You hate her more than she hates you. More than she could, even if she knew how much you hated her. She hates because that’s how you win. You hate to keep this world interesting, now that all the life has been stolen out of it. Again. By yet another move, another set of strangers, another new life to “settle” into. You know in three years you’ll still be causing mayhem on all corners of this tiny, unsophisticated map. Because that’s what you do.
You hate. You make everything…interesting.
It’s Monday. Recess is inside. You’re a cookie cutter third grader watching the New Girl battle the recess monitor. She’s small and already has torn her way through the school’s uniform polos and khakis. Her brown hair is chin length and her bangs are always in her eyes. She wears glasses, or she will soon. Her name means “grace.” When she jumps out the window, she falls.
It’s fourth grade. You’re the teacher who inherited the Wild Child. She seems to have settled down. Maybe it’s the glasses on her nose, maybe the gangly height that appeared all at once, leaving her stretched, rather than bowling-ball, small-child shaped. She looks calmer. Listens while picking at the carpet when you read Harry Potter – Prisoner of Azkaban; your favorite – to the class. She raises her hand when she absolutely knows the answer. And she always does.
But when the second Hannah joins the class and Wild Child becomes Hannah S, things get interesting again. Pairing them seemed like a fine idea – no adversity at first. Cooperation. Except you turn around – leave your back to her just once – then it’s a scratching match. There’s blood. Hannah D stares confused, flounced right out of her happy, curly blond hair.
You’re the art teacher who heard all about the Wild Child and never saw her. She was always tame in class, more likely to beg for validation than tackle a classmate. But the war wounds on your other students don’t lie. You have children yourself. They do sports. They behave. You voice the idea.
You had to do something – had to have something done.
Which is why you’re here now, hating with all the longing for adventure acquired in your little body. You’ll be better than okay one day, but you don’t know that now, in this dinky six lane, twenty-five yard pool. The water yearns to be ocean and desert on consecutive days. The ceiling is concrete and in another few years the cell block look will be completed when Leith has the windows screwed shut. But that’s for the future. This is now.
The girl you hate is named Molly and she’s a fighter, like you. She’s also got ten times your experience on this battlefield. You’re a land beast, regressing to the water; she’s a fish and does her best to make your remember it.
I’m going first.
Just because she’s fastest. Winningest. Best.
You make keeping up with her feet a game. She kicks harder, every time you touch them. Slows down, then kicks up hard when you’re close enough to strike.
Your mother hasn’t cut your nails in a while. You use them.
Molly clings to the far wall, stunned. No member of her kingdom ever fought, ever questioned. You pass her, a land creature gaping on the wall as you become the fish in water.
Except your glory only lasts a few strokes. Then she’s attacking you. You’ll never be able to stand to have other swimmers touching your feet in warm up and warm down after today. At big meets, you’ll act up – slow down enough for them to get close enough to kick. It’ll be a favorite trick, learned the hard way. With your face.
Now she’s pulling you under.
You’re not swimming anymore. Just struggling. For air. Molly’s subjects cling to the lane lines, backed up, unwilling to pass their leader. Eight-year-old faces witness eleven-year-old wrath. Coaches abandon the older swimmers to sort it out.
They’re just getting worse, Brenda says.
Move her, Dave says.
And like that, you’ve graduated from Molly’s kingdom into the domain of her older sister. You’re in the realm of the princesses, now, not the dragons. These are girls who don’t need to fight back. Who will ignore you unless you behave. Girls who don’t care about you unless you’re fast, so now your only fight is with the water and the clock, and minutes, seconds, hundredths will pass and you will come to hate them, but you will always, always love to swim.