She was a tiny child with big, solemn blue-green-grey eyes and a curiously adult way of talking that unnerved some teachers and delighted others. From a distance, she looked maybe four years old; the one time I lifted her she was lighter than my three-year-old niece. She was seven then. In my mind she is eternal, always seven, staring unflinchingly through those strange eyes.
When I met Esther, I was barely more than a child myself. On a break from college, I was volunteering as a classroom assistant in a poor part of the country, thinking I�d really go out and make a difference, you know. I was full of the newest ideas for reforming the school system and itching for a chance to try them out. Unfortunately for me, I had no wisdom in choosing my confidantes, so I quickly got on the bad side of the school principal and her cronies.
The principal was an imposing old woman who wore frosted pink lipstick and godawful cat-eye glasses with thick, gold-checkmarked pink frames. Her name was Mrs. Fitch, or--when the teacher�s lounge door was safely closed--Mrs. Bitch. Nobody liked Mrs. Fitch very much, except the school secretary, Miss Crowley. She was aptly named: I called her �The Beast� behind her back. While Mrs. Fitch was openly mean, Miss Crowley had a habit of pretending to be your friend, then exploiting any weakness she found in you and complaining to the superintendent if you had the gall to disobey her.
Unfortunately, second-grade teacher Mrs. Lemon actually liked both the Bitch and the Beast. They had a way of helping each other: Mrs. Fitch wouldn�t make an issue of Mrs. Lemon�s reluctance to do any real work, as long as Mrs. Lemon didn�t ask for new textbooks or equipment repairs. I had the misfortune of being Mrs. Lemon�s assistant. This was smack in the middle of the budget-cut years, and there were twenty-seven kids in the class. Imagine twenty-seven rowdy, stomping, yelling second-graders sharing their Social Studies textbooks two students per book�and only two adults watching them.
In the middle of all that was Esther. Even her name was unusual; we had two Stephanies, three Beckys and a Rebecca, and no less than four Brians. Next to these, Esther�s name seemed out-of-date, a relic of some quieter grandmotherly time. With her small build, her strange name, and her somewhat ragged clothing, Esther was a natural target. Even at the start of the year the class bully was calling her �Es-turd� and throwing balls of gum at her hair. I wanted to intervene, but I had no idea how to stop him without harming Esther further by branding her a teacher�s pet, so I kept my distance.
The real trouble started as spring approached. Every spring there was a tremendous hatching of June bugs: fat, brown beetles that crept out of their winter lairs around the school�s corners. The boys enjoyed stomping on them, chasing girls around with smushed June bugs while the girls shrieked like proper little ladies. It looked like great fun.
At lunch recess one day I found Esther sobbing in the coatroom, clutching an empty margarine container. I crouched down next to her. �What�s the matter, Esther?� I asked.
She sniffed and looked up at me. Tears had streaked her perpetually-dirty face. �It was the Johns,� she said in a shaky voice.
I knew she meant John Garret and John Lore, the class�s two inseparable, insufferable troublemakers. �What did the Johns do?� I asked gently, expecting another gum-in-the-hair incident.
�I h-had a lot of June bugs. I was going to take them home so they wouldn�t be squished.� Her eyes filled, but with an adult�s composure she held back the tears and continued. �I�ve been taking June bugs home for a long time. But this time the Johns grabbed my container and they--they killed them all!� She wrapped her arms around her bony little legs, trying not to cry again.
�Don�t worry, honey,� I said. �There will be a lot more June bugs for you.� Even then I knew that wasn�t the right answer.
Esther just looked at me. �That won�t bring them back,� she whispered, �the ones who died.�
I helped her stand and brought her to the bathroom to clean her face. She stood quietly, not even protesting as I wiped the tear-streaks from her cheek.
Life went on after the June bug incident. The Johns and Tina Rizzo started calling Esther �Bug-woman,� but she didn�t seem bothered by it. She just ignored them, sitting still even as spitballs flew toward the back of her head.
The next time was during lunch. For reasons I didn�t understand, Mrs. Fitch had decided that Esther should eat her lunch alone in the storage room adjoining the office. I think Mrs. Fitch intended this isolation as a punishment, but Esther seemed to enjoy having access to all the stored books, and was soon talking to me about things she�d read in textbooks designed for sixth and seventh-graders.
