The girl was always at the bus stop, playing guitar with her case open for tips, until one day she wasn’t.

Lori stared at the empty spot as people walked right through it, not noticing for an instant that they were stepping on such sacred ground. It wasn’t as though the guitar playing was amazing or anything, but it wasn’t bad. It was more of the tenacity that the girl had always showed. That she was always there. That she had been better yesterday than the first time Lori had heard her.

Then she was gone, no warning.

Lori shook her head and walked onward, deciding that it was just the timing. After all, the guitarist couldn’t have always been there. She had to be going to eat or something else. Wherever she lived. Lori believed that.

But when the guitarist wasn’t there the next day, Lori began to feel concerned.

On the third day, she started to look.