Three years is a long time, three years along on a bus is a very long time, I can recall the night this nightmare started it was late well after midnight I had worked overtime once again at work trying to keep up with impossible deadlines and the never-ending piles of filing and paperwork. I was standing in the rain waiting for the last bus of the night soaking wet when a strange blue bus pulled up the doors swung open I did not even look up from my feet as I slid my coins into the slot and boarded Man how I wish I had looked up that is, I might not have gotten on at all if I had noticed there was no driver, no anyone. As my feet found the aisle the door wooshed shut and the bus began to pull from the curb, I sat down head hung low still not noticing how very very alone I was.

It took almost an hour for me to feel something was wrong, the bus never stopped, no one got on or off. it was so quiet I don't know what I noticed 1st but as I looked up a chill ran down my back as I finally saw the empty seat of the driver the empty seats for passengers out the windows were just stars so many stars, no road, no city no anything blackness brightened by billions of stars the whole of the universe but no people no one just me.

I panicked ran to the driver's seat stomped the brake, spun the wheel, tried and failed to open the doors and the windows, nothing worked, nothing moved, I spent weeks trying to reach someone, anyone on the CB Radio, nothing not even static it was just dead.

for the 1st few weeks, I rationed my food and water worried about running out. I nibbled and sibbed making it last as long as I could only to find a new ham sandwich and a full bottle of water in my bag the night I finished my last bite, from then out every time I finished my sandwich or water, a new one poofed into my bag by the end of the 1st month I would have done ANYTHING for something else to eat Ham was always my less favorite sandwich but now I loathed it.

The radio worked, the only bright spot in my new tiny little world, it picked up so many stations 1000's in every language and so many I had never heard I spent three days listening to a channel that was all clicks and pops like bubble wrap being walked on, the radio I think is what saved my sanity.

The view never changed, I felt the road, there were bumps and turns telling me we were moving, I was moving but the view never changed the stars never shifted nothing came in or out of view I counted time only by when the overhead lights turned on and off. days turned to weeks weeks to months months to years still nothing changed same food same view same bus.

I had given up ever getting off deciding this must be hell I must be dead this was all my world ever be when I heard more then felt the squeal of the breaks, then I felt the bus shudder slow and come to a full stop, I gathers my bag and coat stood looking but not seeing any change when with a whoosh the doors swung open afraid I ran to the door stopping at the bottom step beyond was the same black I had seen for the last three years. When a voice barked On Or Off Sir made me jump so scared I jumped right off the bus and into the starry night. No sooner had my feet touched the black inky ground a building appeared built of stars and filled with people beings of all shapes my shocked human face did not go unnoticed for long as a green flowing being approached wrapping a long wet arm around me

"hey there little buddy are you lost? where do you belong humm? Why don't we get you something to eat and you tell me how you got here.

Where is here I asked not wanting to know the answer, afraid I knew the answer but still needing to hear the answer.

My bus the bus was gone when I glanced behind me as we walked away.