It’s a thankless job.

The coffee pot usually wakes her every morning like clockwork—four-thirty a.m. Some days she’d like to sleep in until five but it’s a luxury that comes with a price. Because if she did get in that extra half-hour, she’d miss saying goodbye to her husband, and have to hurry over the paper and breakfast. So she would rather not.

But today the coffee pot doesn’t go off, and it doesn’t wake her because that no-good husband she loves so much forgot to make it. He rushed out this morning, pulling on his dusty work boots that’s he’s never-ever-not-ever supposed to wear inside the house, because she likes to Keep Everything Clean. Even though their home is shabby, it’s something she takes pride in. So he pulled on those dusty work boots and it’s such a hassle, so painstaking to bend over in his old age, that when he realized he hadn’t made coffee he was faced with a decision.

One: Trudge inside, get some dirt on the floors, make the dang coffee and go.

Two: Take off his work boots and make the coffee, walk back, put on his boots (really, it’s not worth the trouble) and be five minutes late for work. Which, believe it or not, will be taken out of his pay. His boss is like that.

Three: Don’t make the coffee, thus keeping his finicky wife’s floors clean.

It was easy. He picked number three and left.

Now she’s stirring, yawning, stretching her limbs. Her eyes crack open, bleary with sleep. She’s snuggled under her comforter, wishing that the trailer had heat or…or something. They really need to get an electric blanket.

They probably don’t have the money for it.

Then she sees the time on the ancient, digital clock plugged in and precariously balanced on her nightstand, atop a year-old pile of Guideposts and People and The National Enquirer. It’s 5:15 a.m.

She curses under her breath and sits up, yawning widely. There will be no breakfast this morning, nope. And she was fixing to make herself a couple strips of bacon, an egg or two, possibly some toast with butter. Her stomach rumbles just thinking about it. Most people aren’t hungry when they wake up in the morning, but she is. She’s gotten so used to breakfast over the years of early rising (twenty-two, to be exact) that she’s starving before she’s even fully coherent.

She digs through a dresser drawer for some decent clothes, but it’s getting harder to come by ones without stains or tears. Finally, she locates a good, clean brown shirt and some black pants. Even though the colors aren’t exactly complimentary, they will have to do.

She mindlessly hums a tune as she hurries into the bathroom, brushes her spiky brown hair and dabs on a bit of makeup. It is cramped quarters, but she still manages a small jig sandwiched between the toilet and the sink.

Back out she goes, down a narrow hall, past the other door that serviced as a bedroom to her twins for seventeen years until they both left for college and never looked back. Elisa has a baby girl now, a husband, and she only calls on Christmas. Connor’s a little different—they see him a couple times a year. He has a new girl with him each visit. The womanizer.

She smiles just thinking about him, how handsome he is, just like his father. She’ll have to call him sometime this weekend. It’s always good to hear his voice, so full of warmth and youth.

She steals a look at the kitchen clock as she waltzes in. It’s 5:23 and she has to be at work by six. Her commute isn’t very long, five minutes on a good day, but the weather’s rainy so she best be out in twenty minutes.

Making coffee is as simple as adding a filter and a cup of Folgers to the pot. She really should start putting it together at night, have it ready to go in the morning with a push of a button. But old habits die hard, and they’re so used to doing the small chore early, that she thinks they probably always will.

Gurgle, gurgle. The coffeepot comes to life and a small trickle of brown water spurts down into the pot. She waits until it’s half full and pours herself a cup, goes to sit in the TV room and steals peeks at the morning news between pages of the paper.

When that ritual is completed, it’s near time to go, so she heads back to the bathroom to brush her teeth and put on deodorant because she forgot again. Sixty-four years old and her mind is failing her already. It’s a shame.

Her life didn’t used to be like this, so routine. She married Harold when she was seventeen years old, pregnant with her first child, whom she lost. For a while life was grand. She waitressed, even though they didn’t need the extra money; she just wanted something to do. He owned a small restaurant that he paid other people to run. Then, when she turned thirty-six, she got pregnant with the twins. She was forty-two when she enrolled them in school, and the business had collapsed. Her husband was jobless, they were down to their last penny, and they needed a bus driver.

She said yes.

The rest is history. She started driving the bus, and the kids went through school. They both graduated with honors, and she was never half so proud. Then Elisa announced she was going to New York and left the very next day. Connor followed soon after. It broke her heart. She wondered—what had she done wrong? Had their childhoods really been so miserable?

That left her with the job, Harold, and nothing else. Just emptiness.

She snaps out of her reverie and walks once more, limping a little, because in this chilly end-of-fall weather her joints get to aching a little. Walking or swimming might help, her doctor said, but she was a thin birdlike woman who’d never driven a school bus in her life. The doctor didn’t understand that, despite sitting all day, she always came home tired. The emotional toll was far worse than the physical.

