Alex

When I looked closer, I could tell she wasn't a teenager. She was still younger than I was, but there was a womanly grace to her, in spite of the way she giggled and blushed. Usually that kind of thing annoyed me, but for some reason this time I couldn't help laughing.

She turned her back to me and curled into a tight ball, nothing but a loose blue sweater, jeans, and a puff of short, fluffy dark hair in the seat next to me. I suspected she was faking, but sooner rather than later, her soft regular breathing told me that she was out like a light.

I didn't usually find myself drawn to elves, and that was what she reminded me of. She couldn't have been an inch over 5'5, and her blue eyes were enormous and fringed with long dark lashes, giving her a gamine quality. That made her harasser's offense even worse somehow, and when she was asleep, I turned around quickly to make sure that I knew where he was sitting. He gave me a confused look, clearly having spotted me glaring at him earlier. And the guy hadn’t actually done anything yet, so I couldn’t blame him for wondering.

I sighed, leaning back in the seat. There was almost but not quite enough space for my legs under the seat in front of me, and again I cursed myself for not just renting a car in Chicago and driving up, though I hadn't taken the bus anywhere in close to ten years. Driving would have meant I’d get to the old homestead faster, however, and it would also mean I had nothing to do the whole drive besides being alone with my thoughts. When my mother had asked yet again about when I would be heading home, it had been convenient to tell her I was bound by the bus schedule, which we both knew was late more often than not.

Even through the phone, I could sense her disapproval, but she knew better than to try to start fighting with me so early in the game. She might have gotten somewhere doing that with David, but it would just make me hang up and skip everyone's calls for the next six months just like I’d done before. No, she would wait until I was at White Pines, and we were all gathered together like one big happy family before she started on the old song and dance with my father in chorus.

I wasn't looking forward to that at all, and I was grateful to Chloe for distracting me from my imminent future for at least a short while. When I glanced over, I saw that she had relaxed a little in her sleep. Now I could see her face, round and with just the barest dusting of dark freckles over her nose. Cute, I tried to tell myself, but that leap of heat when we had touched suggested some other words.

Goddamn, but you're a hypocrite, I told myself. I felt disgusted at the man who had driven her into my arms- uh, my seat- but sitting next to Chloe herself, I could feel a strange pull towards her, something that started at my heart and seemed to spread everywhere else. My thoughts were unruly enough that I wondered what it would be like to kiss her on her flushed cheek, just gently enough that she didn't wake up. Or perhaps she would wake up, and smile and...

And hopefully call the cops, I thought bitterly. Jesus, but I'm an asshole sometimes.

I could have passed it off as being a result of a long time between partners. Jennifer and I had gotten serious until she decided she needed someone more passionate, and Gail had been fun until I realized that she liked being a doctor's girlfriend more than she actually liked me. They were both tall, elegant, ambitious women, a lawyer and an installation artist respectively. They were my ‘type,’ insomuch as I had a type, but Chloe was blowing that idea to bits. She looked—and acted—like neither one of them, but I'd never felt a tug of desire quite as strong as that brief flash a few minutes back. I really didn't know what to do with it.

I grunted as something jostled my leg and watched with narrowed eyes as the man in the Packers jacket headed towards the front of the bus. He dropped a scrap of paper into the driver's trash bin and made his way back, avoiding my gaze but watching Chloe with that same hungry gaze that had startled her so badly. It was enough to make me want to deal with him right then and there, but just then, as if her sleep had been disturbed by his passing, Chloe whimpered, turned over, and buried herself against my side.

I froze for a moment, thinking that the best thing to do would be gently turn her back around, but then I relaxed into her embrace almost against my will. She was a soft warm weight against me, and now her arm came over my chest, pulling me closer still. She made a soft satisfied sound that was half enticing, half funny, and fell into a deeper sleep again.

I sighed, giving up any ideas of immediate vengeance and settled down instead against Chloe's sleeping form. She felt almost shockingly good against my side, and I reminded myself again that it was time to find another girlfriend. Maybe it was time for something a little different than the tall and elegant types I preferred.

Chloe didn't wear any perfume. The way her head was burrowed right underneath my chin, I could smell her shampoo, something bright and fruity, and underneath that was her own scent, soft and uniquely hers. She smelled like sleep and soap and home, and I couldn't help drifting off myself. At some point, it became natural to throw my arm over her shoulders, gathering her close as I leaned back in my seat to sleep.

