Serum

-Fifty-One-

For two hours, I sat stiffly, with my bag on my lap, hardly daring to move or pull my eyes from the scenery passing by the window. Conner eventually grabbed my hand and began rubbing soothing circles in the back of it as I watched one town then another and another pass us by. The home I’d lived in for a few short years with my mother, and the one I’d lived in for an even shorter time with Conner drifting further and further away. I refused to let the hooded guards see me cry. Refused to let them report back to Lana about it. So I simply hid my face in the view, stifling the tears as bestI could, though my face still felt puffy.

When the car finally stopped, I noticed we were at a bus station. Not one of the little local computer types, but one of the big interstate, long distance transpor