My Bus Driver Should Be Dead

“Just you today, Raven?”

The old driver asked, his wrinkled face stretching into a warm yellow smile. The doors to the school bus gently hissed as they pulled apart. I jumped the steps and let out a vaporous sigh of relief as they shut back into place. Outside, the mist pressed in against the bus, and tiny water droplets sluiced down the window panes.

I adjusted my glasses, waiting for the condensation to dissipate off of them.

“Just me Jack,” I said with a light grin, shaking my head as I dropped my bag in the seat directly beside him. Behind us were several rows of empty seating. “It’s freezing out there. Doubt anyone can handle this.”

Jack snorted, his one good brown eye fixing me with a dismissive stare. “Kids,” he grunted. “What, are they afraid they might catch a cold? Or are they afraid of learning something useful for once?“. His eye followed me, ensuring I got into my seat safely. I rolled my eyes at him.

“I’m sure the prospect of careening into a snowbank and dying of hypothermia had no impact on their decision,” I deadpanned. “Just because I’m a suicidal maniac who doesn’t like staying home doesn’t mean the rest are too.”

I reached for my bag, hoping I hadn’t forgotten anything. Then I noticed, for a fraction of a second, the whiteness of Jack’s knuckles as he held his steering wheel in a death grip. His smile froze, becoming rigid and forced. I stiffened, ice spreading into the blood of my limbs. Something dark passed over Jack’s face, and then, it was gone.

“Whatever you say, kid,” he said, smiling as he patted my thigh, before giving it a gentle squeeze. I shook my head, smiling back. It must’ve been my imagination. After all, Jack would never hurt me. I’d known him for a decade at that point. He had always just been...there. Like a tree, or a favorite lake. Comforting. Familiar. Constant.

“Gonna be a bit slow today,” he grunted, pushing the stick into position and keeping his right eye focused on the rearview mirror. His left remained where it was, rigid and grey like stone. I twirled a lock of black hair absent-mindedly, brown eyes staring out of the window.

‘Lost it in a fight,’ he’d told me. I must’ve been in...third grade? A year after I met him.

‘What was the fight about?’ I asked, and he ruffled my hair. A girl. He fell in love with a girl, and the her father beat him for it. He ended up leaving his hometown. The story saddened me, but Jack wasn’t bitter.

‘My heart healed, thanks to a new love. One day,’ he promised me. ‘I’ll introduce you to them.’

I was still waiting, but I didn’t mind. I liked having Jack around, and the thought of having to share him didn’t sit right with me. A cough broke me from my thoughts, and I turned to face Jack’s frown. I smiled sheepishly, looking at the floor.

“Sorry,” I apologized, picking at the fabric of my shirt. “You said something?”

“Isaid-”Jack grumbled, “-That we’re gonna be a bit slow today. Are your parents home?”

“Nope. Another ‘family dinner’. Dad’s hopeful that this time it won’t end with them slamming the door on each other, but I doubt it,” I responded. I never could hide anything from Jack, so I’d long stopped trying. He knew everything about me. My home life. My classmates. Even my favorite color.

He painted his entire bus blue in sixth grade after telling me that my best friend Jace Blackwater had spread rumors about my mother’s mental health and how I was considered criminally insane. Things got to the point where people were afraid to be near me, in case I ended up snapping or something.

I never found out how Jack knew, but I was glad he told me. Jace denied it -obviously- but at that point I’d already blocked the snake on everything and refused to speak to him for the rest of the year. I cried a lot that year, but Jack was always there to pick me up when I felt down.

“Who knows? Maybe this dinner will be the one. Or they’ll just clout each other like cats and dogs again.”

Jack nodded sympathetically. “If they ever cause you trouble-”

“I’ll come to you, don’t worry,” I said with a smile. “Thanks, Jack.”

“Don’t mention it,” he smiled, before gently patting my shoulder and going back to focusing on the road. I let out a sigh, staring as we drove further into the fog. It was as if the whiteness had swallowed us. In the rearview mirror, the marble and crimson façade of my high school faded into the distance. A silence fell upon us, and I tried to find something to fill it with.

“Just one more year of high school, and then I’m gone,” I said with a grin, trying for a confident tone.

Jack snorted again. “Gone off to where exactly? Some state college where you learn how to make an excel spreadsheet? And then what? Working some shabby tech startup that offers minimum wage?”

I frowned, turning to him with a quizzical expression. “I wouldn’t really call any of the schools I’m looking at shabby. What’s with you? You’ve been off for a while now.”

I’d noticed Jack had been getting more snappish lately. This was the first time he’d directed it at me. Jack stared at me for a moment, before letting out a huff and turning back to the road. I made a few more timid attempts at conversation, but all were swiftly deflected or simply met with another ‘Hmph’.

