Chapter 19
Passing It On
The bus looked different in daylight.
Not heroic. Not cinematic. Just yellow. A little dusty now. A faint smear of red clay along the lower panels from the high school lot. Trent was on his back under the rear bumper, checking something with unnecessary seriousness. Nate stood inside the open door, arguing about a plastic bin.
“If you put the journals under the folding chairs again,” Nate warned, “I will personally haunt you.”
“They don’t fit anywhere else,” Trent replied from under the bus.
“They fit where I put them.”
“They do not.”
Colin leaned against the side of the bus and watched the two of them for a moment, arms folded loosely across his chest. Emporia had been quieter than Wise.
Less volatile. No drama. No confrontations.
Just a classroom that smelled faintly of rubber and disinfectant, seven wary faces in a circle, and one football player who hadn’t quite known where to look.
Mark stood near the curb, hands in his pockets, talking to one of the high school cleaning staff. He looked steadier today. Not buoyed by outside help anymore. Just… standing.
Joshua was inside the bus, double-checking the sign-in sheets from the previous night, making sure every kid who’d wanted resource information had gotten it. Methodical. Focused. Calm.
Colin pushed off the bus and headed toward the high school door to grab the last crate of supplies.
“Hey. Uh—Mr. Campbell?”
He turned.
Dylan stood a few feet away, backpack slung over one shoulder, hair still damp from what was probably an unnecessary early-morning shower. He wasn’t looking directly at Colin. He was staring at the pavement, one sneaker grinding against a crack in the asphalt.
“Yeah?” Colin said easily. “Hey, Dylan. What’s up?”
Dylan shifted his weight. “That guy you mentioned. The linebacker?”
Colin waited.
“You think he’d… I mean…” Dylan swallowed and finally glanced up. “You think he’d mind if I texted him or something?”
There it was.
No thank-you. No speech. No grand revelation.
Just a request.
Colin didn’t smile too big. Didn’t make it a moment.
“I texted him after yesterday’s workshop, and he said he’d be glad to chat with you. His name’s Emilio,” he said. “He also told me to give you his Facebook handle, and you could chat there as well.”
Dylan nodded once. Quick. Like he’d expected that answer, but still needed to hear it.
Colin pulled out his phone, scrolled, and found the information. “You want to type this in?”
Dylan stepped closer. His hands trembled just slightly as he unlocked his screen. He tried to be subtle about it. He wasn’t.
Colin noticed. He didn’t comment.
He read the information out slowly.
Dylan typed carefully, checked it twice, then nodded. “Thanks.”
“Sure.”
Dylan hesitated again. Then his gaze shifted past Colin toward the curb.
“Hey—Mark?”
Mark turned.
“Uh… you got a minute? Later? Just to… talk?”
Mark blinked, surprised. Then he nodded. “Yeah. Of course. Shoot me a text when you’re ready. I’ll meet you here.”
Dylan exhaled. Not dramatic. Just a release. He slung his backpack higher on his shoulder.
“Cool. See you around.”
“See you,” Colin said.
Dylan walked off toward the parking lot exit, head down—but not folded in on himself the way he’d been two nights ago.
Mark watched him go. Then he looked at Colin, something quiet and grateful passing between them. Not dependence. Understanding.
“We’ll keep it going,” Mark said softly.
“I know you will,” Colin replied.
From the bus doorway, Joshua had gone very still.
Colin felt his gaze before he saw it.
He turned slightly. Joshua stood there, one hand on the frame of the open door, watching Colin with that particular expression he got when something landed deeper than he’d expected.
“What?” Colin asked.
Joshua descended the steps slowly.
“Hero,” he muttered, gouging Colin’s side with an elbow.
Colin grimaced, feeling heat crawl up the back of his neck. “Oh, shut up.”
Joshua’s mouth curved. “Always my intention.”
Colin huffed. “I didn’t leap a tall building, I gave him a phone number. And stop stealing my lines.”
“You gave him a direction. And I only borrowed, you can have it back.”
“That’s over dramatic.”
Joshua stepped closer. “No. That’s accurate.”
Colin looked back toward the parking lot. Dylan had reached the sidewalk now. He paused once—just once—glanced at his phone, then kept walking.
“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” Colin muttered. “He still has to hit send.”
Joshua’s shoulder brushed his. “He will.”
Colin didn’t answer right away.
He remembered the first planning meeting in Charlottesville. How he’d leaned back in his chair, arms crossed, already cataloguing the ways it would drain them. The time. The travel. The inevitable drama.
He hadn’t said no.
But he hadn’t said yes with his whole chest either.
That memory stung more than it should have.
Behind them, Nate leaned out the bus door.
“If you two are done having a tender cinematic moment,” he called, “we are about to head to Onancock, and I would like clarity on that pronunciation.”
