One of the more traumatizing experiences of my youth. Fictionalized for anonymity's sake.

A Little Girl Learns Injustice

It was a typical Saturday morning in late September. The windows on the far side of the classroom allowed the fluorescent lights above to rest their weary eyes. The opposite wall had a glass cabinet full of foreign trinkets, from faux-Egyptian relics to ancient Chinese terra cotta warriors. The front of the room had a small trapezoidal table laden with textbooks and papers. Two columns away and three seats down from this table sat a tiny second grader whose goal was to become invisible. It was apparent that she was in discomfort. She clenched her pencil tightly and prayed the teacher would not call on her, for that would draw attention to the sudden spasms in her face. To divert her attention from her tics, she started to study the pencil in her hand. She got this pencil from a forgotten source not too long ago. It was not mechanical and it had no remarkable feature. Yet, with its yellow eraser, matching polka dots and colorful background, she loved it. The background colors changed from ultramarine to a red violet, where she held the pencil incorrectly, back to her favorite color, dark cerulean. This favorite pencil of hers was special to her alone.

“Hey,” an unfriendly voice said in sotto voce and poked her hard in the back. She felt her eyes clench and squint. Once. Twice. A third time. She felt the onset of more facial tics, yet she was stressed and couldn’t stop. There was another poke, but she continued to resist the urge to turn, for it was against the teacher’s rules to turn around in one’s seat. Unfortunately, the girl who was persistently poking the shy girl in the back was the teacher’s niece.

Against her better judgment, for she knew she would regret this, the eight-year-old slowly turned in her seat and timidly whispered, “Yes?”

The bossy girl her looked so much like the teacher, her aunt, with the same short bob haircut, dark complexion, and short stature. However, she lacked her aunt’s warmth and empathy. The shy girl liked her teacher.

“That pencil; it’s mine. Give it to me.” The tone of her voice was heartless, accusing.

The girl felt her jaw drop against her will. The gall of the teacher’s niece to accuse her of stealing! The second grader felt sullied and self-conscious. It was a huge disgrace to be called a thief, for it was a harsh, degrading word. The little girl felt familiar tears pool behind her eyes. She did not dare say anything, for fear of being caught with her back to the board. How could she defend herself when the malicious girl could easily raise her hand and tattle to her aunt?

How the girl resented the teacher’s niece, with her pixyish bob and adorable pigtails. If only she could pull off that look, but she knew having her hair up would only draw attention to her incessantly twitching eyes.

Ever since she became afflicted with these sudden twitches and jerks, she felt as though her entire life had been reversed. Well, she wasn’t going to tolerant this anymore. She was going to take a stand. “No,” she said and, for the first time, made eye contact with her accuser. In feeble Chinese, she exclaimed, “It’s not yours and I’m not giving it to you.” She felt triumph swell inside her tiny body when the other girl’s eyes widened. There! Courage; for the first time in her short life, she finally knew what that word meant. It meant defending oneself and the truth.

Suddenly, the bossy girl reached out and snatched the pencil away.

“Ay-ya, that’s mine!” the shy girl shouted defensively and strained in her attempts to reclaim her pencil.

“Mei Li!” someone shouted. Mei Li winced. She whirled around and stared up at her teacher’s intimidating figure.

“Yes?” she mumbled and felt her resolve shrink. There was a satisfied sigh coming from behind her. Though she did not turn, she knew the other girl’s expression and wished she could wipe off that familiar smirk.

“Why are you turned around in your seat and talking?” the teacher demanded. The girl felt like a convict. She had never been reprimanded before. Talking was a crime. It meant getting one’s seat moved. It meant standing up at the front of the class in a corner. It meant being noticed.

The girl shrank even lower in her chair. “I just want my pencil back. That pencil is mine.”

The teacher looked at her niece. “Isn’t that the pencil I gave you?” she asked.

The other girl smiled smugly. “Mei Li stole it.”

“No, it’s not!” Mei Li knew it was childish and pointless… this immature quarreling. Why not just LET the girl have it?

“How can you prove this?” the teacher asked.

“Because...” she felt tears well up in her eyes. It was the principle of the matter. She knew it was just a pencil, but it had been given meaning, when defending it she defended herself. “...because...” she looked around and noticed twenty-eight pairs of eyes gawking at her. “...it’s mine,” she finished lamely.

The teacher narrowed her eyes. “Mei Li, it’s just a pencil. And it’s wrong to steal. Let’s just forget the entire thing. I can see that you have more than one pencil in your pencil box. Just give it to her.”