Over the Fence: Tales from an empty bus

The bus I rode to and from school every day when I was growing up had the number 38 displayed in the front window. The number was an indicator of the bus’s route and was there so riders could find the right one to take home.

I rode bus number 38 from the time I entered kindergarten until I graduated from high school, i.e. 13 years of bouncing around in the back of the bus with my (sometimes unlovable) schoolmates. That’s a lot of bus rides, and I’m sure the bus stands empty now, if it stands at all. I know for a fact that it no longer contains a passel of kids, even though it does hold a treasure trove of poignant memories.

The kids riding bus number 38 were not necessarily friends. They were a diverse lot thrown together by circumstance. They all lived along the same route that wound around the countryside near our small Ohio town.

All sorts of memories were made in bus 38, some good and some bad. If the bus does still stand, there’s even a reasonable chance that it might be haunted. Haunted primarily by the ghost of a 7-year-old boy named Danny.

I think I might have been all of 10 years old when Danny started riding the bus. That made me old enough to view him as a little boy. He was little, but he was also the most divine-looking child I have ever seen — before or since. I use the word divine because it means seraphic and angelic. That is what he was, and he was exquisite. A sense of peace and goodwill seemed to surround him and to speak quietly to the rest of us.

Danny always sat by himself near the front of the bus, so when newcomers were picked up along the route, they had to pass him to reach their seats. If you were to watch this tableau, you would see every new boarder hesitate at Danny’s seat on their way by. They hesitated because although they saw him every day, they were always newly struck by his unique countenance. There was a goodness about him that radiated and as a consequence, we all loved him.

Danny never guessed the fate that awaited him. One day, he was sitting in his customary seat when he suddenly doubled over in pain, his blonde, curly hair splayed over his eyes. He began to cry. The tears filled his beautiful blue eyes and spilled over his chubby cheeks. You could see that he was trying to be brave, but it was a losing battle.

Danny was whisked off the bus when we arrived at school, and we learned later that he soon died because of a ruptured appendix. His parents had been told that he had appendicitis but had refused medical help because of their religious beliefs.

The tragedy of Danny’s passing left a lasting sorrow on the bus. Our young minds struggled to make sense of it all. We finally came up with the idea that because he was so perfect, God had wanted Danny back.

No one ever sat in that seat again.

***

At the other end of the personality spectrum was one Chucky Jimison. If Danny was an angel, then Chucky was the devil incarnate. Our family strongly suspected that he had killed one of our beloved pets, though we could never prove it.

One day, Chucky brought chocolates to share with everyone on the bus. We should have been suspicious of this magnanimous gesture from the outset, but we were kids, and still naive and innocent. So we ate the candy, which turned out to be Ex-Lax. This incident occurred in a different time and I don’t believe Chucky ever suffered any consequences. As for the rest of us, we did suffer consequences and instantly became older and wiser.

There are lots of stories about those distant days, but maybe the best one has to do with yet another boy, whose name was Buddy. Buddy was two years older than me and I flat-out worshipped him. In the jargon of the time, Buddy was a cool cat. Because he lived and worked on a farm, he got his driver’s license when he was 14, but he still wasn’t allowed to drive to school — which was why he was riding bus 38.

Buddy would always sit by me if the seat was vacant and I made every effort to be sure it was. Once seated, he would flirt with me, make insinuations and generally embarrass me half to death. However, he never attempted to kiss me or even hold my hand. I think it was all a game for him to see how much he could rattle me.

This went on for quite some time, until one night we happened to be at a party together. In the middle of a room crowded with people, he came directly to me, gathered me in his arms and gave me a knock-em-dead grown-up kiss. Think Clark Gable and Vivian Leigh in “Gone With the Wind.” As my British friends would say, I was gob-smacked. I wondered what, if anything, he would say. To my great disappointment, the answer was not a thing. He simply disappeared.

Buddy soon turned 16 and was allowed to drive his car to school, so our bus rides together ended, and we never really spoke again. I only recently heard that Buddy has passed away. It makes me sad, but I will always have that distant and golden memory of the time I fell in love on bus number 38.