Colin snorted. “You practice it in the mirror yet?”
“I refuse. It sounds illegal.”
“It’s pronounced exactly how it’s spelled,” Trent called from under the bus.
“That does not reassure me.”
Joshua laughed softly and slipped his hand into Colin’s. “Next stop.”
“Onancock,” Colin said carefully.
Nate made a face. “You see? Dangerous.”
Joshua squeezed Colin’s fingers. “Ready?”
Colin looked once more toward the street. Toward the high school doors. Toward Mark, now walking beside Dylan. Toward Trent, climbing into the bus after a quick trip to the school’s rest room.
Not fixing.
Not rescuing.
Just… passing it on.
“Yeah,” he said quietly. “Let’s roll.”
They climbed aboard. The engine turned over with a steady rumble.
Trent eased them out of the parking lot and onto the road, the bus rolling forward beneath a bright, indifferent sky.
David and Nate were right behind them, David’s big Chrysler—long, low, and gleaming, all quiet power and polished chrome—gliding onto the road like it owned it.
Emporia disappeared in the rearview mirror.
The road stretched north.
Colin leaned back in his seat and let himself feel it—not triumph. Not relief.
Momentum.
Somewhere ahead, Alex would be waiting in Onancock, pretending he hadn’t been counting the days.
Somewhere behind them, a football player was staring at a name in his phone. And a man whose stomach had knotted with self-doubt now felt the bright potency of hope.
Colin closed his eyes briefly.
And the bus rolled on.
The bridge onto the Eastern Shore stretched long and low over open water, sky and bay blurring together in pale blue layers. The bus hummed steadily beneath them. Nate had given up arguing about pronunciation and was now googling it with unnecessary intensity.
“On-AN-cock,” he announced at last. “Stress on the second syllable. I feel better.”
“You shouldn’t,” Trent said.
The land flattened as they drove. Marsh grass. White egrets lifting lazily from the reeds. A quiet that felt wider than Emporia.
When they rolled into town, Onancock didn’t announce itself. No skyline. No grand entrance. Just a curve of water, boats rocking gently in their slips, clapboard houses painted soft blues and faded creams.
And at the far edge of the wharf parking lot—Alex.
He was pretending not to look for them.
Hands shoved into his hoodie pocket. Shoulders straight. Standing beside Sharon and Paul, who looked far more openly excited.
The bus door open with a pneumatic sigh.
Alex didn’t move until Colin stepped down.
Then he tried not to smile and failed. “You’re late,” he accused.
Colin checked his watch with exaggerated seriousness. “We’re early.”
Joshua came down behind him, already opening his arms.
Alex folded into the hug like he’d been waiting for permission.
“You good?” Joshua asked quietly.
Alex nodded against his shoulder. “Yeah.”
Colin watched that exchange for a moment—the steadiness of it—then reached out and ruffled Alex’s hair lightly.
“Miss us?”
Alex rolled his eyes. “Missed Josh,” he teased, then ducked away from Colin’s fake punch.
Sharon stepped forward next. She squeezed Colin’s arm, then Joshua’s hand.
“We’re going to head down to Virginia City for a couple of days,” she said. “Paul found a little inn. We thought… give you all space to work. And Alex space to be with you.”
Paul nodded. “He’s been counting down.”
Alex shot him a look. “Dad!”
Colin felt something warm and quiet settle in his chest.
Joshua hugged Sharon with real affection. “You deserve this. Enjoy!”
“Where’s the rest of the family?” Colin asked Sharon.
“With my folks,” Sharon replied, already moving toward the car. There was no big send-off. Just hugs. A few instructions about sunscreen and calling if needed.
“We’ll take good care of him,” Joshua called after her.
Sharon’s wave was dismissive, saying Joshua’s words were unnecessary. “Behave!” she shouted out the window towards her foster son, who grinned and blew her a kiss.
Then Sharon and Paul’s car eased out of the lot and disappeared down the narrow road, leaving Alex standing with them and the open water at their backs.
The wind carried the faint smell of salt and something green and tidal.
David eased into the parking spot beside the bus, and Nate dashed from the car to hug Alex, then clapped his hands once. “All right, team. We unload tomorrow. Today, we breathe.”
Colin nodded and pointed to a nearby restaurant advertising all-you-can-eat fish and chips. “But first, we eat.”
No one argued.
Later, after they had eaten, and Alex had disappeared with Trent to do an unnecessary inspection of something mysterious making noise under the bus, Colin and Joshua drifted down toward the edge of Onancock Creek.
The dock boards were sun-warmed beneath their feet. Boats knocked gently against their moorings. The water moved in small, patient ripples, not dramatic enough to be called waves.