Bus Wreck

At first I was thrown too far off-balance to wonder what had happened. The noise was the only sensation invading my mind as I tried to scurry off of the hard, wet floor under my hands and knees. Children were yelling and screaming and even crying already. The bus driver was on the intercom immediately; she was shouting sedative phrases at a volume that pierced the commotion it was trying to control.

“Everybody calm down! Quiet! Everyone sit down! Be quiet and sit down!”

Most of the kids ignored the request. I listened. I sat down on the seat I had been kneeling on a few moments earlier. I always sat in the back so I could see everyone in front of me. Right now that was too much to see, so I hunkered down and allowed my brain to review the sensations it had just experienced.

There had been a loud noise. Swerving. Disorientation due to the sharp reduction of momentum and the side to side swaying of the school bus. That’s when I must have hit the floor.

The inside of the bus was now erupting with children’s voices. I chanced a look out the window.

Grey sky. That’s wasn’t right. It should be the trees that line the established suburban roads that sliced up the neighborhoods surrounding our school.

Ignoring the deafening roar around me I crept across the vinyl seat and onto my knees to peer out the window. Before I could see outside I looked down and noticed Tommy Harrison sitting calmly on the seat in front of me with his knees drawn up to his chest. His back was to the window. I suddenly remembered him standing up with his head against the glass before it all happened. Now he looked up at me and shook his head. His eyes clearly said “don’t look.”

But I looked.

The bus was sort of sideways across an intersection where two neighborhood entrances faced each another. We had been on the main street between the two and somebody had tried to cross over. That explained the loud noise. A red sedan was setting up against the outside of the bus with its belly up. The wheels of its left side were reaching toward the sky.

People were getting out of stopped cars on the other side of the bus. I saw them scurry around the damaged vehicle, a few stopped to kneel down and see the person inside. A larger group ran around the front of the bus to check on us. From where I sat we, those of us in the bus, looked fine. I focused on the outside again.

A man in a black baseball cap got on his belly to see under the sedan which was lying against the bus. He craned his neck to catch a glimpse through the front windshield. From my raised position above him I could’ve spit on his back with no trouble. He suddenly got up quickly and made a pained expression of recognition. He took off his hat and slapped his mostly bald head with his empty palm. After this gesture of exasperation he ran around to the front of the bus. My eyes followed him until he disappeared around the corner.

I heard the bus door open and he leapt up the steps and leaned toward the bus driver. Her arm dropped as the man spoke, still holding the intercom transmitter. Her face squinted up before going deadly serious. She looked back at the first few rows of panicked children, scanning the faces for one in particular. Upon finding it she looked away quickly, dropped the intercom, and dropped her head in her arms on the steering wheel.

The man with the black hat also dropped his head. Then he placed his hat back on top and took a deep breath. In an attempt to balance out the pandemonium around me I looked down again at Tommy. He was still shaking his head. A tear was on his face. He had seen it all.

The man with the black hat walked back to the third row and looked down at a girl named Melissa. She had blonde hair that was almost white. She looked scared. She was younger than me. The man knelt down beside her and explained something terrible. I can only guess what words he used to communicate the sudden misery Melissa was about to experience. I was distracted by the sound of sirens.

The next few minutes passed quickly. A police officer was on board in a flash, organizing children into a steady exit stream. I was blinded by the reflection of ambulance red on the pale bus windows. A fireman made a great deal of commotion just behind me. Apparently the emergency door was stuck, so I would have to wait my turn. As my classmates disappeared down the big black steps at the front of the bus I turned to sneak a last look at the wreckage below me. A stretcher was rolling towards the car. Police officers were keeping traffic at bay. A fireman had wrenched the upside-down passenger door open and was reaching with the help of another to remove the men inside.

I recognized Melissa’s older brother, Jason. He was a fifth grader when I was a first grader. He had been a hall monitor. All the other girls thought he was the cutest in the Christmas program so some of them had tried to get bathroom passes when he was working. I never had a crush on Jason. I thought Terry Jackson was the cutest in the program. He was only in third grade at the time and I thought maybe when we grew up I would have a chance.

Jason didn’t have a chance. Neither did the driver. I didn’t know him for sure, but his bloodstained mustache and balding head made me guess it was Melissa’s dad.

One of the “rescue” workers tapped me on the shoulder and said, “Come this way please.”

That’s when I decided that nobody on the scene needed rescuing. It was too late for Melissa’s brother and her dad. It was too early for the rest of us.