The Six A.M. Bus

She isn't the kind of girl that takes things for granted. A kid as homey as they get, always silent and thoughtful, tough she's just turned twenty two, she feels like life, just became a routine after her nineteenth birthday.

Waking up at five in the morning, feeling the cold like rainy whiplash hit her feet, she dresses with more than a few yawns, making breakfast before dawn, by half past five everything is usually ready, and though she knows Nana is asleep, she still slips into her bedroom, despite every threat she's gotten before from the formidable woman, and gives her a quick kiss on the forehead before leaving.

Her grandmother smiles, and awakes, gives the girl her blessing (as usual), wishing her good luck in her day, and although it no doubt hurts her back (Nana would never admit to being “elderly”), she still takes the walker to the door slowly, in order to say goodbye to her granddaughter, when she leaves heading for college each morning.

The girl normally turns and with all her strength enthusiastically waves from her place down the road, knowing that the next morning, the routine will still be the same.

Six o'clock sharp.

She sits alone in the backseat of the bus, with a sigh at what has become her daily commute to the U of M, Michigan Business school, and although she knows doing this is difficult every day, especially when so many people have told her to give up, ever since "he" started taking the bus also, the entire hour it takes from her home in Roseville to the stop she gets off at upstate Michigan, doesn't seem like the burden it used to be.

She's not one of those perky girls, in fact she's almost always half asleep, after all pulling all nighters to study in the wee hours after midnight more often than not takes it's toll on her, sometimes she even nods off for a few minutes closing her eyes against the windowpane of her seat, hoping to God the sacrifice is worth it.

She likes to shrink her feet against the morning cold when the winter gets too icy, drawing them close to her in her small seat, knowing that Gus, the bus driver, isn't going to care, wears blue clothes like a mantra (it's her favorite color) sometimes with a bowler hat or feather earrings, giving the finger to any passenger that looks at her with disdain, honestly she's one of those strangers that has a quirk or two, obviously not like the others girls, and despite all, she still doesn't know, that the guy who sits every morning across the aisle from her, the one that sometimes smiles and appears in her dreams, with bright eyes and perfect teeth ...Has known that since the first day.

That guy that gets on in the stop after hers, greeting Gus and using a fancy doctor lab coat, whose pocket just reads Victor R, the same one that sits every morning on the seat across the aisle, right in front of her (the unusual girl with sleepy eyes).

She has never seen him in casual clothes, yet she knows his name is Victor and that he likes to read the newspaper each morning on the way to upstate Michigan, that sometimes his cellphone beeps but he hastily turns it off, she knows also that he isn't married, because the telltale finger on his left hand is empty of both ring and mark and of course, that he's a doctor.

Considering the many times he looks at his watch every day she believes he has an impatient personality, he taps his foot ten times per minute when the bus nears the busiest part of the route (yes she has counted) and sometimes he brings medical books to read during the journey, making her curious over the fact that all of them have to do with either regenerative medicine or brain surgery.

She on the other hand doesn't think she is anything interesting like him, not with her plain brown hair and discolored blue highlights, she does not think that is as bold as her friend Mary (the inventive plastic artist), as clever as Annabelle (the smart book clerk and part time coffee barista), or as brave as Brittany (the cutthroat attorney that married a rancher in Montana).

Maybe if she where as strong as they, she would have the courage to open her mouth and ask a fraction of those many, many questions that dance around her head when she sees Victor, that stranger whom she has never spoken to, that gets on her bus every morning at exactly a quarter past six.

He; unlike her, is interesting, a bit mysterious, a bit laid back, with blond hair and laugh lines in the corners of his mouth, tough in his eyes, she sees millions of sad stories waiting to be told, stories his womanizing smile can't hide. But it doesn't matter, compared to him she's just a simple waitress, who makes the trip from Roseville to upstate Michigan every day, driving herself to her grave with exhaustion just because she doesn't have the heart to tell her Nana that business school isn't what she wants.

He sees her too.

He sees that sometimes she brings headphones to pass the time, or plays with the mysterious contents of her backpack, which contains not only books but also strange jewelry whose origin only she knows, she has a favorite necklace, he has realized, it's a blue stone called Soldalite, he knows because he has googled it online, but the truth is, in his mind, she would look better dressed in sapphires and diamonds.

He has also noticed that she likes Wuthering Heights by the number of times she brings the book with her when she boards the bus, but suspects she just likes the end, the part where Cathy and Hareton end up together, because she doesn't seem like the kind of girl who likes tragedies to him. He knows she also has good taste in music, as he has heard her humming songs he knows by heart more than once and that she is a fan of converse shoes.

The truth is, she sometimes looks so beautiful, it almost breaks his heart. With brown hair, exotic features, and those deep brown eyes that look at him when she thinks he's not watching, it seems that they solely can see into his soul, perhaps that's why he spends so much time trying to avoid looking into them, lest one of these days she really does see his soul for what it truly is, and decides it's not worth the effort getting on the bus at exactly six o'clock in the morning.

What must she think of him?, she probably believes him some sort of weirdo, sitting there every morning without speaking to anyone, a guy with a doctor's salary who could very well afford a car, if it where another girl, someone he met at a bar, in a club, or in the hospital, he would know what to do, his friends wouldn't sit there like an idiots, hell, they would probably laugh their butts off if they ever found out what he was doing, if she where another girl, he would just need to walk up to her flashing a smile and ask her out, but she, she isn't like any other girl, she is special, he knows it, and that's why it's so difficult trying to figure out how to talk to her...

