
Back in the late sixties, yes, the nineteen sixties, bus fare or often called car fare for an adult was thirty-five cents and for anyone twelve and under it was ten cents.
This was a time when parents felt it was safe for children, say around the ages of ten and up to travel by transit unaccompanied by an adult and I would travel from Verdun to downtown Montreal which was about a twenty-five-minute ride by car so a little longer by public transit.
This one day I (age 12) was returning home and waiting at the bus stop digging in my pocket to make sure I had my dime to put in the farebox.
Remembering back, I was talking to this older woman who was quite nice when my bus pulled up and we said good-bye to each other as she was taking a different bus.
I stepped up and deposited my dime when the bus driver said to me, you’re a quarter short young lady, to which I replied, I’m only twelve and he wouldn’t believe me making me get off the bus returning my dime to me.
Standing watching the bus drive away I explained to the nice lady I was talking to earlier what had just happened, and she reached into her purse and gave me a thirty-five cent bus ticket so that I could go home.
© Susan Zutautas 2019
This short story was written for Six Sentence Story over at GirlieOnTheEdge. This weeks challenge is to use the word FARE.