The Girl in a Striped Hat, 2 - further developed.

It was bitterly cold, standing and shuffling in the short queue at the bus stop where everyone waited in weary, self-contained silence. At last her bus arrived. Stef went to her favourite seat behind the side door and gratefully sat down, undoing her coat buttons and wrinkling her nose as the frosty chill outside was replaced by the fug of heated stale air and body odour. Hiding behind her long chestnut hair and fringe, under the knitted striped hat that had been a Christmas present from her Mum, she indulged in one of her favourite pastimes. Stef loved to people watch when she commuted on the bus. London was so very full of mysterious people: not like the West Country village she'd grown up in, where everyone seemed to know everybody and the grapevine spread news in no time. Here, she could imagine the hidden lives of the anonymous, self-contained passengers around her, and once a week in the cafe around the corner from her office, she could enjoy a cappuccino and a slice of cake while indulging in more adventures of the imagination with her fellow customers as her cast of characters? What had they been doing all day? Where would they be going on to when they departed – out with friends for the evening, or home to their families? Was that girl texting her girlfriend or her partner? Were those women in the corner exchanging notes on their social lives, a shopping trip or their plans for Christmas? Since she and Charles had split up, she had no-one and nothing much to rush home for. When they had started living together, she couldn't wait to get home to their nest, but now the only company was silence and loneliness. This stop for a snack before returning to her quiet flat was a weekly treat as well as putting off the inevitable. It was a long time since she had felt happy in her relationship with Charles, but his departure had left a large hole in her life and in her self-esteem. Apart from her daydreaming, most of her entertainment came from the library books that she read avidly, but she was beginning to feel that too much of her life was second hand. Stef knew she was quite shy, but loneliness was starting to get the better of her, and she hadn't chosen to live like a hermit. She needed to pick herself up and start living her own life instead of imagining the lives of others. She needed to get out more, she thought, but how?