I resigned myself to looking out of the window, hoping he wouldn’t be mad for long. But soon he started conversation himself. And it wasn’t in a direction I thought it’d be in.

“Why not stay here?” He asked, frowning at me in the rearview mirror. I wanted to tell him to focus on the road, but I wasn’t sure how he’d take it. “You have everything you could want here. A home. I can get you a job at the school. And we can still be together.”

Together?

“Jack,” I said, staring at him in slight confusion. What was he talking about? “That’s-There’s no way you can convince me to stay here and drive buses all day. Ihaveto go to college. We can still talk on the phone-”

“That’s not enough!” Jack roared, and I shrunk back in fear. He hit the wheel once. Then again. Then he swerved. I screamed as the bus drove off of the road, crashing into a snowbank. The seatbelt dislodged, and I fell face first onto the windscreen. My cheek collided with the cold glass, and the sound of another seatbelt disengaging sent my heart into a panicked frenzy.

“Jack-” I protested, but he grabbed me by the hands. For an old man, he was surprisingly strong. But I kicked his face and scrambled to get away. “-Stop it!” I pleaded, eyes frantically seeking an exit. I reached for the doors. Locked. Of course they were.

“Get back here, you ungrateful creature!” Jack yelled. I scrambled towards the back of the bus, wanting to put as much distance as I could between him and me. But it was no good. The back of the bus didn’t have doors. I let out a shaky breath, before throwing one of the windows open. Even at the age of fifteen, I could squeeze through the windows with ease.

Perks of barely being fed, I suppose.

I pushed myself through the windows, before dropping onto the ground below. It wasn’t the highest fall in the world, but it wascold.I shivered in my jacket. Behind me, the doors opened with another loudhiss.

I sprinted, hearing Jack’s angry screams behind me. How long would he follow me for? How far could I run before hypothermia started to set in?

And where was I?

The fog had made visibility difficult. I hadn’t paid attention to where we were going. Even now, it crowded around me. Claustrophobia was setting in; I picked a random direction and ran as fast as I could without slipping.

I pulled my hoodie on, trying in vain to listen for cues in the grey waste around me. I couldn’t hear Jack anywhere. Had he given up? Realized the insanity of what he was doing? It wasn’t too late for him to stop! I wouldn’t say anything! We were still friends!

I felt a hand on my shoulder.

“Found you!” Jack crowed, his grip digging into my shoulder blade. I let out a cry, trying to wrench myself free of him. But it was no use. He laughed, before pushing me into the snow. The frost sunk its fangs into my hands and legs, as if injecting me with a thousand paralytics at once.

“Now...” Jack panted, pointing at me. “Stay down, brat.”

He looked around, before picking something from the inside of his jacket. It was a hammer.

“Could’ve gone quietly,” he said, shaking his head. “Could’ve just shut up and gone with me. Butno.Had to pull all of this. Brats. All of you. But you’re better than them. And now, you can be better with me. We’ll have a whole life together. I’ll give you everything you want. You’ll never leave me. Your body and soul will be mine!”

I stared into his eyes. He really believed it. He wasn’t trying to make fun of me. He genuinely thought that I should be with him. I couldn’t move. I couldn’t think. I stayed quiet, motionless, hoping he wouldn’t decide to use the hammer.

“But first...” he said, letting out a shaky breath. “I need to make sure you can’t get away again.”

He lifted the hammer.

And then he flew.

Flew, because of the car that rammed right into him. Someone screamed. Jack, I think. It all happened fast. A blue car -don’t ask me what the model was. I skipped my car phase ages ago- rammed into him. His body bent, and then he was thrown back.

I heard something crack. Later, I would find out it was his neck. The car skid to a halt, the sound disturbingly reminiscent of someone clawing at a chalkboard. Someone came out of the car. Jace. Of course it was.

I doubt anyone else was driving in this weather, but he had always loved the cold.

I don’t remember much of the next few hours. Crying, probably from me. Jace trying to get me to talk about what just happened and then driving us to the local police station once he realized I wasn’t going to say anything.

We left Jack’s body there. If Jace had his way, Jack would’ve been fed to spiders. Unfortunately, the legal system disagreed. The courts tried to have him charged for manslaughter. But later investigations into Jack’s record would ultimately cinch the case.

I was numb when I first heard it.Allof it.

I always wondered how Jack lost his eye. He told me he lost it in a fight.

‘What was the fight about?’ I’d asked him, and he ruffled my hair. A girl. He fell in love with a girl, and the girl’s father beat him for it. He ended up leaving his hometown. The story always made me sad, but Jack told me he wasn’t bitter.

