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Laughter Of The Children

Timothy Wallace

    Every year, just before school let out for the summer, the fourth and fifth grade classes of Elliotville Elementary took a field trip to Camden Park. Camden Park is a small amusement park in Huntington, just on the eastern side of the Kentucky-West Virginia border, about ninety-minutes from the school in Elliot County.
    The children had had a lot of fun while at the park this year, as they always do. They rode all the rides and played all the games and ate all the concessions that their bellies would hold. Out of all the children, David and Lee Blake almost certainly had the most fun because they’d never been to an amusement park before; this was the first time.
    The Blake boys probably had the most under-privileged home life of all the children in the fourth and fifth grades; except, of course, for the children that didn’t get to go on the trip at all. The children that didn’t get to go to the park were stuck back at the school playing games on the playground with all the children of the lower grades. Because of either lack of money or religious purposes, their parents would not sign their permission slips. The only reason the Blake boys had been able to go to Camden Park this year was because they had been mowing lawns after school and had saved every dime they could get their hands on in anticipation of the trip. The brother’s parents agreed to sign their permission slips, but refused to supply them with any spending money.
    On the way back to the school from the park, the children would’ve loved to have laughed and joked with one another about the days events, but to their dismay, their monitors for the day—Mrs. Crawford, the fifth-grade teacher and the school’s principal, and Mrs. Collins, the fourth-grade teacher—were very strict, and would not allow such conduct. The children, especially the Blake boys, did not agree with their teacher’s decision, but had no choice but to obey the monitor’s wishes; otherwise, they may have to suffer a paddling when they finally got back to the school.
    Mrs. Crawford and Mrs. Collins may have let the children chat a little on the trip back, if it weren’t for the fact that the day’s events under the hot June sun, and the almost impossible task of keeping track of fifty or so grade-schoolers, had given them migraine headaches of grand magnitude. Not only did the teachers not want to hear a peep out of the children for their own sake, but for the bus driver’s sake as well. They were firm believers in the ever-important “do not distract your bus driver” rule.
    David and Lee were not the unruliest of children, but after the excitement of the day it was very difficult for them to undergo the entire ninety-minute bus trip without talking, if only a little bit, about what fun they’d had. So, as quietly as possible and with their heads below the seat in front of them, they talked about how scary the rides had been and how they thought they were going to puke after eating all that cotton candy. When David expressed to his younger brother his frustration about not being allowed to talk, by calling the bus monitors “mean old geezers”, Lee nearly busted his gut trying to keep from exploding with laughter. When it came right down to it, the pressure was just too much for Lee, and with his forehead pressed to the back of the seat in front of him, his hand over his mouth to conceal his laughter, he emitted a single giggle that the driver of the bus could not have heard; Mrs. Crawford, not surprisingly, did.
    “Lee Blake. David Blake. You boys sit up where I can see you, this instant,” Mrs. Crawford shouted, with the first and second finger of her left hand massaging her temple, and the same fingers of her right hand pointing at the Blake brothers, as if casting a spell of discipline. “Lee, was that you laughing back there? I better not here another peep out of either of you boys, or there will be a paddling with your names on it when we get back. Now that goes for the rest of you children as well.”
    The brothers shrank back down into their seats when they realized all the other children were staring fixedly at them—scowling. The brothers didn’t want a paddling any more than the rest of the children did, so they were quiet—at least for the time being.

    The driver of the school bus was Gerald Pugh. He normally drove a school-bus route to and from the elementary school in the mornings and afternoons, and was known to the children on his route, and everyone else for that matter, as Mr. Pugh. He had decided to drive the bus on this trip for the over-time pay he would receive. Lord knew he needed the money, and he had nothing else to do between routes that day.
