The children moaned. Lawrence lay Ruby down on seat, then took off his bus driver’s quilted jacket and put it behind Ruby’s head so not to be knocked about. I should put a note on her forehead so people know she’s okay, he thought. Deborah leapt at Lawrence as he was standing to get a paper.

“Oh Lawrence, kiss me!” And she dove into Lawrence’s arms and planted the most passionate kiss an alumna of Diesel House has ever planted. The world was still for a moment. A middle aged couple embraced in a true and passionate kiss in the aisle of a school truck, holding a dead fish, encircled by bloody and vomiting and crying school children, with a perfect angel laying on the seat beside them and a blissful young boy peeking over the top of the steering wheel of an out-of-control-school-truck-bus. This moment had never happened before. The angels sang. Orchestras roared. It was perfect.

Trevor had not crashed his car. As a resident of the area, Trevor knew the alleys well. He knew exactly which street the bus would eject itself from. He sped his collector’s car to the end of the adjacent street and waited.

The bus exploded in a jerky blast from the alley. Garbage rained down. Trevor stood in the middle of the street, shotgun in hand. The bus was coming straight toward him. He saw not a psychotic fish-thieving school bus driver at the wheel, but the top of a small child’s head. His heart quivered. Could he shoot dead the child who wheeled the machine that carried his prized fish? No. Could he shoot the machine itself which carried his prized fish (and several school children)? Yes. He aimed low and sprayed a shotgun blast at the tires of the machine. The tires burst and rubber flew in all directions like fireworks. The bus collapsed onto its front bumper and jolted to a violent stop. The only two passengers not sitting, Deborah Champski-Five and Lawrence Fountaingale, who were still caught up in a kiss in the aisle of the bus-truck, flew through the front of the windshield. They landed at Trevor’s feet, still somehow in each other’s arms. He aimed the shotgun down and blasted Deborah Champski-Five and Lawrence Fountaingale to smithereens.