She snatches her purse from the table by the door, along with the keys to her old, battered Chrysler. The rain is falling heavily. She breathes deep. The best smell in the world has to be that of rain. It’s the smell of life. Tears, happiness, regrets, simplicity, all in one. She loves the rain.

The radio is turned on once she’s inside the safe haven of her car, along with the heat that works about half the time. Soon the car is toasty warm, windshield wipers going, her harmonizing along with Shania Twain.

The school comes into view, a nondescript brick building that she’s come to have a love-hate relationship with. Her maroon car comes to a stop inside the parking lot, right next to all the other bus drivers. She meanders inside the staff room for another cup of coffee, this one hotter than the one at home but far weaker.

“Hello, Gloria,” She says to one of the other drivers, a plump woman in her fifties. Gloria smiles brightly at her.

“Mary! How are you?”

“Fine,” she replies, helping herself to the coffee. And a candy bar from the vending machine, or she wants to, but she’s five cents short.

“Here,” Gloria says, pressing a nickel into Mary’s palm.

She looks up. “Thank you.” Number 56 is pressed and the machine promptly drops a snickers bar down to her. She snatches it up with greedy hands.

“I tell you, I’m going to the principal next time those greasy brats use vulgar language!” Someone yells. Gloria and Mary turn toward the door. It’s Raine, another driver, and she’s angry as ever.

“Yesterday they used the f-word six times,” She says to no one in particular, hanging up her tweed coat. Unlike the other bus drivers, Raine is quite young. Mid thirties. Very pretty too, with her soft blonde hair and a thin, angular frame. Kind of reminds Mary of Elisa.

“I swear, if I ever hear Alex or Allie using that language, I will personally skin them alive.” There’s a crazed look in her eyes, one she gets often. Mary has a feeling she doesn’t really want to be here, at the school, driving buses.

“I need a cigarette,” she mutters, almost manically. “I need someone to come with me, please. Someone?”

“I will,” Gloria volunteers. Mary sits down at one of the staff tables, chewing slowly on her snickers. She watches at the two women leave, sort of wanting to join them, knowing better. She gave up smoking years ago, after the twins were born.

Samuel hobbles in, a man even older than Mary who’s so worn-down he looks like he could fall over dead at any time. He’s wearing his usual uniform of a flannel shirt, stonewashed jeans, and doc martins. His face is scruffy with a short grey beard, skin peppered with almost-transparent freckles. He nods to Mary and sits down across from her. A second later he’s snoring.

This is it. The people that are in charge of getting kids to-and-from school. Gloria, Raine, Samuel, Mary. Most of them have been working here for two decades, sometimes more. They’ve seen kids come and go.

They’re almost never thanked.

“Okay, people, time to start the shift!” A familiar voice barks, entering the room.

Oh right. Mary forgot Dianne.

“Samuel! Wake up!” She commands as soon as she sees the man, slumped on the table. Mary has the urge to jab out the tiny woman’s eyes with a pencil. But she resists. As she does every day.

Samuel snaps to attention and mumbles something.

“Gloria! Raine!”

The two women come in, giggling, traces of smoke lingering on their clothes. Gloria’s hair is wet with raindrops, and she’s smiling, eyes twinkling. Mary wishes she had gone out with them after all. Even Raine looks happy.

That is, until they see Diane.

Gloria sighs. “Calm down, lady. We’re ready.”

“It’s ten past six,” Diane says, ignoring her. She looks down at the silver watch she always wears. “We’re all due out in five for the early morning-ers.”

Mary sighs. Oh, well. This is the easiest shift, after all. And the saddest. Kids, kids who never have enough to eat, who have to partake in breakfast at the school. They are all so sleepy. Mary feels for them. Really, she does.

She gets to her feet, bids adieu to her friends, hurries outside using her jacket as cover from the rain. She has keys to the Number 6 bus, the one she’s faithfully driven her whole time here. She pats the side.

“Good morning, old faithful.”

The bus doesn’t reply.

Up the stairs she goes, which are steep and painted green. Down in her seat, a little too heavily. Silence fills her ears. Mary relishes in it, knowing it won’t be like this a few minutes from now. She puts her coat back on because, contrary to the warmth of her car, the bus is cold and unforgiving.

She turns the engine on and rumbles out of the parking lot, catching the other drivers heading toward their buses as she goes. Raine sprints in the downpour, Gloria alternates between jogging and running, and Samuel—well, he walks like he would on a lovely spring day. Nice and slow.

He may be old, Mary thinks, but he’s the best driver out of all of them.

Her first stop is only a few blocks away. She slides open the doors.

