Night Bus to the Coast

The heater on the 23.15 to the coast died somewhere past the ring road. By the second hour Nell could see her breath. There was only one other passenger, a woman in a long green coat three rows ahead, who had come prepared: she was wrapped in a thick tartan blanket, reading by the dim yellow light above her seat.

At a dark crossroads in the middle of nowhere, the woman turned around.

'You're shivering,' she said. 'There's room under here.'

Nell hesitated for exactly as long as it took her teeth to chatter, then moved forward and slid into the seat beside her. The blanket smelled of woodsmoke and lavender. The woman's name was Ada, and she was going home to the coast after a long time away.

They talked quietly, so as not to disturb the driver, about the towns they had grown up near and the ones they had run away to. Ada's knee was warm against hers under the blanket. At some point Nell's head drifted onto her shoulder, and Ada did not move it.

Near dawn, as the bus came over the last hill and the sea appeared, grey and endless, Ada turned and kissed her. Lightly at first, as a question. Nell answered it.

When the bus pulled into the empty seafront station, the driver coughed loudly and announced that they had arrived. They climbed down into the cold morning air with the blanket around both their shoulders.

'Breakfast?' Ada asked.

There was a café on the front, just opening. It had a heater that worked. They hardly noticed.