Thanatophobia

Tai looked like a vulture in the body of a girl. She perched at the back of the bus, on the very center seat, feet tucked, elbows on knees, head in hands. Her hair was a crown of black or brown feathers atop her head. Her fingers were talons digging deep into the soft flesh of her cheeks. Her panic was inaudible, invisible, imagined, some dreaded fictional monster writhing around inside her.

The bus lurched and Tai was thrown uncomfortably away from her panic and into the present. Peeking through her fingers, she noticed that the sun, which had blinded her as she walked home from school, had set now. The bus wove through the labyrinth of Suburban streets, homes full of sleeping people. She wanted nothing more than to go home. Home. Shouldn’t she be home? Hadn’t she just been home? Tai, suddenly confused as to why she was on this unfamiliar bus on this unfamiliar street, was thrown again, from the present and into the past.

She envisioned her walk home beside the blinding sun. She recalled opening the front door. She remembered her mother, thrown across the floor. No movement, no breath.

Of course. The bus ground to a stop outside a familiar trailer park. Tai stumbled off the bus, into the dark. Her mother was no longer a factor. Her mother was a non-entity now. Tai was alone.