“Morning, Hayden,” she says to the small boy who’s there every morning, dependent on food. Mary’s seen his mom before, Louise, and she’s on something. This morning Hayden has a small bruise on his cheek, no doubt one that came from his older brother, Corbyn. Mary used to drive Corbyn to school, when he was in Elementary, and he was the meanest kid she ever knew.

Hayden, however, is sweet and meek. Unlike his brother.

“Hi, Mary,” He replies, sitting down in the seat directly behind hers. His brown hair is a bit mussed from sleep, and his brown eyes are half-shut. Or half-open, if you’re an optimist. She’s not.

“You have dinner last night, Hayden?”

There’s a pause.

“You answer me, now.”

Hayden sighs. “No.”

Mary fishes the rest of the snickers from her pocket, steering one-handed. With the other she passes it back to him, knowing if Diane ever found out she’d have her hide but, oh well, she’s not going to let cute little boys go hungry.

He takes it without word, scarfing it down. Mary feels a pang in her stomach. She knows Hayden isn’t her responsibility, hardly, but she can’t help feeling obligated to him.

He leans his cheek against the green leather of her seat, head brushing hers.

“Do you have kids, Mary?”

“Yeah.”

“Are they my age?”

She laughs. “No, honey, they’re all grown up. But I have a grandbaby who’s in kindergarten. Just a year younger than you.”

“Boy or girl?”

“Boy.”

Hayden grins. Mary sees it in the rearview mirror. She smiles back at him.

She loves Hayden. The thought startles her.

It’s one of the hardest parts of driving the bus. She hates that most of them are bad, horrid children who don’t care. But it’s the ones with the twinkling eyes, the quiet ones, the thankful ones, that always stick with her. He’s one of them.

Up she goes to the next stop, a couple blocks down the street. A girl named Britney is waiting with her two sisters, both of who are in Kindergarten. They all amble their way onto the bus, shooting Mary cautious looks, like she’s evil or something. Mary doesn’t like Britney.

“That lady, driving?” She hears her whisper to her sisters, loudly enough for everyone to hear. “She’s a witch. She’ll steal you and boil you alive if you get too close.”

Mary feels a pang, deep inside of her. She’s gotten picked on since her first day on the job. You’d think she’d be used to it by now.

She isn’t.

“Shut up,” Hayden whispers hoarsely.

“Pardon me?”

He swallows. Mary sees it in the rearview mirror. “Shut up.”

Britney laughs. “Make me.”

He leans his head against the window and sighs, fogging up the glass. He then proceeds to draw a very unflattering portrait of Britney in the fog.

She sees. “You’re going to regret that.”

Mary makes a grab for the P/A system that is wired into every bus. She presses the button that puts her voice on the speakers. She could just yell at them, but this has more formality, and grandeur.

“Quiet back there! I will be reporting any disturbances to Principal Hartley.”

Britney huffs. Hayden smiles. Her sisters stare at Mary with large, afraid eyes. It’s like this every morning.

She finishes her route. Having collected twenty hungry bodies by the time she’s done, she lets them off by the front doors, and they all filter in. Mary checks the time. It’s 6:45—she has a fifteen minutes before she has to go again.

The rain has let up a bit, but a light sprinkle is still falling. She slowly gets off the bus and goes back to the staff room, where Raine is waiting.

“Hey,” She murmurs as she walks in.

“Oh, hi Mary,” Raine replies. Her eyes follow Mary as she gets another cup of coffee and sinks down into a chair. “I’m sorry about this morning.”

“It’s fine. We all have those days.”

Raine looks deflated. “I can’t take it much more. But we need the extra money. Did…” She splays her hands on the tabletop, searching. “Do you ever feel like…trapped? Like there’s no way out?”

“Never,” Mary lies. She doesn’t know why.

Raine’s lower lip trembles. “Maybe it’s just me.”

“Maybe,” Mary mumbles.

Right at that second Gloria sloshes in, singing God’s praises in her heavenly voice. “Hello, ladies.”

Raine smiles and sits up a bit straighter. “You look happy.”

“I am, I am.” She scurries over to the table and holds out her cell phone. On it is a picture of a little, caramel-skinned baby. Her eyes are squeezed shut and her fists are clenched. Her mouth is opened in a silent wail.

“This is my new grandbaby!” Gloria announces.

Raine coos. “Oh, she’s so cute! I want to eat her up. What’s her name?”

“Tara.”

Mary slowly slinks out of the room, out the door, back to her bus. She waits in the Driver’s seat for the rest of the ten minutes.

Elisa never told her she was having Caroline. She didn’t let her know until she was born. And even then, she never sent her a picture. Just an email. In all her life, throughout all the hurt and pain and heartache, nothing had felt worse. Nothing.

