We had assigned seats on the school bus. My “seat buddy” was in her third year of tenth grade (eighteen or nineteen years old) and filled most of the seat by herself. I was only in seventh grade (thirteen years old) and didn’t want to share a seat with her any more than she wanted to sit with me. She was a bully. Some days she would refuse to let me sit down and I would get in trouble for sitting in an empty spot. She always kicked and pushed me, saying I was crowding her personal space.

Eventually, I got tired of it and said she wouldn’t have to be on the bus if she graduated. She hit me, so I hit her back. We were both suspended for a week.

On the next ride home, [Girl] pushed me into the aisle. I felt a sharp, stabbing pain in my backside, and [Girl] laughed. I reached back and found blood on the seat of my pants and saw [Girl] holding a bloody pencil. I limped to the front of the bus. 

Bus Driver: “You need to sit down!”

Me: “[Girl] just stabbed me with a pencil!”

Bus Driver: “I’m tired of—”

Me: “Look!”

I showed her my bloody hand and she glanced up.

Bus Driver: “We’re almost to your stop.”

My parents weren’t home because they both worked, so I called my grandparents. They drove me to the hospital, where a room full of strangers looked at my bloody butt and determined that I would have a scar but I would survive.

[Girl] denied everything, but the bus driver had recently installed two cameras on the bus because of the two of us — one by the driver and one by the emergency exit at the back. They clearly showed her pushing me and then throwing something (presumably the pencil) out the window as I walked up to the front.

[Girl] was permanently expelled and her parents covered my medical bills in exchange for not pressing charges.

I still have a small scar on my backside twenty years later.

I’m standing outside with my daughter, waiting for her school bus. Near us is another mom with her child.

The bus rolls up, as usual; however, the driver today is different. This happens occasionally when the usual driver is ill or whatnot. I don’t think anything of it, but being that this substitute driver just so happens to be black, this doesn’t rest well with the mom next to us.

She lurches forward, blocks my daughter from entering, and barks at him.

Woman: “Excuse me, what do you think you’re doing? Who gave you permission to be driving this bus?”

Driver: “Oh, nothing, I just thought I’d get up at seven in the morning and steal a bus full of screaming kids. What do you think I’m doing?!”

Woman: “What is your first and last name?”

Driver: “First name, Bus! Last name, Driver! Are you going to put your child on or not? I need to get going!”

My daughter moves to enter the bus, but the woman blocks her again.

Woman: “Don’t! Not until I say it’s okay.”

Me: “Ma’am, would you get out of her way and let her get on?”

Daughter: “Come on, I have a field trip!”

Woman: “Let me find out if he’s supposed to be driving this bus.” *Takes out her phone*

Driver: “MISS! I GOTTA GO! I HAVE KIDS WAITING TO BE PICKED UP! MOVE OUT OF THE WAY!”

Woman: “No, you stay right there!” *Playing on her phone*

The door hisses shut and the bus roars away.

The woman and I ended up exchanging some loudly spoken and unkind words before I ended up hurrying my daughter back to our house and driving her to school, thankfully in plenty of time to make it for her field trip.

Meanwhile, I sent a letter to the school superintendent explaining the incident in the (highly likely) event that the other mother would contact them to give her own completely inaccurate version as to why her son and my daughter were not picked up for school that morning, resulting in that gentleman getting in trouble for nothing other than trying to do his job while black.

I’m a school bus driver. An adorable little girl gets onto the bus and spits out coins into her hand, before offering them to me.

Little Girl: *Helpfully* “I had my bus fare in my mouth!”

Me: “Yes, you did! Ew! Please put them in the fare tray.”

Our handball team has a local championship around three hours from away from home. It should last three days, but our team is eliminated in the first round. So, after one night, we head home. The mood is very bad, as we’d hoped to spend a nice weekend in the mountains.

Teammate #1: “Ahh, so stupid. Three-hour trip for nothing! Now I have to sit in this stupid bus again after only one day!”

Another teammate agrees. Suddenly, a red Porsche overtakes our bus and [Teammate #1] exclaims:

Teammate #1: “Wow! With that car, I would be home in thirty minutes! But instead I sit here, on this awful bus!”

Teammate #2: “Yeah! It would be nice. I imagine that is my car and my chauffeur is driving it home for me. I just sit with you in this bus out of pity!”

Teammate #1: “Oh! You are so nice! But instead of sitting here, you should have taken me for the ride home in your car! Your chauffeur should go home by bus!”

They joke around about “their” car and about how difficult it is to go by bus for a while, until our bus slows down and passes an accident. The Porsche is sitting in a ditch, its front totally destroyed.

Luckily, the driver is standing beside it, filing a police report. [Teammate #1]’s and [Teammate #2]’s jaws drop.

Teammate #2: “Oh, my God! MY CAR! WHAT DID THE CHAUFFEUR DO TO IT?!”

Teammate #3: “Do you still think it is soooo bad to go by bus?”

I guess the driver won’t be home for some time!

I’m a substitute school bus driver. While most students behave well on the bus, there are a few who have some trouble.

One day, I have a thirteen-year-old student yelling and being disruptive. After a few warnings to keep conversations quieter, I pull the bus over onto the shoulder and walk back to him.

Me: “It’s getting awfully loud back here; I need you to come and sit closer to me. You can make sure I’m following the route correctly.”

Usually, giving disruptive students a “job” helps them behave better.

Student: “Okay, fine.”

He follows me to a seat near the front, but instead of having fun telling a grown-up what to do like most other students, he continues to annoy the other students around him. I decide to try distracting him.

Me: “[Student], do you know what the loudest animal in the world is?”

Student: “No, I give up.”

Me: “Blue whale. Do you know how long it takes light to travel from the sun to Earth?”

Student: “No, but do you know what a Deinonychus is?”

Me: “That’s my favorite dinosaur — a dromaeosaur discovered in the 1960s by John Ostrom that revolutionized the way we view dinosaurs as active, warm-blooded animals. I know what it is, yes. And it takes almost eight and a half minutes for sunlight to reach Earth.”

Student: “Um… What about Stygimoloch?”

Me: “A Cretaceous ornithopod that’s recently been thought to be a juvenile form of Pachycephalosaurus rather than a distinct species.”

[Student] is no longer disruptive, just curious.

Student: “How did you know that?”

Me: *Friendly tone* “I’m wearing Triceratops earrings and a Tyrannosaurus necklace. I like dinosaurs. You can’t out-dinosaur me, but you’re welcome to try.”

He was indeed unable to stump me on dinosaur facts, but trying kept him distracted until we got to his bus stop!

This story is part of our Best Of October 2020 roundup!

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