I squeeze my own platinum stud, skewering the rear post into the pad of my thumb. The sting of pain dulls the anger working its way through my stomach and up through my chest. One issue at a time. Frankly, we’re not even here to listen to some messy business about a substitute teacher. We’re here to talk about the picture. Clint hasn’t been able to get more than a few words from Erika. He pushed to set up this meeting with her principal just to get her to open up, and she called his bluff. I didn’t agree to the plan and wanted him to wait until I got home. She shouldn’t be forced to talk, but I have lost my voice with Clint lately.
“Who pressured you?” Dr. Singh’s words are slow and cautious.
Erika shakes her head.
“I know you. You’re a National Honor Society student. You’re respected by the faculty here. I know you didn’t do this on your own.” Dr. Singh leans farther over his desk. “I want names.”
“You don’t have to answer that.” Clint’s arm shoots over the back of Erika’s chair. His hand grips her opposite shoulder. He’s regained his bearings. “I’m sorry, sweetheart. I should not have insisted on this meeting. I apologize for wasting your time, Dr. Singh. We need to let Erika share with us what’s been happening with her and, uh, her friends. I let my frustration get the best of me.” He starts to rise.
“I did get your call, Mr. Hansel, about wanting to meet, but thatis not why we’re here.” Dr. Singh shifts his focus. “Erika, I don’t want to punish you.”
“Punish her?” Clint barks.
“No, Daddy.” She hasn’t called him that since American Girl dolls claimed a prominent corner in her room. “I did this. I called out the substitute and shared the video.”
Video? The story Dr. Singh shared with us was about Erika? I blink back the tears in my eyes. Frustration is the worst emotion. There’s a purity to fear or rage. Not pleasant, but easier to parse and then lean into. Frustration is anger, confusion, and the inability to understand my daughter all rolled up into a soggy mass inside me that is now threatening to drip down my face. I plunge my hand into my bag and scramble for the small pack of tissues I always keep tucked inside, but Dr. Singh beats me to it. He slides a previously hidden box toward us.
“Erika, why don’t you tell us what happened in your own words.” He gives our daughter a small smile.
“It’s as you said. I wasn’t thinking.” She retreats back into her curved spine.
“But I think you were. You had something very specific in mind when you lashed out like that. What was going through your head when you taunted him?”
Taunted him? Our daughter may throw teasing jabs at Reid and vice versa, but we’re not a family that ridicules or hassles one another, even in jest. In fact, we’re more likely to say nothing at all.
A lump settles in my throat. Do I even know who we are as a family anymore?
Erika raises her face to Dr. Singh. “I’m not—I’ll never be...” Her voice is barely above a whisper. Then she shrugs, like none of it matters.
“Never be what?” he prompts. At least he’s no longer demanding names. Maybe he has a legitimate chance to get her to open up.
“Beautiful.” A single sob escapes her lips. “I don’t know. I mean, I don’t need to be beautiful. I just want to be... normal.”
My heart breaks at Erika’s inability to see herself the way I can. She is beautiful. There is no doubt, but her maturing body feels like a betrayal to her. She’s a soccer, track, and lacrosse girl. A curvy figure is an albatross. I’ve seen her wear two sports bras to try to look more like her friends who have retained their athletic shapes. Is that why she took the picture? Some attempt to make peace with her own body?
“I don’t see the connection,” says the principal.
“It doesn’t matter.” She grabs the back of her neck. Her fingertips whiten as she presses in.
“It does. It does matter.” Clint lowers his arm so he can shift in his seat to look at her.
“He lied, okay?” She snorts. “He told me. He said I was beautiful.” Her spine straightens, and she sets her features in icy detachment.
I begin to see the girl who could do the things Dr. Singh described.
“Who?” Dr. Singh’s brows furrow and he flattens back in his chair as if he doesn’t want to know her answer.
“Danny. Danny Doward.”
“Doward? The substitute teacher?” Dr. Singh shuffles through a folder on his desk.
Erika grabs two tissues and presses them against her face. Clint leans over and whispers something to her I can’t hear.
“It’s okay, I can do this.”
Yes, yes you can,I want to shout.
Erika looks straight ahead, addressing her principal, whose eyes are still scanning the paperwork in front of him. “A month ago, I went to a par—a gathering after the first football game against Essex.”
