Kaleidescope

"I like to be alone..."

'I like to be alone but I hate to be lonely.' She laughs at the quote on the crumpled piece of paper in her fist. "I'm never alone." She whispers as she sits on the cracked concrete steps of her dilapidated apartment building; waiting for the bus. 'That's right, together forever. You'll never get rid of me.' it said. 

She sighed as the clouds rolled in and it started to drizzle. She pulled her over-sized hood up over her ever expanding curly afro and adjusts her glasses. She saw the bus coming around the corner and shoved the paper in the fraying pocket of her over-sized black jean jacket. What she wouldn't give to for once, be lonely.

The decrepit old school bus pulled up minutes later in front of her building. 

'This bus looks like a rotting banana.' 

"Shut up." She whispered fervently as she walked to the door of the bus, keeping her head down as she walked up the bus steps. She stole a quick glance up to find nobody looking at her, she remained unnoticed. She slouched down in a empty seat and leaned on the window and looked out, eyes glazed over taking in the picture of rain soaked asphalt and thick evergreen forests surrounding the bus like a maze.

 'The trees are pretty.' The voice whispered.

"Yup." She whispered, so no one would hear. "Really nice." She added as she put her headphones in. Music was her escape, her reprieve, it helped her keep the voice quiet and keep her relative peace of mind. She unlocked her brand new Samsung s7 and scrolled through her ever expanding music playlist.

 "Hmm..." She mumbled to herself as she decided what song to play.

 'Play the song, the song I like.'  

She sighed and scrolled down to 'Never Forget you' by Zara Larson and MNEK and tapped it, drifting off until the bus came to an abrupt halt at Meadow Crossing High School. 

'Welcome to paradise, where dreams come true.'

She scoffed as she got up from the worn faux leather seat "You know for a mental illness you're pretty funny." She mumbled as she walked off the bus, up the walk, and into the school, pulling off her hood and shoving her hands into her pockets, gripping and pulling the contents out of her pocket to find her schedule, keys and a crumpled piece of paper. 

'I like to be alone but hate to be lonely.' the voice said, reminding her of what was on the crumpled sheet of paper. 

"But I'm never alone, remember?" She said as she pulled her collar up around her neck, turned her music up and faded into the background of Meadow Crossing.