech to a stop in front of it – just to end the adventure in the hopes of getting back home before my guest arrives. Luckily I just read about a man who was arrested for kidnapping for having trapped a woman in her car with his in the same way in a parking lot.

The god of red lights finally does me a favor and stops us both, side by side. Again I honk and this time the driver turns to look down on me. “Now!” I yell to China, as I try to sustain the driver’s gaze: I gesticulate, now pointing to China, now pointing to the bus doors, now begging her to wait a minute.

China crosses in front of me and then stands in the downpour knocking on the bus doors, a look of painful anticipation on her face. The driver looks at her and then at me. I’m a witness, I think she’s thinking. She has to do something. She opens the doors, China jumps up on the stairs and the light turns green. I take a right to double back to the main street and go home, panting. Suddenly my car feels cavernously empty and I wonder when next China will drop into it.