    Mr. Pugh was a large man, and well...a fat man. At about six-feet-one and two hundred ninety pounds, he was round, with a round belly and a round face to match. To accentuate all this roundness was the too-large-for-his-body round head that was always shaved bald and topped with a ball-cap. His ball-cap always sat perched on the very top of his bald head, as there was not one made to fit the monstrosity. Visible from the back—the angle from which most people, especially the children, were accustomed to viewing him—and starting where his neck meets the back of his clean-shaven head, Mr. Pugh had fat rolls that undulated the length of his neck—much like the rolling Appalachia foothills through which the school bus now traveled—before curiously disappearing beneath the collar of his familiar green t-shirt.
    About a third of the way home, Mrs. Collins happened to glance up at Mr. Pugh. She noticed that his usually pallid complexion was now flushed, and small beads of perspiration had appeared on his forehead; she was concerned. In her dry and raspy voice, Mrs. Collins said, “Oh, Mr. Pugh? Are you all right, Mr. Pugh?”
    “Yes, ma’am,” he said tremulously as he pulled a handkerchief from his trouser pocket and dabbed his sweaty forehead dry. “I’m fine Mrs. Collins. Just a little warm is all.”
    “Okay, Mr. Pugh,” said Mrs. Collins, who had to be eighty. She was a tiny, humped-over woman with radiant white hair, and skin as dry and wrinkled as a sheet of notebook paper, crumpled and discarded in a waste-can. “I thought I should ask Mr. Pugh. You are rather flushed, and perspiring; it worried me somewhat. Drive on then, Mr. Pugh, if you’re positive you’re well,” said Mrs. Collin’s colleague, Mrs. Crawford. The two women, side by side, occupied the same seat.
    Mrs. Crawford, proud of her accomplishments as a teacher and principal, was a tall, slender woman, and although she was almost as old as Mrs. Collins, her hair didn’t contain even a single streak of gray or white. Neither was her skin near as dry or wrinkled. She had probably slowed the aging process of her skin with lotions and moisturizers, and likely disguised the natural color of her hair with dyes. Mrs. Crawford was a feared woman in Elliotville Elementary School, chiefly because of her age-hardened visage. She had a stern chin, cold eyes, and her bottom lip protruded slightly and appeared to quiver incessantly with resentment and irritation; virtues withheld for the discipline of disobedient, disruptive, and boisterous school children.
    Mrs. Collins whispered something to Mrs. Crawford—something inaudible to the children, as well as Mr. Pugh. After the silent exchange between the two teachers, Mrs. Crawford half-stood from her window seat and directed her firm voice toward Mr. Pugh. “Mr. Pugh,” she said. “We will have to skip our mid-trip rest-stop. We’re already running late as it is, and I’m afraid if we stop we won’t make it back in time for the children to catch their buses home.”
    Mr. Pugh’s shoulders and head sagged slightly as he said, “Okay.” He sighed incredulously. He had been looking forward to the stop.
    Mrs. Crawford, sensing Mr. Pugh’s umbrage regarding her decision not to stop, cocked her head to one side; straightening her porous spine, she stood erect. In a more callous and piercing tone than before, Mrs. Crawford said, “Is that clear, Mr. Pugh?”
    Mr. Pugh resumed his normal, though still hunched posture. He knew that Mrs. Crawford, as principal, could most unquestionably affect the security of his job with one effortless phone call. This in mind, the vibrato had left his voice as he said, “Yes, ma’am, Mrs. Crawford, ma’am.” He again dabbed the sweat from his crimson face, brow, and neck.
    With indifference Mrs. Crawford said, “Good. Drive on then, Mr. Pugh.” She resumed her seated position against the window, and the two teachers again exchanged inaudible words.
    Mid-way through the trip back to the school, a rest–stop had, of course, been scheduled. Mrs. Crawford had obviously not thought it sensible to make this stop, as it may delay their scheduled arrival back at the school. The children, as well as Mr. Pugh, moaned under their breath as they sped past the rest area—the building itself a blur. All of the children, particularly the ones with full bladders, had been looking forward to the stop, if only to stretch their legs.
