Nothing

[Rojo]

I think I may have insomnia.

Just a thought.

I don't remember the last time I saw a familiar face. As of late life has become not a collection of objects and people and shapes and colours, but a blur of shattered glass and dulled colour with the sound fading in and out. Life has become a swamp through which I have to wade through.

The only time I feel normal is on the buses. I spend most of my time on buses, hopping from one end of London to the other. I see all kinds of people. People who will go out and be accountants, be shopkeepers, be house cleaners, be murderers and so much more. I envy them. I envy that their lives have any destination. I envy that they have things to do, places to see and people to meet. I have nothing.

Occasionally I shuffle out onto the streets, blinking like a child in the sunlight and stumble into a fast food resteraunt and order something I don't want to stop the pains in my stomach. If I can't afford the buses then I go down by the London Eye and perform. It's not even performing. It's sitting on a little box with my legs crossed and hoping people will put some money in the bag. Of course they do. Stupid tourists who arrive every day think I'm some sort of performer. Hah.

Then I get back on the buses, just going around and around endlessly. I get looks from people on the street. I never change my clothes. I never wash. I just ride the buses. Sometimes I wonder what life would be like if I had something to do with my time other than sit on an uncomfortable seat with bogeys and chewing gum on the underneath.

I need a life. I need a friend. I need to be saved.

[Asila]

I hoped the sunglasses and flesh-colored square bandage pasted to the side of my scratched face wouldn't draw any attention from the bus-hitching denizens of the night. But as I drifted into the bus station like a salt-scoured castaway to a shore, I abruptly realized how wishful that thinking was. The small number of people waiting for the bus locked their startled gazes on me, their eyes registering shock and pity.

Irritated, I threw the hood of my striped purple jacket over my head and shoved my trembling hands into the pockets, my mouth sinking into a frown. It was bad enough that I'd just had to employ every quick reflex I possessed and every cheap trick I knew in order to escape my crack-addict boyfriend. Bad enough that he'd managed to arrange my humiliation with these marks. Did I have to deal with their stares on top of it all?

No. I didn't. So I stalked down the row of seating, my footfalls loud with my annoyance, and tucked myself into the nook between the end of the bench and a trash can. My potential bus-mates quickly lost interest, leaving me to myself as they too waited for their ticket out of here. Even if "out of here" for them would prove relatively close.

The only problem being left to myself is that myself was not at all happy with me.

How could I have allowed this to happen? What had I become?

For the truth was that I was the only one to blame for what had happened. In order to escape my greedy foster mother, I had attached myself to a young musician with a place of his own. But so many of those new-age types developed self-destructive habits, and Troy had been no different.

But he didn't really matter. Not anymore. It was the realization that I had bought my freedom by selling out myself that had me cringing with the pangs of remorse. I could have done better. But I didn't have strength enough to place any trust in that potential. So I'd chosen what had seemed to be the easy way out, and I had paid the price.

As the bus rolled toward us, I stood. This bus was my chance to go somewhere else in this city. Somewhere away from here. Location didn't matter as long as it was away from what I had known. In my pocket was the wallet that I had snagged from my ex, the money from his latest deal within. It was my means for survival until I learned how to live.

But did I have the strength to face the uncertainty of a new beginning? As the doors swung open, I found myself paralyzed by doubt.

((So, you said on the c-box that you'd have your character "meet them after stumbling off a bus at 3:00 AM in the middle of Victoria." I hope you meant that, because that was the scenario that I tried to set up.))

[Rojo]

I feel like everyone else is listening to one great big song and I'm the only one without headphones.

I see hundreds of people everyday. Going about their buisness, stomping around in the direction of bars, fast-food joints, tourist attractions and office blocks. They're all so damn serious. Looking to the future, wondering if Stacy's got that report finished yet or if Fred has installed that new air conditioning unit yet. I am free of responsibility. I am free of that hurly-burly uncertainty. All I know about my future is the next destination of the bus.

