The Number 82

It was shaped like a cello, the puddle. Less a point of fact than a squinting interpretation which two sharp-nosed women, standing stoically by the curb, admired through a blanket of besieging rain. The taller of the two internally mused that the glassy curves rippled and seethed to the beat of the downpour giving the impression of an ethereal string concerto that Nature herself was conducting. Her thoughts turned to other sounds that could accompany the track. The background hum of traffic perhaps acting as a trombone choir or the rhythmic shuffling of shoes over concrete as percussion. 

The completion of the orchestra was lamentably cut short however when a zestful forefinger and forearm were prodded road-wards by the smaller of the two women, shortly followed by the arrival of the Number 82 bus which courteously pulled in with a sibilant sneeze to serve the aforementioned limbs of the smaller figure and in doing so completely ruined the formation of the puddle, expelling much of its contents over the back of a nearby gentleman much to the amusement of the passengers on the bus. I say amusement because until that juncture the man had been intriguingly scrutinising a branch from a holly tree at unnervingly close quarters rendering several onlookers to believe that they were witnessing the habits of someone extremely peculiar; a feeling that was only compounded when the saturation of the man's coat by the bus drew no reaction from him whatsoever.

What captivated him was this.

A sunburst lichen (Xanthoria parietina). Ernest Moss had walked the same route almost every weekday morning for six years and most mornings he could be found at some point inches away from this particular lichen for reasons that will become explicitly clear later on. But for now a salient truth must be imparted. Ernest was hopelessly unaware that the Number 82 bus he ordinarily caught was pulling away without him on it.