    Mr. Pugh, unbeknownst to everyone, including himself, had required the stop more than anyone. Mr. Pugh was a diabetic, who suffered from frequent bouts of hypoglycemia. He wished, now more than ever, that he had something sweet to eat; something easily obtained from a vending machine at a rest area. It turns out that Mr. Pugh was just as intimidated by Mrs. Crawford as the school children; children only one-fifth his age. If only he’d had enough nerve to stand up to Mrs. Crawford and insist that they make their scheduled rest-stop; if only Mrs. Crawford had been selfless enough to think of anything but her reputation as a disciplinarian—a tragedy may have been avoided.

II

    David and Lee Blake were both the image of their father: curly locks of strawberry-blonde, pale-blue eyes, a freckle here and there. David, the older of the two boys, was the image of their father as an older man, while Lee was the image of their father as a younger man. Both boys were intelligent beyond their age, and their father had taught them to always stand up for what they believe in. As the school bus passed the rest area, Lee believed in only one thing; he needed to use the restroom, and in the worst way.
     Lee’s legs bounced furiously up and down and side to side. His knees knocked together in rhythm, sounding much the way two hollow, empty maracas being rapped together might sound. He groaned in agony as his bladder continued to distend. When David shushed him, Lee responded in a tone loud enough for everyone on the bus to hear, including Mrs. Crawford.
    “But I hafta peeeeee,” Lee said restlessly.
    David shushed Lee again, though more earnestly this time, as he looked warily about to see who had heard. To David’s mortification, he noticed Mrs. Crawford turn her head in the direction of the seat in which the boys sat. She looked, to David, infuriated and exasperated. In actuality, as the brothers would soon discover, Mrs. Crawford was livid.
    Mrs. Crawford was too respected a teacher, principal, and authoritarian too stand idly by while anyone disobeyed her direct orders; especially when it was one of those troublesome, unruly Blake boys—but above all else, when she had a headache.
    “Lee Blake!” Mrs. Crawford snapped. Lee peered hesitantly over the back of the seat. “Just for that little outburst, not only will you receive five licks from my paddle when we get back to school, you will not get to empty your bladder until I’m finished with you. And if you so much as think about urinating anywhere but in the proper place, you’ll get five more licks. Is that understood?”
    Hesitant, and with trepidation, David attempted to stand up for his brother, but his audacity was of no avail and only served to get him in trouble along with his little brother. “But, Mrs. Crawford, He didn’t mean any—“
    “Oh. Have something to add, do we David?” said Mrs. Crawford. “Very well. Three licks for you as—”
    “But—”
    “Interrupt me will you?” she added. “Five licks then. And they won’t be love taps, mind you. One more word out of either of you, and it will be ten apiece. Is that clear, David?”
    David nodded.
    “Lee?” she said.
    Lee nodded.
    “I will not say it again, children.” She was addressing the entirety aboard the bus now. “One peep out of any of you, and its five licks. I commissioned my husband, just last week, to drill holes in my paddle for less resistance. Keep that in mind.”
    With an evil-eye she seemed to single out every child on the bus, before her malevolent gaze came to rest at the seat occupied by the Blake boys. She shifted her cold, dark eyes from one brother to the next, her prominent lower lip trembling. She seated herself, facing forward once again, but glanced back over her shoulder on occasion, just to make sure the brothers were behaving themselves.
    Lee continued to dance in his seat, only now he trembled uncontrollably with fear of the paddling to come, while David stared into the driver’s rear-view mirror at Mr. Pugh. Mr. Pugh’s face was blood-red, and his head seemed to loll about as he struggled to keep his heavy eyelids from falling shut. Concerned about Mr. Pugh’s condition, David thought he must alert someone at once. He was hesitant, though determined, nonetheless.
    “Um, Mrs. Crawford—”
    Mrs. Crawford gasped. Her head snapped around so violently, David thought it might keep turning right on around and around, unscrewing itself from her neck. But it didn’t, and Mrs. Crawford’s face was as red as Mr. Pugh’s, only with rage rather than infirmity. She was again livid, and when she gasped it seemed every person on the bus gasped simultaneously, flinching in expectation of Mrs. Crawford’s reaction.
