He’s a beautiful boy. He smiles like an angel and has blood on his hands and his mother lies dead in the hallway with a halo of crimson around her head. He’s a straight “A” student with a one way ticket to hell and a bus pass in his pocket. He has twenty minutes to wash, pack and make the next bus to nowhere. He might just make it.

She’s a beautiful girl. Her eyes are blue and have seen better days. She was raped before she was old enough to understand it and failed to make the cheerleading squad. She’s got a one way ticket to nowhere and a bus pass in her pocket. She has all the time in the world and is waiting for the first bus that looks interesting.

He sees her first. She’s on the bench following the three foot rule and he can either stand or invade her space. She barely reacts to his sudden presence. He’s a beautiful boy, but she’s a beautiful girl.

She keeps her nose buried in her book, but the words have begun to march off the page. They seem to have a mind of their own, resisting her efforts to herd them back into place. She watches as they wind lazily toward the boy, across his rust colored fingernails and around his curiously delicate hands.

He senses her looking, staring at his now clenched fists. Can she smell the blood, the flesh, the fear? Did he miss a spot when he was washing? He has a stuffed backpack and ten minutes to salvation and she won’t stop looking at him. He hopes her bus will come soon. He prays it’s a different one than his.

She’s given up trying not to stare, besides, the boy on the bench no longer has eyes. She’s a little worried because she knows they were there when he sat down and hopes whatever he has isn’t contagious. The words from the book are still meandering happily around him, forming odd sentences whenever they come together and then separating and moving on. She thinks she’d like to kiss him.

He’s a bit nervous. He can feel her probing eyes on every inch of his surface and wonders what she knows. Can she sense his guilt? He wants to run, desperately, but is rooted to the bench. He fumbles through his backpack in search of the comfort of wood and iron and wonders if anyone else is looking.

She sees him fumbling, wonders if she should offer to help. She decides not to, besides, he has started to lose his skin and she is mesmerized by the smooth machinery of his insides. She watches words sliding by in the red blood of his veins and other words moving gently across striated muscle. She’s amazed at the empty space they leave behind, like snail trails of nothingness.

He’s a beautiful boy. This morning he took a hammer and crushed in his mother’s skull in thanks for his existence. He had smiled the whole time. He thought he’d be okay with it. The screams have faded away and the bitter taste has left his mouth and his bus is pulling up.

She grabs his backpack as she boards the bus. She’s watched the boy disappear into the words and had coaxed them back onto the page. She tucks the book inside the pack next to a bloody hammer and a tattered baby blanket. She’s a beautiful girl on a bus to nowhere with a ticket in her hand and a beautiful boy in her soul.

The doors close, the bus moves on.