Why do they think she’s odd? She’s just different, unique, like all of them. Some like to sing, some like to run. Rebecca, I notice, prefers to sit alone and hum. Most girls like to talk. She doesn’t. Some like to be in groups; Rebecca prefers to be alone. Some girls want to hug. Rebecca doesn’t want to be touched. I never land on her or touch her; I just watch her from the wall.
All the girls have different names. Rebecca remembers them all, though the girls would be surprised to learn that. Rebecca doesn’t understand names. She understands nouns. She thinks of her name as Girl. Her teacher is Teacher. The other girls call the teacher Miss Cullen. What do those words, Rebecca and Miss Cullen, mean to her? I wonder, too. I’m just called Fly. If someone called me Jack, well, I’d wonder about that, too. I might think that was odd!
Since everyone is different in an assortment of ways, why is she considered odd? I hear many times that she is “odd.” But, I like her.
I do notice that Rebecca sees and understands things in her own unique way. Some of the girls struggle to learn new things in class, which make perfect sense to Rebecca. Teacher often needs to explain something new over and over again to the other girls. Rebecca only needs to be instructed once. She sits in the coat closet and hums waiting to learn something new while the others struggle to learn a math function or spelling word.
Rebecca doesn’t like odd things; she likes evens. Everything in Rebecca’s world that she can control is even – symmetric, numbered, and orderly. Everything outside of what she can control is odd – asymmetric and chaotic. So Rebecca stays in her own ordered world of evens. It makes perfect sense to her, and to me. To others, I imagine, that might seem odd.
Many of the girls at Somewhere Else are adopted by wealthy families who want to help the girls to better education and better life. Rather noble, I suppose. But Rebecca’s opportunity hasn’t come; she’s hidden away in the orphanage. The head mistress of the orphanage despises Rebecca. She complains she doesn’t know what to do with her because she’s so different. I think if she understood Rebecca she might learn to like her for her differences. But, I don’t think that’s ever going to happen.
Chapter 2
Walking across the ceiling of the head mistress’s office, I overhear this conversation:
“Whatever will we do with her?” The head mistress is spouting off to the board of directors. “She’ll give Somewhere Else a bad name. No one will ever adopt her.”
I stop walking and listen when I realize she’s complaining about my friend Rebecca again.
“Well, we must present her in a better light,” suggests Parson, who is on the board of directors. “Let her be seen more. She’s a pretty enough child, sort of. Why not clean her up a bit? Present her at the monthly tea with the others.”
“Humph,” the mistress grunts. “And let the world think we don’t train our girls to have manners; that we don’t train them to be poised? We do, you know. It’s just that Rebecca doesn’t…you know, Rebecca is different. She has an oddity about her.”
“Yes, yes,” says the parson impatiently. “You’ve told us all about that on many occasions. What I’m suggesting is simply that you present her good points rather than her oddities. She might appeal to someone, after all. If the girl never has an opportunity, you know, she will be with you forever.”
The mistress makes a face. She wrinkles her nose and swats as I zoom in closer. I can see she doesn’t like the idea of Rebecca being under her charge forever.
“Oh, all right, I’ll try,” she agrees. “But I can’t imagine who in their right mind would want that child in their home!”
“Now, now,” Parson says. “We must remember she’s one of God’s children, too, odd or not.”
“Humph,” the mistress says.
When the board of directors leave their meeting, they walk around the back of the orphanage to the garage and livery in the alley. They pass Rebecca sitting in her normal place on the back step swaying slightly back and forth with her head down intent on shelling and counting peas under the shade of the big London Platenus tree. She never looks up when the men pass. But, Rebecca sees them, counts them, and organizes them by size, and color of their waist coats. They don’t know that. But I do. I see her count and organize everything she sees. What a wonderful gift she has. With my eyes and her mind, we could make quite a team!
But, my own mind is buzzing. What does this latest board meeting mean for Rebecca?
Rebecca doesn’t want to be touched or have her hair combed. And, oh, you should hear the commotion! Dressing her or combing her hair is so much work the mistress and the staff usually avoid Rebecca altogether. Her tangled hair goes uncombed and her dirty pinafore is the same every day. But, it sounds like that’s about to change.
“Rebecca, come here,” the mistress calls.
Rebecca freezes. Her fingers squeeze the peas. Every muscle tenses. She stares at the screen door where I’m hanging, but I don’t think she’s looking at me. She isn’t looking at anything.
The mistress shoves the screen door open, grabs Rebecca by the arm, and drags her into the kitchen. The peas scatter and roll down the steps.
“Now there, see what you’ve done, girl? So wasteful, tsk tsk. Watch yourself and come along with me now. We’ve got to show that parson what a trial you’re getting to be to me. We’re going to show you in a better light, according to his reverendship. Now, sit you down,” she orders.
Her shrill voice vibrates the air around me, and my body trembles in the vibration. Rebecca’s hands are over her ears. I try to pull my wings over mine. Rebecca rocks to and fro. My body trembles in the turbulent air waves.
The head mistress fights Rebecca to get the braids in place. Mistress brushes, Rebecca throws the hairbrush. Mistress parts the hair; Rebecca tangles it with her fingers. Mistress fusses, Rebecca howls. It’s an upsetting struggle for both of them. I feel like a referee at a rugby match flitting back and forth between them. Finally, in exhaustion and frustration, the mistress surrenders, leaving Rebecca alone. But, Rebecca does look a tad more presentable, I have to agree with the parson. She yanks her braids then pounds the floor.
The next morning when Rebecca shows up for class, her hair is combed and braided. I think the head mistress remembers what the parson warned: she’ll be with you forever. I see the head mistress rubbing her hands together with something close to glee at the way Rebecca has turned out this morning. She even wears a clean and starched pinafore.
“So, I hope this is our lucky day,” the mistress says as all the girls leave for school. Rebecca is the last to walk out the door. The mistress gives her a little push.
“Hurry up, you’ll be late again,” she shouts angrily.
I could have told her, if I could just speak, that Rebecca is never late for class. It’s the other girls, the ones who gather by the door to gossip and laugh at the more unfortunate girls, who are always the last ones in to class. The shy obedient girls go directly to their seats, and Rebecca follows after them. She’s always in her seat when the noisy girls walk past her deliberately making noise, pulling her hair, or needlessly touching her, just to upset her.
“What you countin’ today, Ugly Bug?” one of them whispers in her ear and tugs her braid.
Ugly Bug? Who are they calling an ugly bug? I take issue with that comment! I buzz a zig-zag flight pattern around that sassy little head. Ugly Bug, indeed!
Rebecca growls and grabs her braids. She holds them tight and shakes her head rapidly. The next girl down the aisle deliberately pushes Rebecca’s red cardigan off her chair and onto the floor. Rebecca groans.
“Take your seats please, young ladies,” Teacher says.