They were in New York for a day, the mother and the 6-year-old girl. They had somewhere to go. They waited at the bus stop, wide eyed, awe-struck by this strange city. The bus pulled up, passengers stepped down, other people jostled ahead. The mother allowed her daughter to walk up the bus steps first. But somehow the doors shut, the bus lurched, then drove away. The mother was left on the sidewalk, alone. Her daughter was on the bus, alone. Terror lit a wild fire in the mother's soul.