Gloria had known her daughter was pregnant. And she was told the second the baby was born. Why doesn’t Mary have that? She slowly leans her head back against the seat and closes her eyes in a silent prayer to God.

Please, Lord. Give me the strength to get through this day. Give me the strength to do this job. Give me the hope to keep going after.

She’s been asking for that more and more often.

She does her route. She picks up the kids and yells at them twice to quiet down, drops them off at school. She eats her lunch and calls her husband, desiring closeness. But he brushes her off, saying he has to go, his boss will be angry.

She chats idly about unimportant matters with Raine and Gloria, trying her best to include Samuel, who keeps dozing off. Then, before any of them know it, it’s time to pick up the kids, drive them home, be done.

She roars down the road, letting off the children, until the last seven are left. They all live in the same neighborhood, so ridding of them is easy—Britney and her sisters, then Hayden, who looks reluctant to go.

“Hey,” She tells him on a whim, gently grabbing his arm. “If you need help, go to your teacher. She’ll help you, okay?”

Hayden won’t look at her. “I’m fine, Mary.”

Her shoulders sink. She studies him, his sad face. His eyes won’t meet hers. He’s lying. He needs help.

She can’t do a thing.

“Okay,” She croaks, leaning away. “Have a nice day.”

“Yeah.” He jumps down the steps, the doors shut behind him, and they are off, leaving a broken boy in their wake.

The last three children left on the bus are named Leah, Mark, and Alex. They’re siblings. As she pulls up to their stop, as they get off one-by-one, she hears Leah hiss, “Say thank you,” in her brothers’ ears.

“Thank you,” Alex says.

“Thanks,” Mark mumbles.

Leah looks at her. “Thank you, Mary.”

“Sure thing, honey.” She watches them as they cross the street to their house, as a woman comes out to meet them. She wishes Hayden had a life like that.

The last thing she does has to do is drop the bus back off at the school. She hands the keys over to Dianne, who thanks her with a smile. Smiles are rare from Dianne.

Raine and Gloria have already left. But Samuel lingers, in no hurry to go home to an empty house, wifeless, childless. So Mary does something crazy.

She invites him to dinner.

His eyes light up and he follows her back to her house in his car, which is even older and more rattled than hers. They go in and sit down, drink some iced tea and watch television, until her husband comes in.

He looks surprised to see Samuel but he doesn’t say anything. He kisses Mary on the cheek, walking across the room to do so in his dusty work boots, forgetting to take them off. But she doesn’t care. Not today.

She makes dinner while the men talk, and it brings a smile to her face, the chatter in the next room. Maybe she’ll invite Gloria and Raine one day. Maybe Dianne, if she continues this odd streak of actually being kind.

They eat spaghetti with sauce from a can, but it manages to taste good. Not long after, Samuel leaves, mumbling a sincere thank-you.

As Mary climbs into bed that night, the phone rings. She makes a mad grab for it, sinking back down onto the mattress before she hits TALK. Most people don’t call this late. If they do, it’s probably bearing bad news.

But no, it’s Elisa.

“Mom?” She asks.

“Elisa?” Mary sits up so quickly her head spins.

“Yeah, it’s me.” Deep breath. “How’re you?”

For the next five minutes the women make small talk. Mary is dying with curiosity. She knows Elisa didn’t call just to chat about the weather.

“I’ve been thinking…” She says at last, while Mary exhales in relief. “That maybe you and dad would like to come visit us.”

Her heart stops. It can’t be true.

“Really, Elisa?”

She sounds reluctant when she answers, but it’s there, the offer.

“Yeah. We’d love to have you.”

“Of-of course I would,” Mary stutters. “We would.”

“Okay. I’ll call you tomorrow with the plans.”

“Goodnight. I love you.”

Elisa pauses for so long that Mary wonders if she’s gone off the line. But, no, she’s still there.

“I love you, too.”

Beep.

Mary lays the phone back down, world tilting. She’s going to see her daughter and her husband and her grandchild. It gives her something to live for.

She’ll wake up tomorrow at 4:15 and have breakfast with her husband, she decides. She’ll tell him over eggs and bacon and maybe some buttered toast. Oh, and a cup of coffee. They’ll both rejoice and wait anxiously for Elisa’s call, and though she knows that maybe her daughter might back down, might withdraw the offer, it’s still given her a little bit of happiness. That’s enough.

As she rolls over to go to sleep, she realizes that her job isn’t entirely thankless. It gives her something to do, children to look after.

She pictures Hayden, Leah, Mark, Alex. She pictures doing this for another ten years, three decades, as long as Samuel has.

It’s doesn’t seem so horrible.

It’s something she’s good at. Being a bus driver.