This was unbelievable. This was dumb. She'd just been allowed to go. Just left. She was mad at everything! Wasn't the guy supposed to stop the girl and tell them he was full of crap?! Beg for forgiveness or something? Something?!

At first, she'd been sad. How could this have happened? 'This sucks', you know? But then she'd got to thinking about how sucky a boyfriend Gawain had been, and how he hadn't even been able to avoid 1 perky reporter's scrawny ass. That rage had gotten her out of the mansion and onto a bus. Now, she was just riding the bus... of rage. And letting it be all ragey and s*!^.

Where was this bus even heading? She could have sworn 'home'. Right now, anywhere was better than the mansion. It was getting on into the evening and she could figure it out if she got lost. She could do this all day.

Blah. He'd missed the bus. This was the kind of thing that sucked about living in New York. You had access to world class...everything, but you had to travel through some not-so-world-class areas to get to them. When you missed the bus...you had to walk through some of those areas. Areas you know that your parents would fume over. Areas that your parents would hopefully never realize you'd walked through.

Because nothing had happened. And you made it to a bus stop in an area that was acceptable.

It was cold, and Jameson wrapped his arms around himself as he waited for the bus to arrive, and after a fashion, it did. The teen chalked it up to another great thing about New York. Most of the time the busses ran on schedule.

So on he got, scanning his ride card and making his way further into the bus. God, it was cold. He spotted a familiar face and made his way to the seat. It was too late when he realized just how pissed off and preoccupied Ami looked.

"Hey...small world. Anyone sitting here?"

Ugh. The last thing she needed was someone she knew seeing her now, when her whole world was spinning counter to its regular spin style. One look at Jameson, and Amelia balked. Her eyes turned up to him, then back down to some spot on the bus's floor underneath the seat ahead. Her arms moved to hug her chest as she shrunk in on herself.

"No. There's no one sitting here." Her voice came out colder and rougher than she usually would have wanted. She hated a lot of things right now, but what she really hated was that. She was mad at Gawain, not Jameson. He was just a nice guy from school who she had a few classes with. It wasn't like he'd dumped her or anything. But she couldn't control it. And that sucked. Her lips turned downwards as her eyebrows squished together in thought. "Sit, if you want."

God dammit. She hoped he got off at the next stop. At least then one of them would get off today.

Oh man. He'd screwed up by even saying anything. Truly, the last time they'd spoken outside of school had been under a tree in Central Park, and that had been pleasant enough. There had been interaction at school though, they'd worked on labs together, and that had been pleasant. This was not pleasant though, at least not so far.

This was awkward too. It was also obvious that she didn't really want him to sit, but was making an effort to be polite. The bus lurched into motion and Jameson stumbled, nearly falling into the lap of a grumpy looking woman in the next seat. Regaining his balance, he sat next to the girl from school. "Thanks." He mumbled quietly.

A few times, as the bus rumbled, he opened his mouth to say something more, but thought better and closed it again. Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out one of his ear buds and put it in his ear, then fiddled with his iPod until he found a good song. The other ear bud, he left in his pocket so the ear next to Amelia was free...just in case.

"Nn," Amelia grunted an affirmative. 'No problem', she meant. But it really couldn't have been translated as 'no problem' in any language or dialect she knew of.

And so, he sat. And she sat. In silence. For a good awkward minute. It made her feel like quite the ass. Again, it wasn't his fault she was mad. There was no logical reason he deserved the icy shoulder. She just wasn't feeling like a chatterbox. She wanted time to think, to rage, to scream inwardly at Gawain, and to demonize him. Isn't that what any young girl would want?

Amelia sighed. Even if her desire for silence and keeping to herself so she could demonize Gawain was reasonable, it still wasn't fair. She wasn't an ass. She could try and be a bit better. And less bitter. The girl stomached her emotions, and tried desperately to break the silence. She opened her mouth and turned her head towards Jameson... then closed it, and looked down.

God, she was a loser.

Take Two: "My boyfriend dumped me." Her nails dug into her jean legs. There, that broke the silence neatly as a hammer breaking glass panes. "Well, really. I dumped him..." Into tiny little pieces, which were then swiftly dusted up and scooped into the trash bin. But there were still little tiny fragments so small you couldn't see them with the naked eye... There was nothing neat about breaking glass.

Oh man. For a second, Jameson panicked like any good man does when a girl starts talking about boy problems. What was he supposed to do? How was he supposed to help? It wasn't like he was a counselor, or girl buddy. He was just some unlucky schlub who'd happened onto this bus.

But...he was that schlub, he decided a few moments later. He was who she had to talk to, and he was going to have to be a man and see what he could do. It's what his father would have done, Jameson was sure of it. It was also the kind of man he wanted to be.

"That's really awful." He said, mildly curious and slightly panicked to hear more details. "Anything I can do to help?"

D'oh...smooth. Hopefully she'd realize he was trying to help.

Hands on knees slid forward to be hands clasped together. Her elbows too the hands place on that same old location. Her forehead moved to rest against her hands as she slid forward in her seat.

Apply directly to the forehead.

