The driver caught my eye in the large rear-view mirror and motioned to me. I took out one earphone.

‘Coming up in five minutes,’ he said.

‘Okay.’ I replaced the earphone.

‘Seems a strange spot . . .’

‘Pardon?’ I removed Adele again.

‘I said it seems a strange spot to set a young lady down.’

I always felt people who called me ‘young lady’ had mistaken me for someone else. Which suited me fine right at that moment. ‘It’s fine,’ I said.

‘You sure you don’t want me to take you into town? There’s a Best Western – I’m sure they’d have something, even this late. I got someone in there just before midnight a few weeks back, off this same bus. They’re not bad, those Best Westerns.’

‘No, it’s okay.’ I could tell he needed more. ‘I’m expected,’ I said.

I hadn’t told many lies in my life. I hadn’t needed to. It had all been straightforward until now. Which was lucky, because even small lies, even to strangers, even when they had no business asking, could set my mind off on a spin-cycle. I looked down. I hefted my heavily framed picture onto my lap. I had grabbed it as I walked out of the door. Ridiculous. I didn’t know why I’d done it. I had lifted it quietly from the wall, not waking the sleeping body in my bed, and walked out the door with it in the early dawn – barely thinking, only feeling everything I was feeling. I’d reached the end of the street with it before I even thought about the fact that I had it with me and how ridiculous that was. And then I saw the bus trundling towards me and suddenly had to make a choice: get on the bus and bring it with me all the way here, or not get on the bus.

‘That’s a funny thing to be carrying around with you,’ the driver said. ‘I saw it earlier, what is it – a picture of a skull or something? You a Goth Girl?’

So, I was going to have to converse. ‘Um, no. It’s instructive, actually.’

‘Instructive?’

‘It’s skeletally correct. Front, back and side view.’ He still looked confused. ‘I’m going to be a doctor. It helps me study.’

‘Oh,’ he said, nodding like the world suddenly made sense. ‘My little boy wants to be a doctor. He’s only four though. And he actually wants to be a diving doctor, he was very clear about that.’ The driver’s eyes crinkled with warmth at the thought of his son. ‘But then on another day he said he wanted to be a space farmer, so maybe he’s changed his mind . . . Ha!’ I smiled at his story. Kids are great. Maybe I should become a paediatrician. The driver went on. ‘So, studying to be a doctor, eh? What uni you at?’

I flicked my glance away to look again through the side window. ‘Oh, actually not at uni yet. I will be though. Final year of school. I’m going to study medicine.’