The streets are now only lit by lonely street lamps, casting their orange glow every few feet. At this hour of the morning only drunkards, addicts and idiots wander about. I'm not sure of which category I fall into, but I know eventually I'll have to curl up in a park under a bush or sleep in someone's boat for the night and try to force myself to fall asleep, but I know I won't. I don't sleep; not anymore. Now I just...wait for dawn...

I stand as the bus stops. Everyone is forced forward slightly by the sudden stop, causing me to clutch onto one of the bright yellow poles with the red 'STOP' button on it like a lifeline. I don't even recognise skin colour anymore. Everyone's just a blur of different shades of grey and black and white. I can't tell if that...person in front has glasses, I can't tell if that entity across the street has bright yellow trainers on or their gender. I shuffle to the front of the bus, expecting the way onto the pavement to be clear, but there stands...

Oh.

Oh oh.

It's a girl. And I can see her. I can actually see her. She's wearing sunglasses and a purple striped jacket and she's got a flesh-coloured patch on her cheek. I can see her! For a moment I almost feel a long-forgotten sensation of happiness, but it's only fleeting, like a whisper of a mouse dying in the middle of a rainstorm. It's strange. Everything else is a blur, like glasses when you get them wet or smudged and all the colours seem runny and stretched out. But her? No, she is crisp and clean and suprisingly pretty. I take am moment just to examine the front view, recalling all those feelings the curves of women tend to evoke and then forgetting them because it's all just pointless.

I stare for a few seconds more, then I turn around and go and sit back down. I recieve annoyed tutting from a couple of the other people in the line behind me, but I do not care. There's something different about this girl. And I intend to find out what.

[Asila]

The passengers flowed out of the bus, expelled by the machine's long hiss. As they trickled into the night, the new passengers moved forward to be swallowed by the narrow doorway. As the numbers waiting with me dwindled, I felt a pang of longing. I, too, wanted to be held secure in that steel giant's cold embrace. I would not be left here on these uncertain streets to face a future I did not want for myself.

I stood. I would face this new beginning because I must. Doubt could only be my enemy, not my friend.

I moved forward. Drifting up the steps I felt as weightless as smoke, but just as free to soar over objects that were hopelessly rooted to the ground. I paid my fare to the bus driver and sauntered down the aisle, carefully trying to divine which passenger would give me the least trouble. This salvation I found in a rather ragged individual who seemed preoccupied enough with troubles of his own to be depended on for my solitude. I sat across from him and turned to the window, gazing once again at the damage reflected in that night-backed mirror.

My reflection stared back at me, pale gray eyes a bit wild, a touch too intense. Unsettled. My deep red hair leaped in disheveled waves where my hood could not contain it, the roots showing an inch and a half of dark brown. Of course, the bandage and scratches were a major source of irritation for me, but they were not what irked me most. What I was really hating right now was the skittish wildness of my own gaze, for it harshly presented the truth of my current state. A state that could only be classified and psychologically unstable and liable to collapse under the pressure of one more harrowing event.

My jaw tensing in disapproval, I looked away from my own gaze and told myself that the wildness seen in my eyes was largely due to their pale, feral color. Husky Eyes, a fleeting friend had once dubbed me for their shade. Oh, how I missed her now. But I had lost her to the flow of time like I had so many others. I was just too far beyond human comprehension to hold on to the ones I cared for. Too detached to function properly in society. I so often came across as a girl who was as cold as glass. And just now, I felt as brittle.

Abruptly, I dropped my face into the net of my hands, breathing deeply and slowly as I tried to fight tears so sudden they had surprised me. No! I would not break down now!

I shuddered.

[Rojo]

I watched out of the corner of my eye as the girl sat down across from me. She gazed out of the window, looking at her own reflection. I could still see all the lines, curves, depressions and protrutions of her face as sharp as if some patient artist had spent years and years drawing her sherely for my benefit. It fascianted me. This girl was a one-in-a-million thing. I could see all the colours of her clothes, her hair. the lips; everything.

