My daughter Katie is an English major.  This semester, she's taking a children's literature class.  When her professor in this class found out Katie had applied to law school, she said "How are you going to find time to write children's books if you're in law school!?" 

This is what Katie wrote for her 'conflict' assignment.

The Bus Story

   I was sitting on the bus, going to school the same way I did every morning.  It's a yellow school bus, the old kind, with cracked brown leather seats that stick to your thighs when you're wearing a skirt, holes covered in duct tape that doesn't quite prevent the fluff inside from spilling out.  Probably this has something to do with kids like me who can't seem to stop themselves from sticking their hands into the cracks, pulling apart the material just a little more every day.  It's like a scab you can't help picking.

   My buy stop is two blocks away from my house, it comes at 8:57 everyday.  In the winter we wait and wait and pray that it is just ten minutes late, because after that we get to go home and that means no school.  But it always seems to make it, and it made it this day, when it was spring anyway and I didn't mind the wait.  We are one of the first stops, my brother and I, which is nice because we can sit wherever we want, in the way back on the window or in the aisle, or in the little seat so you don't have to share, no matter how full the bus gets.  Not a lot of things are free when you're a kid, most of your choices are made for you, what classroom you are in, what you learn and what you eat for lunch, what position you play on the basketball team, even our clothes are picked out for us.  Red plaid skirt, white polo shirt, blue sweatshirt with the emblem of my school on one side.  So it may not seem like a lot to have a choice of where we sit on the bus, but it's something, I guess.

  Last year we weren't so lucky.  We were "too rowdy", our bus driver said, and the seats had to be assigned.  I prayed I would get put in the back, with my best friend, or at least someone I knew who would keep me from dying of boredom on the 45-minute ride home.  When I was little I used to fall asleep on the bus and miss my stop, somewhat acceptable for a kindergartener, not so much for a fifth grader.  But they didn't put me next to my friends, or even next to a kindergartener that I would have to keep from falling asleep---they put me in the worst seat ever, the seat next to my older brother.

  Older people are always telling me that they fought with their brothers when they were my age, and that now as grown-ups they are best friends.  I can't imagine such a rosy picture for our future.  There's no way around it, my brother is a terror.  I think his entire purpose in life is to make me miserable.  When all I want is a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, he takes the last piece of bread.  When I need to take a shower, he takes an hour long bath.  And even when I call the front seat of the car and say no blitz, he still gets to sit there because he's older.  As if being two years older than me is some accomplishment that deserves a reward.  Besides all that, he is constantly poking me, pulling my hair, calling me names, and there I was last year, forced to sit next to him morning and night.  I didn't have to worry about falling asleep but sitting next to him was a nightmare.  Even thinking back to last year puts a knot in my stomach.

  But this year, especially this spring, things are different.  Finally, my brother is old enough to ride his bike to school, and that means for an hour and a half a day, forty five minutes in each direction, I am in peace.  This new found bus-riding Zen was part of the reason I was in such a good mood that spring morning.  It was finally warm enough outside that my legs weren't two blue frozen popsicles.  I was right at the last section of the book I was reading, about to find out once and for all who put frogs in the principal's desk.  (Turns out it was the kid with freckles.  Never trust a kid with freckles.)  My window was open, the sun was shining, and sitting in the very last seat on the right side  I felt total freedom.  Bliss.  That's when it hit me.  People know what they are talking about when they call it a ton of bricks. 

  I have one job when my brother rides his bike to school.  One job.  I have to bring his backpack on the bus with me, because with all his books and homework it is too heavy for him to bike with.  I always remember.  I sling my backpack over one shoulder and his over the other, and they bang into the seats on either side when I am trying to get off the bus.  But this day, this beautiful spring day of bliss and freedom, I had forgotten.

  As soon as I realized what I had done my face started to feel hot.  My heart ws pounding in my chest and my hands were sticky and sweaty.  Every moment that brought the bus closer to school made my panic more intense.  He was going to kill me!  And the worst part was that I deserved to be killed!  All his homework, his books, even his Walkman--everything was in that bag.  I could picture it there at the bus stop, getting smaller and smaller as I drove away, clueless.  By this time it had probably been dragged into some neighborhood dog's backyard, or picked up by some hoodlum kid playing hooky.  Every time the bus stopped to let another kid on I thought about jumping off and playing hooky myself.  But who was I kidding, I was only ten.  I would never survive the mean streets of Minneapolis on my own.

  By now my friends were getting on the bus, and I tried o focus on their giggling and chatting instead of my growing desire to throw up.  I was doing pretty well until one of the girls asked me some specific question about our math homework.  What I tried to say back to her was, "I think it's the least common denominator."  What actually came out was, "I...I....I....thinkithaleeeeee," my words came out in a high pitched wail that sounded a lot like  a dog when you step on it's tail.  The floodgates opened, and my whole body started shaking with the sobs I had been trying to hold back for the last half an hour.  I could just imagine my brother's scrunched up freckled face, his eyebrows lowered and his mouth closed tightly, ready to give me a beat down as soon as I stepped off the bus.  Now, as if things could get any worse, I was impersonating a wounded animal on the back of the school bus.

  Finally, after what seemed like the longest and shortest bus ride ever, we got to school.  One by one the other kids got off the bus, until there was only me.  I could see the reflection of my face in the window, and I looked as bad as I thought.  My eyes were red and swollen, my cheeks and nose blotchy, my breathes raspy from having cried so hard.  I didn't realize how tense I was until I stood up, and felt the stiffness in my legs and neck.  Out the window I could see my older brother, waiting impatiently for me to get off the bus.  He saw me through the window, and already I could tell he was getting mad.  His eyebrows shot up in surprise then down into that angry stare I had seen so many times.  His hands closed into fists.  His face scrunched down so tight I could barely see his freckles.  I took a gulp of air and stepped off the bus.

  "What's the matter?  What happened to you?" My brother asked.  "Was somebody picking on you?  'Cuz if they were, they're in trouble."

  He hadn't even noticed his backpack was missing.  He was upset because he saw I was upset. 

  My older brother wanted to defend me. 

  My older brother wanted to protect me. 

  I started crying harder.

  "IforfotyourbackpackI'msorryIdon'tknowhowIforgotpleasedon'tbemadyoucanhitmeifyouwanttoI'msorryyyy!"

  "What?  Speak English, jeez."

  "IsaidIforgotyourbackpackanditprobablygotstolenbyhooligansandIknowyourHootieandtheBlowfishtapewasinyour
walkmanandIwillgetyouannewoneIswearrrrrr."

  "Huh?"

  "I FORGOT YOUR BACKPACK!"

  He looked surprised for a second, probably more because I was yelling than what I had done.  "My backpack?"

  "I'm really sorry, I know your homework was in it and your school books and now you won't be able to do your work in class and it's all my fault," I said.

  Now my brother's face had relaxed, and he actually looked like he was starting to smile.  "Wow," he said.  "Thanks!"  He patted my shoulder and went back to playing football with the rest of the seventh grade boys.

  I guess one  of the neighbors found his backpack and called our mom, so I didn't have to buy him a new Hootie and the Blowfish tape.  And while the rest of his class went over the math and language arts problems they had done for homework my brother was allowed to take all the erasers outside and bang them against the side of the school. 

  I reminded him of how well this worked out for him the next time I called the front seat of the car.  He still made me sit in the back.

 

What did you think of this article?

Liked
Disliked
No Opinion