Coach Heading North.

Nose pressed against ice-cold window, Jodie sat motionless
Drifting, lost in some inner world of her own
Where not even the slack-mouthed tin-swigging fools intruded,
And fascinated, possibly for the first time in that miserable
day-to-day existence
That luckier folk called living
By the carefree rivulets of scudding rainwater.

It had been a surprisingly difficult thing to do -
Scribbling that sad, inadequate note
On paper from a shabby, underused exercise book.
Hoping it would say everything, knowing that it wouldn't say
enough.
Waiting for the familiar bus with her world crammed into that scruffy
school bag.
Leaving for good -

Leaving the woman she'd been trained to call mother
The vile half-brother that she'd never wanted,
The "uncle" who always sat close: uncomfortably close, but only when
they were alone
And asked her slyly if she had a proper boyfriend.. you know,
proper?
Maybe she wanted one, eh? He wasn't doing anything while mom was
out
And she was a big girl now..

Maybe she'd found one for herself, that no-one knew about.
A cheerful enough face if you weren't fussy,
A rank stench of stale tobacco and sweat,
A bag of pale undercooked chips in the bus shelter and.. just
and.

He wasn't going with her, because
She'd not even bothered telling him about her new life:
That was to be shared with someone truly special.

Jodie reached inside her thin unpaid-for catalogue coat
Carefully, slowly, so that no-one should see,
And brushed that part of her that sheltered her newborn to be.
Hers..

Here at last, on this coach heading north,
Jodie had discovered real, unquestioning love
And she knew, with a mother's absolute certainty,
That this was what she'd been searching for
All along.