On The Bus

A middle-aged woman got up from her seat with her daughter behind her, a girl of about 7 or 8 dressed primly in her white school uniform, black hair pulled back tightly and held in place by a white hair-band and two black, long braids down her back. "Come here, grab the handrail", said the mother in a flat, stern voice.

The girl moved forward, purposefully or not getting ahead of her mother and perhaps, in the opinion of the latter, not grabbing the handrail with a solid enough grasp.

"Where do you think you're going, Ana?" she yelled, shrilly. "I told you to grab on!"

She then proceded to shake Ana by the shoulder and shove her against the handrail. Ana didn't say a word and looked on, without much expression on her face.

The mother pressed the button by the door to signal the driver to pull up at the next stop. He did so to let some people on, who came on board through the doors up front, but he forgot to open the door in the middle of the bus, where Ana and her mother were waiting.

"Mister, could you please open the door?", said the woman calmly, sweetness in her voice.

He did so, and then the mother grabbed her daughter's hand and they both got off the bus.