**The Number Twenty-One Bus**
After his father’s funeral, Oliver worried endlessly about his mum. The grief had nearly swallowed her whole. For weeks, she barely left the house, lost in a daze, and Oliver feared she might slip away too. Then, slowly, she began to stir—only to visit the cemetery, over and over.
The cycle might have dragged on if not for another loss—Gran, his father’s mother, passed away just eight months later. The second funeral jolted Mum awake more than any of Oliver’s pleading ever had.
“Mum, maybe you should go back to work?” he suggested. “Sitting home alone isn’t helping.”
“No, love. I’ll be fine. Just find yourself a nice girl, get married, give me grandkids—that’ll keep me busy. You’re nearly thirty, and still single,” she deflected, as always.
“Find someone like you, and I will,” Oliver promised.
And off she went, retelling the story of how she met Dad. Oliver could recite it word for word. But he never interrupted—what harm did it do?
“Did you love Dad straight away?” he asked, though he already knew the answer.
“Who *wouldn’t* love him? The moment I saw him, I was smitten. You’ve got his eyes, you know.”
That was new. “What were his eyes like?”
“Sharp. Honest. Like he could see right through you.”
“Ever try lying to him?” Oliver smirked.
“Once,” Mum admitted. “You were just starting nursery, and I wanted to go back to work, but nothing fit—I’d put on weight after having you. Money was tight back then, your dad was the only one working. And then I saw this blouse in a shop… spent every penny I had on it. Dreaded telling him.”
She paused, lost in memory. “He came home, took one look at me, and *knew*. No point hiding it. When I confessed, he just hugged me and said, ‘Good. I got a bonus—go buy yourself a skirt to match.’ I wore that outfit for years, till the fabric frayed. After that, he got promoted, and things got easier.”
“Mum, what about a holiday? A chance to clear your head.”
“Alone? Don’t be ridiculous.”
“You used to go before, when Dad couldn’t take time off. Make friends, have a laugh—maybe even meet someone. I wouldn’t mind,” he teased.
“*Oliver!* I’m a pensioner!”
“A very pretty one,” he countered, kissing her cheek. “Think about it.”
His parents’ love story was simple. Dad spotted Mum at a bus stop—petite, fair-haired, lovely. Normally shy around women, he’d blurted out the first thing that came to mind: “You waiting for the number fourteen?”
She’d laughed. “No, the twenty-one.”
“I panicked,” Dad later admitted. “Thought if you left, I’d never see you again.”
They’d boarded together, talked nonstop. Two years later, they married. Oliver came soon after. Their first flat? Number twenty-one.
Dad died on the twenty-first, too.
When Mum finally agreed to a seaside retreat, Oliver was relieved. At first, she called daily, bubbling with details. Then—silence.
“Busy!” she’d chirp when he rang. Her voice was *different*.
Then came the confession: “I’m bringing a friend home.”
Oliver’s stomach dropped.
The man—Geoffrey—was polished, overly keen. New clothes, but wearing *Dad’s slippers*. Oliver’s suspicions flared.
“Left a big family in London, did you?” he prodded. “Or were they *relieved*?”
Geoffrey flinched.
Mum gasped, clutching her chest. The ambulance arrived in minutes.
Back home, Geoffrey had vanished—along with her jewellery.
At the hospital, Mum wept. “I don’t know what came over me.”
“Don’t,” Oliver soothed. “He’s gone. That’s all that matters.”
Days later, at a bus stop, a girl stood waiting.
“You catching the twenty-one?” Oliver asked on a whim.
She smiled. “Yeah. Why?”
“Looks like we’re headed the same way.”