These thoughts made me think about my own appearance. I too stared into the depths of the inky blackness of the glass, the only lights were pools dotted about occasionally of orangey glows. Lamposts. My reflection stared back.

A young man who could be no older than 17 or maybe 18 looked out of the glass. His face was sunken and pale, his eyes like two pits of black with just hints of swamp-water green hidden at the far back. The nose was pointed and sharp, like a bird's beak. At this, something stirred deep within my memory, I think it was a time at school, surrounded by people. Was I popular? Or were these people picking on me? I didn't know so I looked back to my reflection again. The mouth of the boy was no more than thin line, the lips were cold and white, like snow. On the chin were a few scraggly hairs that curled downwards. The face itself was surrounded by a baggy grey hoodie, blackness of the hood enveloping any sign of a neck and only a few tufts of messy hair that the colour of which could not be determined were the other things visible.

Looking at my own face for the first time in a long while didn't evoke any emotions I thought it might. I was expecting memories to come flooding back, or a rush of realisation. Instead I felt angry and ashamed, as if I didn't want any other to see my face. I lifted my hands and tugged roughly at the hood, pulling it further forward to better hide my visage.

Looking back over, I saw the girl had her head in her hands. The air around her seemed to distort, like a heatwave except only around this young lady. It took me a while to remember what was usually ascociated with such actions; sadness or sorrow. Those horrible empty feelings. I suddenly felt sad too, as if remembering what the emotion was like had started it in myself as well. I felt cold and upset and...and frustrated! I didn't feel empty and cold anymore, I wanted to smash and kick and brake! But none of this showed on my person. The struggle itself was internal.

"You all right, love?" came a voice. The words sounded sloshed and slurred together like a drunk person to me. They came from mine and the girl's left. I thought about looking around, but I for some reason could not look around to see the man (or so I thought from the low pitch of the voice, despite how slowed and warped it sounded to my ears.)

[Asila]

The concerned question seemed to ooze through the chaos of my struggling mind, as slow in speed and as uncertain in form as mud seeping through a fissure in an unstable wall. The wave of self-destructive emotion ebbed, tempered by the realization that a weakness had been shown and seen by a person other than myself. A person I could not trust. And that was just a mistake I could not allow myself.

I breathed deeply, seizing the opportunity to stabilize my mind. Now I had to resolve this situation even as I was trying to figure out how to deal with the original situation. I didn't need this now, but...

I lifted my head and met his gaze with my eyes, knowing they would shine with unshed tears. Yet my pride was unphased, because I knew how to use such signs of emotion to my advantage. I smiled weakly. "I'm all right. I've just had a trying day, you know?" I sighed shakily, blotting my eyes on my sleeve.

[Rojo]

When the girl spoke, it was like harp music gently playing directly into my ears. Soothing, harmonising, melodic. . .it soothed the anger I had felt a moment ago and replaced it with something cool and peaceful. . .calm, I believe it is called. Once again, this was all within my own head as my body seemed too stiff and reluctant to yet show body language.

"Oh I know," the man replied with a heartfelt but weak attempt at sympathy "'been down the marketplace, tryin' t'sell oranges, y'know. . ."
I listened carefully to the words, partly because it was hard to understand them, like the man was talking underwater and also because of the way he spoke. With an strange ring to it. . .I think this is called an accident. . or was it accent? I was unable to remember. And his shortening of words, even missing some out entirely; it was most strange, as if the speaker was too tired or lazy to complete the entire sentence.

I once again tried to move my neck to look at the man, but my neck was reluctant to move. So were my arms and legs, strangely. My view was focused forward, giving me a swishing, swaying view of the back of the bus. I could barely make out the white sign on the back, denoting something about 'no snooker' or was it smoking? I couldn't read it. I remember thinking perhaps I needed glasses and this thought brought back yet another very vague and faded memory. A plastic smile, crying, a warm embrace and another smile, only this one was more kind and. . .fatherly? This only made things more of a mess, making me confused. I shook myself and waited with almost hungriness for the girl's reply.