Day Two of Kindergarten: School Bus

Yesterday after school, we allowed Elias to take the school bus home. He was very excited. I waited at the bus stop to retrieve him.
Big yellow bus.
Big noisy engine as it pulls around the corner.
Big squeaky exhale as the bus comes to a stop and the door opens.
Big boisterous bus driver with big mama forearms dangling above a big black steering wheel on the big boy school bus. I'm waiting for my big boy to exit the bus.
Waiting.
I'm waiting and no child exits. Gulp.
I step on to the bus to speak with the lovely smiling woman who is trying to talk to me while I entertain visions of my beautiful baby: walking down the highway focused on his "tramisformer lunchbox" while big rigs speed by, only inches from his perfect little body. Or maybe he got off at the wrong stop. Maybe he's wandering only a few streets away within our neighborhood, confused, crying, looking for our house. Or he's in front of the school with his teacher, standing out there in the heat. Hot, thirsty. Asking where his mom is. His teacher is ready to get the hell off that sidewalk and has decided that I'm that mom. The one who's always late, who puts her work before her children, who can't get her shit together to remember when she's supposed to pick her son up from school. Oh shit, was I supposed to pick him up today? How could I screw that up? No. No, that's not it. And oh, God, I see him being led away from the elementary school bus parking lot by some strange man who goes to elementary school bus parking lots for the sole purpose of snatching up beautiful little boys whose mothers are stupid enough to let them ride the bus by themselves on only the second day of Kindergarten. What have I done?
All these scenarios float through my head in only three seconds and I tell myself not to cry. I tell myself not to freak out. And I don't. Instead I talk to the big smiling school bus driver. Her name is Leslie.
"You have a Kindergartner?" She is beaming at me.
"Yes, his name is Eli." I am cool as a cucumber, I think to myself. Leslie looks up to her overhead mirror and shouts, "Keli! You on the bus? Keee-Laaayyy."
Nothing happens. Leslie purses her lips and looks at me.
"Hmm. I don't think he's on here."
"Um, no. It's Eli," I explain and I'm standing beside her now. I'm scanning the green seats, one by one. "His name is Eli."
Leslie is carefully going through a stack of yellow cards. "I don't have no Keli," she says and raises her eyebrows at me. We both wonder what I'm going to do next. At this point, the children at the front of the bus are watching.
The bus is LOUD. Full of screaming and laughter. It is completely chaotic and overwhelming to me. I can't make out any faces really. It's just this sea of screaming kids, none of whom are mine. I have no idea how this woman voluntarily drives a bus full of children twice daily. I think to myself that whatever she's earning, it's not enough. I think to myself that this woman will have my boy's life in her hands for at least half an hour every day and I don't even know her last name. I don't want to know her last name so much as I want her to like me, to like Eli, to take care of him. Where the hell is my little boy?
"No," I say again. "ELI Roe."
"Naw, Unnhuh." Leslie casually throws down the stack of yellow cards. "I don't have no Eli either. Oh, wait. Roe? William?"
"Oh, God. Sorry! Yes, William Elias Roe. We call him Eli," I tell her. And now I know that I will be remembered as the idiot who didn't know how her child was registered at school. Yes, that's me. I'm the jerk who puts one name on the papers and then to keep it interesting, we call him something else completely different.
"I'm sorry," I say again to Leslie. She writes something down on the yellow card that says William Roe. I am sure she is writing that his mother is an asshole. Then she stands up from her seat and shouts, "ELI! This is your stop!" To this, a bunch of other kids take notice and chorally repeat her.
And then, finally, I see a little mess of red hair pop up over a green plastic seat in the middle of the bus. It is my child. His face is red with laughter and he is surprised to see me on the school bus. "Oh! Hi mom!"
"Let's go, Eli. This is your stop," I say. And I can't help but laugh.
"Oh. Ok mom!" He has no idea there was ever any problem. Leslie says goodbye to Eli and to me, she asks "You gonna be here tomorrow?"
"Oh Yes, I think I better." I say, embarrassed.
"Ok then. See you tomorrow." And she closes the door and drives off.
All the evil scenarios in my head float away, for now. Eli and I talk about how important it is to know where to get off the bus. The only explanation he offers is that, "Well yeah, it was really LOUD on there."
That's my boy.