A Necklace, A Romance and a Myth

"Boarding School! Won't it be fun?!" 

My mums words echoed round my head as I shifted in the seat uncomfortably. No mum. No it would not be fun. I hadn't even gotten to the school yet, but the school bus alone gave me a pretty clear insight on how this was going to go.

For one thing, it was filthy. It was also old. And creaky. And smelt funny. And the only other person besides me in the bus itself was the bus driver. Who, by the way, was the spitting image of Hobo Jim, who squatted in the bushes behind the park. 

The bus driver also seemed to have no idea where he was going. The last time we had seen another car was hours ago. Instead all we could see for miles around were fields and the occasional cow, if we were lucky. And even now that was dissapearing into only my memory, for the sights had now been replaced by trees. It seemed to me like we were in the centre of some woods or something, and I didn't even know there were woods around London. And these weren't flimsy little trees either. These were great big oak trees, tall, strong and daunting as hell. 

I shifted around in my seat a little as the trees became more and more dense. The rays from the sun began to severely decrease as we drove on - darkness spilling into the bus.

The bus seemed to be speeding up too. Every few seconds it seemed to jolt severely as it hit a tree root or hole in the ground. "Bloody hell," I muttered to myself, grabbing my phone and shoving it in my pocket before it got tossed onto the floor. 

Grabbing the corners of my seat to keep my place, I peeked out into the darkness, wodering what dickhead would drive fast in this light. Turned out we were going faster than I thought. Outside the great trees had turned to mere sillouhetes, flying past the bus as we rocketed through the undergrowth. My grumpiness had now seemingly been replaced by anxiety, maybe even fear as blood began to pump ferociously through my veins, my mind blank at what to do. I didn't even know a bus could drive this fast, let alone what to do when it did.

At loss for what to do I bent forward and put my arms around my head, like you would do in an aeroplane. The metal floor of the bus was shaking ferociously, causing my nerves to do very much the same.

"Stop you fucking madman!" I shrieked as I tensed my muscles waiting for a crash, a bang, a jolt ripping throughout my body as we hit a tree, leaving me paralised for the rest of my life.

"...we have," the bus driver croaked back as the sound of the engine cut off.

With shallow breaths I slowly lifted my head from my arms, unsure of what sight I would be met with. I hadn't heard the brakes, but neither had I heard the thump of metal against tree or felt the jolt of impact go through my body.

I honestly didn't know what to expect when I looked out of that window. But what I saw....well....I definitely did not expect that.