And so the days pass, between the doctor and the waitress, like the sweetest routine in the world, him looking at her, and she looking at him, separated by a barrier which none think they know how to cross. Although both know it would be so easy, after all.

It's only an aisle.

Then something else happens, on a rainy day of September, that cold Monday in which Nana seems more concerned than usual because of the weather, because for the first time in two months, she gets on the bus, and by six fifteen.

He's not there.

Neither is he by six-twenty, or at six forty-five, and then the girl asks herself for the first time, what if I really do not see him again?. She has been so busy and stressed, in those past two months, all she's ever being doing in her days is study and work, study and work, a endless routine from her home, to college and from college to the diner, only to return home tired and barely get enough sleep.

does he not know that seeing him in the morning is the best part of her day?. And for a moment she cringes in fear.

What if Victor really doesn't return?.

The next morning she falls asleep in her desk finishing an essay, and is awaken by a very worried and angry Nana, realizing that if she doesn't hurry she will miss the bus, the girl barely has time to hop in the shower let alone eat before she's flying past the door running as fast as her converse can take her, she has a big test coming up at seven am sharp and can't afford to miss class or not turn in the essay she was working on, but that's not why she runs, or why her heart is beating fast.

The reason she runs is because she wants to see him, wants to be there on time, to ensure that if anything happened to him, she can be there and won't miss any sign of something being wrong.

Maybe she just wants to be sure he's not gone.

In the end, he does board the bus as usual, punctual as ever, at a quarter past six, his eyes noting only that she is red cheeked from exertion and has a beautiful sheen of sweat covering her skin... Nevertheless nothing happens, he looks at her, and she looks him, then one of the two looks away, and it's as if the previous day hadn't occurred, as tough their strangely perfect routine hadn't been disrupted. Except that it did, and she knows in her heart.

Something has changed.

Her stop is coming, there are only fifteen minutes left, soon they will reach that minute in which she will give him one last glance before she has to get down from the bus, and he will stay until his own stop comes along, but she can't deny it anymore, she was worried about him, now the silence that used to be so comfortable, is suddenly killing her.

"You weren't here yesterday," the words leave her lips without permission, soft and hushed, like the wind, so whispery that they make him wonder if he really did hear her speak, or if he imagined it, but a double check proves that she is still there, a little surprised at herself perhaps, but just as corporeal, definitely not a hallucination.

"I was on call at the hospital" Victor responds after a second, as if she really where someone he owes explanations to, as if she where a friend, a partner, a lover, not just some stranger on the bus, looking into her eyes with sincerity, he smiles, and she smiles back, both knowing at that moment that things will never be the same.

"I'm Kaya" she finally says after a long pause of smiles that seem to communicate words that neither understands.

"I'm Victor," he replies trying to memorize each of the four letters of her name, hearing that subtle music in her voice, that voice which he has heard only in his dreams.

"I know," she says, pointing to the pocket of his robe "I've known it since a long time ago actually"

And that's all it takes, that simple admission that she has been watching him almost as much as he has been watching her, for his legs to become functional once again, and do that which he has imagined himself doing many times, cross the narrow aisle in front of him and sit next to her "your hair looks much brighter up close, I didn't notice" is the first thing that he thinks of saying, because, really being this close to her, close enough to touch her, is suddenly muddling his vocal ability.

"Your smile also" she breathes looking into his eyes and telling the truth "is this really the first time we have talked? I feel like I've known the sound of your voice for the longest time"

"I know, the feeling" Victor whispers unbidden, putting his hand on Kaya's cheek "you feel even better than you do in my dreams" he says caressing her face in wonder “Kaya”

She curls up next to him, breathing in his subtle scent of pine soap and smiles "you do too" And it feels like somehow.

She has found home.

"I have a car" Victor suddenly confesses softly, slowly putting his chin on her head and pulling her into his arms in a loving motion "it's faster than this bus by a long shot, and nicer on the eyes too” He chuckles feeling her settle more comfortably into the crook of his neck “but every morning, I still come here, and lose half an hour of work time, just because I can see you"

And the bus stops, with Gus announcing her stop, but Kaya doesn't care, her arms are already stretched around Victor's neck, pulling him in for a kiss.

And the moments their lips meet, it feels like if time itself has stopped everywhere.

Lips moving together with the pent up energy of many mornings and nights, she kisses him with such a tenderness, soft, but yearning, and it takes a second before he starts kissing back, his lips are less tender than hers of course, kissing her with the anxiety of a guy that's been waiting to find someone like her his whole life.

Savoring, prodding, tasting the limits, and Victor's hands can't help but intertwine themselves in her hair, because he just doesn't want to let her go, it's a deep and beautiful kiss, the kind that Kaya thought only happened in movies and books, something special, and there with their lips, she thinks.

They must be creating magic.

The next morning Kaya doesn't take the bus, or the subway either, neither does she have breakfast with her Nana or run ten blocks in upstate Michigan to get to campus on time, because at six o'clock sharp, just as she turns to wave her arm in farewell to her grandmother from the road, a black Mercedes pulls over behind her and opens the passenger door.

The driver looks at her with a very mischievous expression from the inside of the car and asks "Want a ride?"

To which the girl laughs accepting the proposal with natural mirth "I would be delighted" she responds settling into the offered seat, reaching out for a moment to kiss the mouth of said driver, before he turns the engine back on and drives away with her.

And Victor smiles, his hand squeezing Kaya's, while driving that morning. Knowing that this is the beginning of something science can never explain, something he's not sure even God can explain, and maybe, just maybe ...  

That's the best part.