    “David Blake!” she shouted incredulously, as she bound from her seat into the aisle. “I cannot, absolutely cannot, believe that you would deliberately disobey me like that.”
    “But, Mrs. Crawford?” David said, pointing at Mr. Pugh.
    “No buts about it mister,” she said as she stomped down the aisle toward David, wagging at him her long, bony finger. “When we get back to school, you are going to get a paddling the likes of which has never been experienced by any student, ever in the history of paddling.”
    Almost in a panic now, because it appeared to David as if Mr. Pugh might fall unconscious at any moment, David said again, “But, Mrs. Crawford. If you would just—”
    Practically on top of David now, Mrs. Crawford screamed at him incoherently as she reared back her open hand. “Backtalk me, will you?” she shouted, this time with more clarity.
    Mrs. Crawford slapped David hard across the face, leaving a deep, red imprint of her hand on his cheek. The profound smacking sound of skin on skin reverberated throughout the bus. David was appalled, and in pain. Tears welled in his eyes as he rubbed his burning cheek, though he did not make a sound. Mrs. Crawford, surprised by her own actions, recoiled from David as she realized what she had done.
    Mrs. Collins shouted in disbelief, “Mrs. Crawford! That’s enough!”
    All eyes, except for David’s, were now on Mrs. Crawford. David stared intently at the bus driver, pointing his tremulous index finger at the seemingly ill man, as he rubbed at his stinging cheek. No one but David noticed Mr. Pugh slump in his seat as he lost all consciousness. Horrified by the forthcoming consequences certainly imminent of a speeding bus full of school children, with no driver behind the wheel—David fainted.

III

    The bus veered sharply toward the shoulder as Mr. Pugh’s unconscious body sprawled over the steering wheel. Everyone on the bus shrieked with terror. Mrs. Collins gawked in disbelief as Mrs. Crawford was hurled across the Blake brother’s laps; her head connected with the lower pane of the emergency window, cracking the glass as well as her cranium. Then, Mrs. Collins leapt for Mr. Pugh and the steering wheel, desperate to gain control of the runaway bus-her effort was of no use. Mr. Pugh fell out of his seat, shoving frail Mrs. Collins feebly into the stairwell. She hit her head on the folding door, knocking her unconscious, and Mr. Pugh’s bulk slid down the steps, coming to rest precisely prone on top of Mrs. Collins.
    David, after fainting, had been knocked to the floor in the aisle between the two rows of seats, and now lay supine, parallel with the aisle. Mrs. Crawford, after breaking the window with her face, fell limp astride Lee. With every ounce of strength in his nine-year-old body, and with a display of unorthodox strength, Lee lifted the teacher from atop him and shoved her aside, just as Hercules might have lifted and shoved aside a boulder that rested in his path. Mrs. Crawford sat slumped in the seat next to him, while Lee gripped the back of the seat to his front, bracing himself for a crash. Every adult aboard the bus was now incapacitated, and the many children aboard were left to fend for themselves.
    A boy in a seat near the front of the bus, with a display of great audacity, made an attempt at getting into the driver’s seat to perhaps brake and steer the out-of-control bus to a stop. His bravery was of no benefit to him, or any other passenger, because just before he reached the driver’s seat, the bus again swerved sharply in the opposite direction—this time away from the shoulder and towards the road, tossing the helpless boy back into the seat opposite the one in which he formerly sat. The jolt threw Mrs. Crawford out of the seat in which she slumped; she landed face-down, squarely atop David.
