All tagged goodbye

I sit on the idling school bus, knitting a scarf and waiting for the other students to board so we can all go home, but the head that appears at the front of the bus belongs to my father, not a fellow student.

Mom and I trudge up the hill through the warm Kansas rain, lugging my possessions up two flights into my college suite. Dad sits in our van with the Colorado plates, eerily silent after a lifetime of telling me I’d be the one to make it to college.

As the bus pulled away, I twisted around in my seat to watch her wave. How long did she stay on the porch, coatless in December, watching the bus go down the street?