Greyhound

by Aaron Kreuter

That was the summer Rachel and Jonah spent three and a half days in a bus, all the way from Toronto to Victoria. In Perry Sound the bus had to be cleaned, so they sat on a hill next to the bus station talking about what it would be like to finally get out of Ontario. Fifteen hours later they pulled into Thunderbay. Sitting on wooden boards behind a dilapidated building across the highway from the station they kissed until they were worried the bus would leave without them. They held hands and didn't talk the entire breadth of Manitoba. In Saskatchewan Jonah awoke with a start at 4:30 in the morning; outside was a storm. Long, thin whips of lightning dancing across the prairie sky. The bus was driving in the middle of the two-lane highway. Everybody was asleep. Jonah thought of waking Rachel but she looked so beautiful asleep. He would write a poem about it, the storm, the road, the flatness of the land, her face, read it to her in the morning. They were sixteen and running away to pick fruit in the Okanagan, write poetry, be free.