    The bus slid ninety-degrees and skidded along broad-side, half on the shoulder and half on the road. The bus’s rear tires chirruped and barked repeatedly as the wheels bounced up and down. The bouncing and barking stopped when the rear wheels slid into the gravels on the shoulder, but when the tires made contact with the grass-line; they bit deep into the soft dirt. The force was too great for the top-heavy bus, and it flipped violently onto its side in a wake of cascading earth before rolling onto its top. Children screamed, yet their cries were muffled by the thunderous roar of twisting and heaving metal. It was bedlam as the children were flung about, much like the way clothing is flung about the drum of a clothes-dryer. Twice the big bus rolled; a myriad of slender, fleshy limbs flailed.
    The bus, after rolling once again from its top onto its side, slid only a little further before its mangled bulk came to rest. It lay in a ditch on its side, about twenty-five feet from and parallel to the road—the very road the bus had traveled calmly along, only moments before. For a couple of seconds, everything was as still and silent as the vacuum of space; after that, turmoil. Young boys and girls moaned and groaned, cried and pleaded for mommy and daddy, God or someone, to please help them. “Ow” and “it hurts” and “I want my mommy” were the most common of phrases heard; then there was a voice—not an adult’s voice, but a child’s voice, a boy’s voice—the boy could be heard, beseeching the children to calm down; please everyone, calm down.
    The boy was David. He had regained consciousness just before the bus rolled. He’d had time to attempt forcing Mrs. Crawford from atop him before unseen forces pitched him about the rolling bus. He’d held fast to his fifth-grade teacher, who only a minute ago had smacked him across the face. She cushioned his impact as he came to rest on top of her. Just before he struggled to his feet, straddling her, he looked into her open yet fixed, unseeing eyes, and noticed how her head was cocked at an impossible angle; he realized she was dead. He recoiled in revulsion from her still-warm cadaver, just as she had recoiled from David after smacking him. He was not quite yet able to grasp the fact that he had gazed into the eyes of a deceased woman: the first dead person David had ever seen.
    David snapped out of his terror-induced daze and shook the remnants of cobwebs from his addled mind. He thought of his brother. Where was his brother, Lee? He called Lee’s name, searching frantically about his immediate area amongst all the crying children. He saw one of his best friends, Joe, sitting cross-legged on what now served as the floor of the bus, nursing a minor scratch on the palm of his hand.
    “Joe,” he said. “Joe, you seen my brother? You seen Lee?”
    Joe looked up at David. Snot leaked from his nose as he said, “Hey Davey. Yeah. Lee’s over there, with Amanda.”
    “You all right Joe?” David asked.
    “Yeah. You?”
    “Yeah.”
    David looked in the direction of Joe’s indication and saw his brother lying on his side in the fetal position next to a girl from his class. David went to his brother, and when Lee saw him he sat bolt upright and smiled.
    “Davey,” cried Lee. He jumped to his feet and was standing on grass; it protruded through the window that Mrs. Crawford’s head had cracked, and the subsequent crash had burst out.
    David and Lee embraced. They smeared tears and snot on one another’s t-shirts.
    “You okay, bub?” David said.
    “I’m fine, Davey. Just scared. You okay?” Lee said.
    “Yeah. I’m okay too, now that I know you’re okay. I’m scared too Lee; everybody’s scared. We just gotta get outta here, somehow.”
    David scanned the bus and the faces therein; he saw neither Mrs. Collins nor Mr. Pugh. He knew Mrs. Crawford was dead, and was pretty sure that Mr. Pugh was either dead or out cold; it had been his passing out that had caused this lethal accident. David had no idea what had happened to Mrs. Collins.
    If only Mrs. Crawford woulda let us stop, David thought, this never woulda happened.
    David understood, still hugging his brother, that had Mrs. Collins been all right, she would already be attempting to calm the children, as well as tending to the injured and devising a way to get everyone out of the bus. Recognizing that no one else had taken control of this situation, David knew that he must now take matters into his own hands. It was the instant of this realization that David had pleaded for his classmates to calm down.
    “Davey,” Lee said. “We can go out the emergency door.”
    “Yep,” David said. “But, I think me and you are the only people that know that, bub. So we’re gonna hafta to open it ourselves and help everybody else.”
