Beautiful

Aussie was a freak.

Aussie was a retard.

Aussie had no parents.

Aussie had no social skills.

Aussie was not cool.

Aussie was not normal.

Why did Aussie even go to their school?

Wasn’t there a special school for people like that?

Ms. Lee knew about all these things that had been said about her student, as well as many more. Numbering among those who said such things were teachers and parents.

Folding her hands in her lap Ms. Lee kept her voice gentle. “Do you know why I asked you to stay?” 

Across her desk the little face shook in the negative. 

Aussie was ugly.

Aussie would never have a boyfriend. 

Aussie could not dress well.

Looking at the small figure standing before her now, Ms. Lee could not protest against those accusations. The girl’s clothes were worn and dirty. They hung from her misshapen frame in a such a grotesque way that it made Ms. Lee almost instinctively cover her nose. All morning Aussie’s blue dress covered in tired yellow flowers had stood out in the class of muted colors. 

Aussie’s dull eyes and slack jawed face stayed still, fixed on her teacher’s face.

Ms. Lee’s hands tightened.

“How are you liking school?” 

Aussie was new, she had been homeschooled by her mother before the accident. Now, her flighty aunt had no time for the girl. Ms. Learna had heard most of that in the teacher’s lounge.

Aussie looked away, her mumbles indiscernible.

 “August, I found your notebook.”

Mrs. Brown down the hall had seen Aussie ransacking her backpack in the middle of the lunch room, her snuffles loud enough to wake an elephant, Mrs. