The Sweet Hereafter

The novel opens with Dolores Driscoll describing in first person what she saw just before the school bus she was driving, which is full of children, was involved in an accident. Dolores says at first that what she saw “for certain” was a dog but then immediately qualifies that statement by admitting that what she saw was obscured by the snow and “you can see things in the snow that aren't there” (1). She suggests that she may have overreacted, but that she prefers generally to err on the side of caution, and that her reaction was natural, given that she is a mother and wife to an invalid. She then describes the object she saw as a “reddish-brown blur,” smaller than a deer, that came to the center of the road and stood still. Dolores, in an effort to avoid hitting the reddish blur, pulls the steering wheel hard to the side, triggering the accident. She does so automatically and without thinking. 

In the remainder of the chapter, Dolores recounts, from a future perspective, how the day of the accident began and unfolded, up to the moment when the accident actually occurs, at which point the chapter ends.

Dolores cares for her husband, Abbott, who was a carpenter but then became partially paralyzed by a stroke some six years prior. He is confined to a wheelchair, and is incomprehensible to anyone but Dolores, who understands Abbott perfectly. Abbott’s speech is somewhat cryptic, but it tends to be logical, thoughtful, and wise upon translation. Dolores and Abbott have two grown sons: Reginald and William.

Dolores recounts how she initially drove a Dodge station wagon (nick-named Boomer by her sons, for the noise it made) to pick up her two sons from school. She began transporting a few other children, and ended up taking more and more children, until she drove a 24-seat GMC (named “Rufus”) until 1987, at which point she began driving the 50-seat “International” school bus (nicknamed “Shoe”). Dolores put the Dodge, which reappears at the end of the novel, in the demolition derby, up on blocks after it gave out. 

On the day of the accident, Dolores feels cut off from both sons, which gives her an empty feeling similar to “hunger” (8). Dolores recounts how, at her first stop, she thought about her sons while waiting to pick up the three Lamstons children (Harold, Jesse, and Sheila). Dolores talks about the children’s violent, alcoholic father, Kyle Lamstons, who takes out his anger on their mother, Doreen. The town considers the family a “failure” and in exchange, the family members “withheld themselves” and act “aloof” (11). 

Dolores then picks up 11-year-old Bear Otto, who is Native American and the adopted son of Hartley and Wanda Otto. Bear is friendly and a peacemaker, and Dolores likes him. The Ottos are college-educated hippies but also good civic citizens. At the time of the accident, Wanda is pregnant with another child. 

Dolores next picks up the Hamilton, Prescotts, and Walker children, who are all in elementary school, and whose parents live in self-built houses on land that Dolores once owned. Dolores inherited the land and then sold a lot of it off for cheap to pay medical bills following Abbott’s stroke, which she didn’t mind because the families needed land to build their homes on. She prefers them owning the land than it being developed into fancy homes for rich, outsider yuppies from New York City.  

Dolores realizes that it is going to snow but is not concerned that she has not put chains on the tires because she believes, based on extensive experience, that the new snow will be dry and hard. Dolores is kept on as the bus driver because of her considerable ability, her reliability and punctuality, and her intimate knowledge of the roads and how the weather affects driving conditions. (17).

Dolores picks up Sean Walker, the only child of Risa and Wendell Walker, who own and operate the Bide-a-Wile Motel.  Sean, who is almost 10, has a learning disability and is small for his age, and fragile, but plays video games well. It appears that only Sean is keeping Risa and Wendell together.

When Sean gets on the bus, he turns around, lifts his arms to his mother, and says “I want to stay with you,” which is uncharacteristic for him (22). Risa urges him on and Nichole Burnell, an eighth grader, also encourages him. Risa and Dolores talk, and Risa reveals she’s been having a hard time. Dolores sympathizes. Sean screams out for his mother, and Risa is almost hit by a car. Dolores yells at Sean to sit down, and then apologizes. 

Billy Ansel is the father of 9-year-old twins Jessica and Mason. He drives his truck to work each day, right behind the bus, and his children wave to him from the bus. Ansel owns and operates a gas station and car repair shop in town. Dolores suggests that Ansel, whose wife, Lydia, died of cancer four years before the accident, wants to avoid being home alone in the house without his children there. Ansel, a Vietnam veteran who hires veterans at his gas station and car repair shop, is generally considered handsome and noble. Ansel gives the other young veterans a chance to rehabilitate, earn a living, and gain self-respect. 

Dolores picks up nine children from an area called Wilmot Flats, which is almost a shantytown in which the very poorest families, including the Atwaters and Bilodeaus, live. There is inbreeding and teenage pregnancy: “It’s like all those poor children are born banished and spend their lives trying to get back to where they belong” (30).

Dolores sees an actual dog, the same reddish-brown color, run across the street in front of the bus, and it scares her and upsets her. It is one of the junkyard dogs, which are often sick and vicious and are killed by boys in the forest, but this one seems pathetic. Dolores wants to pull over and calm her nerves but instead continues on as if nothing had happened.

On the day of the accident, Dolores drives down a slope and toward town at 50 or 55 miles an hour. On this particular day, as is often the case, the scenic road down into the town is Dolores’s favorite part of the drive. It is here that Dolores sees the reddish-brown blur, turns the wheel to try to avoid hitting it, and crashes the school bus.