"Naw," she said. "Naw, I couldn't possibly ask you to--," what the hell could he do? "Christ," she found herself laughing bitterly. "Maybe I should just make like Taylor Swift and write a song about it." That was a laugh.

Jameson laughed out loud at the Taylor Swift comment. Slightly dark humor was something he could get behind. "God no." he said, "I don't know if the world could handle two." He paused for a moment wondering if he should go on, then threw caution to the wind. "I saw something on the internet that said one of her ex-boyfriends should write a rebuttal song called, 'Maybe It Was You." "

He didn't really give her a chance to hate what he'd said, because he was curious about something else she'd said.

"And you couldn't ask me to do what?" Maybe there was something he could do?

"Heh." That heh was to the 'maybe it was you' comment as well as the follow up, folks. "Naw. I'm just mad as hell and pissed at that idiot for not chasing after me when I left, and for going to that damn reporter first when he woke up and realized he'd died." She shot him a serious look, and added. "Don't ask."

She shook her head, and bowed it back towards her hands. "Right now, I just need to blow off steam and be bitter and demonize and make derogatory comments about his gender and size, in general. Or maybe I should just deal?" A puff of air escaped her nostrils at that thought. One might've even called it a derisive snort.

Ah. It had been a rhetorical statement. She hadn't actually wanted him to do anything. Jameson realized, with mild surprise that the panic that had momentarily crushed his chest was loosening up. This wasn't so bad. Amelia just needed someone to listen...as she was all the things she said she was.

Good lord. What was that someone long dead had said about a woman scorned? The comments were cutting...and probably deserved?

Jameson didn't know what to say...until she said she just needed to deal.

"Just dealing never helped anyone." Jameson said. His experience with girls was anything but expansive, but from what he'd seen. "You can't just hold all of that in, or you'll get all bitter and shriveled." He'd heard that somewhere...hadn't he? Hopefully it hadn't been some kind of obviously effeminate TV show his mom had insisted on watching in his presence.

"Better to vent."

"But venting makes me sound like some vindictive crazy woman," Amelia chewed her lip. "And, I look ugly."

All of a sudden, something skittered across the side of the bus so fast nobody noticed it. But if someone HAD noticed it, they might've thought 'Jesus Christ... lizard', or 'there's something definitely lizard-like about that thing there...' Luckily, nobody noticed the flash of reptilian skin or the white wife beater as it had passed by Amelia's window. Nobody at all. The bus rattled on. Amelia glanced at her watch.

"Hrm..." she muttered. She could vent all day, or keep it in and deal with it, but honestly, riding the bus all night wasn't feasible... and seemed a really bad idea.

On the rooftop, something made itself cozy, hugging the metal exterior of the bus. Again, nobody noticed the bump on the ceiling or the bulge on the roof. Nobody noticed the faint fluttering sound of a happily lolling tongue in the wind.

"Where are you headed?" She asked. If the stop was close to where her house was, maybe they could get off together. She was currently ignoring the venting comment, but... given the opportunity, maybe it would be healthier to tear Gawain a new one in front of a willing ear.

Vindictive crazy woman? Jameson had to chuckle and shake his head. "Haven't you heard? Guys dig the crazy chicks." Probably not what she wanted to hear right that moment, but Jameson knew he'd heard that one somewhere cool.

Where was he headed? "Home to Manhattan." Jameson said, "I was working on my English project in one of the outer branches of the library."

"Where are you getting off? I wouldn't mind a bit of a walk if you needed an ear." Yup. That was the kind of guy he wanted to be.

>> "Haven't you heard? Guys dig the crazy chicks."

Had to be a lie, like saying ladies like the troublemakers. Even though technically, she'd just been dating a troublemaker. She'd broken up with him, though. So yeah. Her logic was sound. She didn't say anything to that. What would she say? 'Do you?' Instead, she ignored it, and turned her mind to an entirely different thought: Getting home.

Jameson had said Manhattan. Manhattan was a pretty big island. "Where in Manhattan?" She started to ask. That question was cut short by a much more audible bump from above. Her eyes rolled up towards the roof. The silence that followed was almost tangible.

The Crazy chick comment failed hard. Jameson almost winced. He'd been doing so well, then fell right into the deep end while wearing cement choes. Luckily the silence didn't stretch long though. Ami had a question.

Where in Manhattan?

Confident he knew this answer, the teen responded, "Right by Cen-"

He'd been going to tell her that he lived on the nice side of Central Park, in the big apartment building that people always saw on TV shows. Other kids were generally impressed by that, even in their teens. The bump from up above had startled the ideas out of his head though, and his eyes followed Ami's, glancing up at the roof of the bus.

"What was that?"

Skitter skitter. Damn speed bump. The lizard mutant found a better hand hold and clung on. He'd be happy once this bus stopped and the kid got off. Didn't really feel like stopping a moving bus to extract him, though. That wouldn't be very fun at all.

No more sounds were heard from above. Beneath? Sure. The average sounds you'd associate with a bus moving over a city street. But nothing suspicious. He made sure.

"No idea," Amelia said. "You were saying?"