For the first couple of days everything was just ducks & bunnies. We’d gotten our Mommy/Daddy magical/wistful moments of wonder, including our first encounters with bus-drivin’ ladies. The AM driver was kinda rough looking, seemingly chafed over us taking a few extra seconds to take snaps of the boys climbing aboard. The afternoon driver was classic bus lady, probably came from the same generation of cantankerous bats who coughed out invectives over their cigarettes when I rode the Yellow #9. Luke’s driveway was populated by giddy family, neighbors and extra kids that first afternoon and when the #408 (The “Frog” bus) pulled up she opened the doors and barked in a boiling gin and Lucky Strike voice,

   “What are you all doing here?!”   

   Someone spoke, explained about waiting for children that she happened to have on the bus and whatnot. I was still afraid of bus lady retribution so I stared at the ground and pretended it wasn’t me shooting spitballs at her neck.

Jack leapt off with a wide smile; he’d had a great day! He liked kindergarten, a triumph!  This was going to be easy.

   Except that it wasn’t. For the first couple of days Jack liked it more than he didn’t – offering small details into what went on: knew a few kids on the bus, saw Luke at recess, made friends with Shannon (who he likes even though “she looks funny”.) But class hadn’t gotten any more interesting, his teacher wasn’t all that cuddly and the throng of kids at the bus line up was overwhelming. There was also a kid on the bus who’d started hitting him and Luke on the second and third days. Oh, good fucking gumdrops – a bully already? But no, just a spaz. Jack said he was small and weird looking with black “pebbles” stuck to his face. So, it was a little, ugly, moley bastard who was obviously an idiot as well. What kind of smaller kid stands over his seat on the bus to whack the heads of two bigger kids that he doesn’t know? No matter, Jack had plans for “paybacks”, the driver said she’d reported the midget dingbat to the principal and informed me that our boys had hit the kid back already. Good enough. Early rough patch, nothing but smooth road ahead…

   Right.  It took no time at all for the giggling rainbow unicorn of school day bliss to go feral; ravaging our kindergarten pipedreams with twirly horn and horsie fangs before taking a dump on the afternoon peace. Last Wednesday, Jack ambled off the bus liked he spent the day trapped in a sewer pipe. Cradling a new stuffed cat, he came over to hug my waist as the bus driver pointed to me.  That charming quahog-with-throat-cancer voice again, “I need to talk to you!”

   Oh hell, it was falling apart too fast.  I didn’t want to go on that bus. Neither did Jack, pleading “I don’t want to go back on the bus, Dad.”  I assured him that the driver only wanted me and thought, because I’M the one she intends to kill…

   In short, she explained that he’d had a rough day at school, thus the stuffed cat given to him by his teacher, and that she’d tried to reassure him that she was taking him home to me. How about that? She might actually be nice! Cranky, gnarly, croaky but quite possibly sweet. And now there was school parenting to be done.  Had to get to the heart of what happened in a situation we weren’t able to witness. Not easy getting info from a lad who doesn’t always like recounting the fun parts of his day. But we got it. Jack, however social and playful, can get pretty nervous in new situations; particularly those involving huge amounts of new people. And until he warms up to a new environment he abhors having attention focused on him. So, when the teacher started asking him questions he shut down and started to cry. A couple of times.

   From that point on he’s had difficulty getting back on the bus. That first day after involved a breakdown at home while Luke was over playing. That entailed a whole lot of reassuring talks and some tears right up to the arrival of the bus. But he got on. And at 3:35 he came back…with the cat. Same routine the next day and the cat came off the bus with him again. My heart broke a wee bit and my eyes started to roll a little but he said he hadn’t cried at all. The teacher just let him have the cat one last time.

   This week still brought plenty of resistance to going to school, claiming fear as well as terminal illness, but each day was easier than the last. At various points we’ve considered letting him have a break although modifying the parameters which might allow that, starting with no school meant at trip the doctor’s. Then no playing with friends before or after. Thinking he could probably live with that easy enough I amended it all to skipping school w/o being ill would result in no playing with anybody who did go to school for a whole week. We put him on the bus each day however, still unconvinced that letting him have a day off was the right thing regardless of what he to endure later.

   That course of action became cemented as ideal after consultations and suggestions from a couple of unlikely resources: our parents. You know, those domineering imbeciles who didn’t have a clue about bringing up kids while we were growing up… Turns out, as you grow older your own parents manage to escape mental retardation, becoming pretty bright creatures and go-to experts when you’re freaking out about raising children. I believe if it wasn’t for my mom and Elisa’s folks Jack & Elsie would have been packed off to the Soylent Green factory long ago. 

   So there it is: Jack has been stuffed on the bus relentlessly since things went sour. And it’s getting better. Some days I have to hold him upside down, tickle him and shout Oh god, nooo, the bus!!!, others I have to cram a baloney sandwich down his gullet, pull a clean shirt over his head and tell him to suck it up. And here we are: Friday of his second full week; a three day weekend ahead; he’s been bringing home stars & smiley faces on his schoolwork; doing his “homework” on his own and talking about his day in more detail all the time. We can see the smooth pavement coming up in the distance.

   It oughta be a shitheap of a weekend, however. Sounds like Jack is starting to get the croup Elsie had all week.