The girl was twelve.

‘My heart healed, thanks to a new love. One day,’ he promised me. ‘I’ll introduce you to them.’

I wanted to vomit when I realized what he meant.

He painted his entire bus blue in sixth grade after telling me that my best friend Jace had spread rumors about my mother’s mental health and how I was considered criminally insane.

He painted his entire bus blue after telling one of my classmates that I had a criminal record, that my family has a history of mental illness, and that I stabbed someone to death at my old school because they looked at me funny.

He wrote about me.

That was the worst part. He wrote about me. Wrote about our life together, his fantasies, everything. The courts tried to stop me, but I demanded to read it. I wasn’t sure about the legality of the situation, but I think the judge allowed it out of pity.

Two hundred sheets. A5 paper. I read every single one. I can still hear the words in my head sometimes, when I go to bed and everything’s quiet. I can probably recite the thing by heart at this point. Tell you the average number of words per page. Page sixty-nine and seventy have some kind of liquid on them. Page one-hundred and ninety was where he started planning on kidnapping me. Page one was written a month after I met him.

Dad was livid. Though most of that anger was focused on me. Something about why I didn’t tell them, something about how this wouldn’t have happened if I wasn’t so lonely because that’s the reason Jack specifically closed in on me. He and Mom screamed a lot at each other too.

Mom didn’t care much; I don’t think she really understands what happened.

Someone suggested therapy and my Dad lost it.

It’s fine now, I guess. I’m finishing my eleventh year now. Jace’s been...kind, about the whole thing. It’s strange, being with him again. We’ve changed a lot since we were kids, but at the same time, some things are the same. Little details, like how he still never uses a comb and has perfect hair.

My parents don’t really get it. I don’t expect them to. They don’t get why the idea of spending time at their house is akin to thrusting me into piranha-infested waters and telling me to swim. They don’t get why Jace drives me everywhere now. I practically live at his house, only coming back to my parents’ to sleep and rarely eat (Jace enlisted his mother into ensuring I have a diet fit for a teenage boy. He’s overreacting, but I actually like looking at myself in the mirror, so maybe he has a point).

I’m rambling. What I’m trying to say is: Things are bearable.

So why am I sharing this?

Jack got a burial. I don’t think he deserved it. Jace vandalized it when I mentioned my thoughts on the matter. I visit it, sometimes. It’s a guilty pleasure, one I probably won’t give up until I move far, far away from the source. I indulged it today.

Stepped through the wrought-iron gates, walked amongst the crypts and the tall, black wildflowers. Ducked underneath the raven statue, to the little headstone tucked away from the rest. Jack lived his life in shadows, on the edge of society. It seemed fitting that he rot there too.

Something felt...wrong, when I reached it. As if I was standing on the edge of something unholy. There was a shift in the air, and a definitive, but incomprehensible feeling that I should back away. But I didn’t. I went closer. Closer. And closer.

It was open.

The coffin was open. Piles of dirt surrounded the hole in the earth where Jack’s body was. Who could’ve dug it up? Whowould’vedug it up? It’s a small town -posh though- and nobody new had moved in. Was it all a prank? Kudos if it was, because who the hell has the time, the patience, and the lack of any worth to society to dig up six feet of dirt?

Grave-robbers? Jack’s organs wouldn’t have been worth anything by now. He had nothing of value on his person when he was buried -not that he had much of value anyway- and why would they leave the rest of the far wealthier crypts untouched?

I felt sick. Like a snake was curling up in my belly and filling me with its poison from the inside.

I ran. Just ran. I kept running, all the way to the police station. I’m still shaken. I’m at Jace’s house right now. Typing this in his bedroom. The police must’ve informed my parents about what happened, because Dad sent me a text. Nothing out of the ordinary. Not really. He often texts me.

But usually those texts are reprimands for not eating lunch at home, or empty platitudes like ‘I love you’. Not pictures of handprints in my bedroom window. Not footage of my parents’ surveillance cameras capturing motion in the periphery around their house. Specifically, at the outside of my bedroom.

Whether or not it’s just a harmless prank, they don’t want me home either.

Jace is awake too, keeping constant vigil at the window. Every so often, he sits down and hugs me. We don’t need words to tell each other that we’re afraid. His parents are downstairs. All the windows and doors are locked.

I don’t want to die. Why is it that the one person who made me feel free is the one making me feel trapped?

My eyes hurt from typing this in the dark. Jace has given up on the window and is trying to get me to sleep. He’s also trying to convince me that I should let him look at what I’m writing. He’s so-

There’s a hand knocking on the window.

I don’t know if I’m going to survive the night.