[ WP ] After a long and exciting life , Mrs. Frizzle has died . Her long-ago students meet at her funeral - for the first time in a while - to reminisce about their experiences with her and how it 's shaped them .

There were a lot of old students at the funeral service. Phoebe felt like she was back there at Walkerville in one of the assemblies where they made everyone sit on the floor because there were n't enough chairs. She used to play with dust bunnies or find ways to make her legs go numb so she could experiment on them with pokes and prods as the principal droned on. Somehow the Frizz always managed to catch her eye and wink, as if the two of them were friends. That's what hurt the most, even though it was stupid. A deep, childish part of her felt that Ms. Frizzle belonged to her. But she must have had handfuls of Phoebes. In this crowd of aging men and women there were probably ten. 
 
 Ralphie, so thin now, had said the real ceremony would be held on the Frizz's farm, with close family. This was for her “ fans, ” and he suggested that the reason it was a closed casket was that it was an empty casket. One look at the thing and she'd known he was right. All of this was empty. Maybe it was Ms. Frizzle's concession to her less open-minded family. That seemed like her. She'd always been good at placating people. Phoebe imagined that she'd learned that the hard way. 
 
 She kept hoping Arnold would show up. She was sitting at the back, on one of the folding chairs the home had put out for all the unexpected and strange people, but it was still hard to see the door with everyone milling about and commiserating. She wished they would all sit down. He would n't show but she looked anyway, maybe hoping that it would be Walkerville Arnold who would turn the corner. Or even a boy who looked like him that she could, for a sweet moment, mistake. He'd been the only one who'd understood. And then he was gone, moved away. 
 
 A noise at the front of the room drew everyone's attention to the empty casket and the minister behind the podium, who said something Phoebe could n't quite hear. Something about the service starting momentarily. It got people moving, and they began to shuffle themselves into the pews. Carlos smiled at her, leading his tiny daughter down the aisle. D.A. was here too, and Ralphie. She thought she had seen Wanda but there were just so many people. Maybe before it was over she could get the whole gang together. For coffee or something. But, even then, she was assuming that their class had been special. That Ms. Frizzle had been as important to them. She was only a grade-school teacher after all. Imagine a professor Frizz. A Frizz who taught literature, or AP history. Or quantum physics—or whatever it was Tim ended up studying. There might be teachers far better than the Frizz out there all the time. Likely, she figured that at the end she might corner one or two of them and exchange pleasantries for a few minutes before they had to go, and made promises to talk again soon. They all had their lives to live now, their kids to raise and to take to school. This was just a funeral for a teacher they'd liked. Had anyone who'd moved away come back? Or just the locals. Like her. Waiting after it's all over for— 
 
 Waiting after class had let out for the day, sitting at that tiny desk again and looking around at art and posters made by little kids. Heart pounding in her chest as she waited for the Frizz to come back. A break in the clouds outside that let sun down onto the cold, rain-soaked trees. Finally Ms. Frizzle at the door, looking so much older—of course, and how could she have been surprised? Breaking into tears because she ought to have *someone* else she could talk to besides her damned third-grade teacher. 
 
 “ Phoebe, ” Ms. Frizzle said, remembering her after all these years. “ My girl, what's wrong? ” 
 
 The minister tapped the microphone and the conversation in the room fell to a hush. He began a eulogy for a different person. A well-liked, long-lived teacher. Everyone nodded at the sweet parts, and when a twenty-two year-old former student came out to the piano to play and sing “ Stand By Me ” as sweetly and unironically as only a young girl could they all began to weep like they were supposed to. Phoebe cried too, in her mind imagining the old tree that grew on the highest hill of that windy farm where the Frizz had chosen to have her body interred. Around the simple grave, raincoats pulled tight and shoes soaked through, eight children stood side by side and tried their best to say a last goodbye to the real Ms. Frizzle.