 

I woke up to the bus drawing to a stop, and for a moment I thought we had slept all the way to White Pines. Instead, the driver announced a fifteen minute stop in Madison, and told us we were welcome to leave the bus as long as we were back in time. He apparently had no intention of keeping to the always-late creed. Damn.

Chloe must have been exhausted because she barely stirred at all before turning back to the window. I was momentarily disappointed to feel her warmth draw away, but as her harasser brushed past me again, I decided that it was just as well. Not bothering to put on my coat, I followed him off the bus and to the small shelter where he proceeded to pull out a cigarette.

He regarded me warily as I approached him, perhaps getting ready to defend himself with some kind of protestation that she hadn't minded all that much or even that he had been paying her a compliment. I had heard plenty of that kind of talk before; it was just as common at a hospital as it is elsewhere. There was no one at the shelter except for the two of us, everyone else choosing to run to the coffee shop across the street.

“Hey man, your girl, she's really cute, you know?”

The whine in his voice made my hackles rise, and I knew that I couldn't conceal the look of disgust that crossed my face.

“Don't get back on the bus.”

He stared at me as if he wasn't sure that I was speaking English.

“What the hell, man...”

“I mean it. Don't get back on the bus. Stay here. Pass some time. There will be another bus here in three or four hours that runs the same route. Pay the driver and get on that one.”

He started to get angry, his brows beetling at me and puffing up like a toad.

“Hey, you can't tell me what to fucking...”

I shrugged, because I had figured that there was a better than average chance it would come to this. As he stepped forward, so did I, and my forearm slammed across his collarbones. I pushed him back off of his feet and slammed him into the Plexiglas wall of the shelter with nothing more than a grunt of effort. He yelped, but then my forearm rolled up to his throat, threatening to cut off his air supply. He stared at me, and I smiled mirthlessly.

“I can threaten you with all sorts of things if you like,” I said mildly. “I could call the police, I could refer you to the bus driver, I suppose, I could simply take it upon myself to get your name and start making life difficult for you...”

He looked supremely nervous at that, and I had the idea that he was wondering who I was and what I could actually do. It was less than what he thought, but his ignorance of the fact suited me just fine.

“... Or you can just call ahead to let your people know that you're going to be late, and take the second bus. Tell them you missed a connection or something. Then you never have to think about this again, and it all ends here.”

I released him to see what he would do, and after a moment where it looked as if he might have wanted to fight, he nodded, two quick jerks of the head.

I nodded, because there was no need to humiliate him further, turned, and walked back to the bus. From the seat, I watched, and he never left the shelter, not even when the bus driver announced we were leaving.

Good riddance.

When the bus pulled away from the Madison stop, Chloe stirred a little, stretching out and looking around. Her bleary eyes told me that she would have far rather stayed asleep, and she gazed at me in some slight confusion, something that I found strangely endearing. I had to stop myself from reaching out to tuck a strand of dark hair behind her ear.

“What's going on?” she asked. “Are we in White Pines already?”

“No, we have another few hours yet. Go back to sleep.”
“Oh, okay.”

With nothing more than that, she snuggled up against me again, and this time, I didn't hesitate to wrap my arm around her. I told myself that there was nothing wrong with it, that people often leaned against each other on long bus rides, and that after all, she had started it.

I must have dozed off myself because suddenly my eyes opened, it was three hours later, and Chloe was stirring under my arm.

“Mm, feels nice,” she murmured, but before she could enjoy herself too much, she came awake with a start, sitting up and drawing away. I was amused to see her cheek imprinted with the pattern of my sweater as she looked around in confusion.

“I am so, so sorry,” she said contritely. “I didn't mean to sleep all over you like that...”

“No problem at all,” I responded, stretching a little. “I got some sleep as well. No harm done.”

She looked relieved at that and her shy smile zinged its way through me every bit as strong as the previous electric shock.

“Thank you for not minding and for everything, really. That bus trip could have been a lot nastier if you hadn't been here and so willing to give up the fun of sitting alone.”

That was when we rolled into the small bus station at White Pines, and I realized that I might not be having much fun for a while. I put that out of my mind in favor of helping Chloe get put back together, and as we trundled to the front of the bus, she glanced behind her.

“Whatever happened to that guy who was bugging me?” she asked in confusion. I could have sworn he was sitting right back there.

“Lot of stops between here and northern Illinois,” I responded with complete honesty. “He probably just got off while we were sleeping.”