    Lee knuckled the tears from his eyes and said, “Well, whadda we waitin for? I wanna get outta here.”
    “Me too, bub. Me too,” David said.
    As David and Lee waded through the bus-full of frightened and anxious, crying children, the brothers asked each individual child if they were okay. Most replied that they were, in fact, okay. The ones that didn’t were only banged and scratched up, save for one little girl, who appeared to have a broken arm. Lee knew her, as she was in his fourth-grade class, and as he knelt beside her to comfort her, she cried uncontrollably and repeated over and over again that her arm hurt. Lee hugged the girl, told her that she was going to be okay, and helped her to her feet as she cradled her busted forearm with her uninjured one.
    As Lee tended to the girl, David returned to Mrs. Crawford’s corpse. He did not look forward to doing what he knew he must do; he had no other choice. He stooped over his former teacher and closed her lifeless eyes. He had not the strength to move her, but wished that he did, because the other children would wonder, as they stepped over her corpse, why their principal and teacher was lying on the ground not moving; most would know the truth. But David felt better knowing that by closing Mrs. Crawford’s eyes, taking off his shirt and covering her head with it, he would spare a lot of kids the horror he had endured as he looked into her unseeing eyes. He reminded himself that he, in no way, had done what he’d done as a favor to Mrs. Crawford—the mean old lady that had smacked him nearly senseless for no reason. He’d done it for the other children, and for his own peace of mind.
    David left Mrs. Crawford and returned to his brother’s side. On his way, a boy asked him if Mrs. Crawford would be okay. David told him that she’d be just fine; she was only sleeping.
     By this time, Joe had joined the brothers and the little girl and the four of them continued toward the rear of the bus and the emergency exit; Lee leading the group with his busted-up friend in tow.
    People that had been following the bus in their cars, or had bore witness in some way to the crash, were now gathered outside the bus and shouting in, asking if everyone was okay, and if anyone was hurt. They shouted at the children instructions about what actions to take, not knowing that a couple of courageous boys already had the situation well under control.
    When the brothers and their friends reached the emergency exit at the rear of the bus, Lee stood aside, comforting the girl with the broken arm, while David and Joe struggled with the red-levered handle that opened the emergency door. When the lever finally gave way and turned ninety degrees to its open position, the boys shoved on the door but it would not budge. Men pulled on the door from the outside, while a couple more boys volunteered to help David and Joe push from the inside. The warped door finally popped loose—it creaked and jerked and complained as it swung open. To the men outside, Lee handed off the girl with the broken arm; and then David, Lee, and Joe helped all the rest of the children out the door.
    The adults outside looked over every individual child meticulously for injuries as a state-police car and an ambulance arrived—sirens blaring. Most of the children were only banged up, with a few bruises and scratches here and there. The rest, astoundingly, seemed to be entirely unharmed. The worst injury, aside from the either dead or near-dead faculty members still inside that nightmare of a school-bus, was the little girl’s fractured ulna.
    As Joe, the last of the children besides the Blake brothers, was ushered off the bus and into helping hands, David and Lee stared at each other from either side of the emergency door, and with a deserved sense of accomplishment, they smiled. They stepped from the bus together, arm in arm. A paramedic came over to examine the boys for injury, and as he looked them over, Lee gazed up at his big brother.
    “Davey?” Lee said. “You think we’re still gonna get a paddlin? Cause I really gotta go.”
    David laughed. Lee ran into the woods.

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This appears in a pre-2010 issue of cc&d magazine. Saddle-stitched issues are no longer printed, but you can requesting it “re-released” through amazon sale as a 6" x 9" ISBN# book! Email us for re-release to order.

This appears in a pre-2010 issue
of cc&d magazine.
Saddle-stitched issues are no longer
printed, but you can requesting it
“re-released” through amazon sale
as a 6" x 9" ISBN# book!
Email us for re-release to order.