One day I was in the office talking about something with Mrs. Fitch, and she mentioned that Esther had been accused of stealing desserts from Tina Rizzo�s backpack. I tried to defend her. �I�m sure Esther�s not a thief--�
�That child,� Mrs. Fitch practically hissed, peering over the rims of her incredibly ugly glasses, �is an ill-bred, sneaky, disgusting little animal who no more belongs in polite society than a wild ape does. She eats with her fingers, refuses food, and will not look me in the eye. I have no doubt that she did steal those cupcakes.�
Mrs. Fitch was barely done with her tirade when I heard the storage room door close softly. Startled, I realized that Esther had heard the whole thing--that Mrs. Fitch had intended her to hear it.
Later I wondered why a grown woman, a principal of many years, would dislike a child so intensely. I eventually decided it was probably none of my business.
It was June now, almost the end of the school year. Mrs. Lemon took down the raindrops-and-flowers decorations of spring. The sky was almost unbearably blue and the maple trees that lined the sidewalk had grown big green leaves; robins chirped; marbles clinked together; and as I walked toward my car in the storybook perfection of mid-afternoon I was so caught up in the brilliant beauty of it all that I almost walked past the little crowd gathering around the lower-grade doorway. Almost.
Instead, I stopped to see what the commotion was about. I bumped my way past students and immediately saw the problem.
Esther was standing there, in tears but resolute with an expression of righteous indignation. The school janitor stood a few feet away, looking nonplussed and holding a broom. And in between them, struggling on the ground, lay a little brown bat.
�You will not kill him,� Esther said, her voice low, almost a whisper. �You will not kill him. You will not--�
�Look, I don�t like killing things any more than you do,� the janitor said. �But I have to. It�s school policy, there�s nothing I can do about it.� He was either apologizing or explaining, and it occurred to me that Esther had the power in this bizarre triangle. She, an undersized child, was somehow holding off the entire staff of the school. I was dimly aware of some of the older boys in the background yelling, �Hit it! Kill it!� She�s holding off the kids too, I realized in amazement.
Mrs. Fitch grabbed my sleeve. �You try and reason with her. She trusts you.�
Halfheartedly I tried to do what the principal had asked. �Esther, bats carry rabies��
Esther turned those sparking eyes to me. �Bats don�t attack unless you bother them,� her voice said, while her eyes said, Traitor. I trusted you.
Everyone was becoming impatient. The students began to stomp and mutter as the strange standoff continued. Someone had to do something; that was obvious to us all.
It was Mrs. Fitch who spoke. �End this silliness now,� she ordered. �Jim, just kill it and get it over with!�
Time slowed down then. That�s how I remember it, in stop-motion frames, agonizingly slow. The janitor raised his broom to deliver the killing blow. Dust fell off the bristles; the bat flopped pitifully on the ground. The broom began its arc down, down toward the helpless animal. And Esther jumped. Something roared in my ears. With a sickening crunch the broom came down on Esther�s head. I thought I saw a look of almost-relief cross her face.
Madness broke out then, adults yelling about ambulances and kids shouting, �Is she dead?� and craning to see. I stepped into the middle of this bedlam and gathered Esther�s tiny fragile body into my arms. A trickle of red ran out of her ear and her blue-or-green eyes stared flatly past me, past everything.
There�s not much to tell after that. The funeral was embarrassingly public, with all the school staff telling Esther�s parents what a great child she had been and Tina Rizzo singing �Amazing Grace� and crying. Even Mrs. Fitch brought a wreath and gave a moving little speech. �This school has lost one of its brightest stars,� she said.
Afterward, I got a summer job at the public library and went back to the elementary school in the fall. It was almost sad how quickly life returned to normal for everyone except Jim, the school janitor, who had retired over the summer and moved to Florida. Mrs. Lemon had a new classroom full of wiggly students, and the only reminder of Esther�s brief school career was a persistent ghost story that went around about Esther knocking on the radiator pipes in the school basement. In a couple of years, that, too, was forgotten.
The June bugs still hatch in the spring, and the boys still stomp on them. Sometimes I catch a few in a jar and bring them home to my garden, where they�ll be safe
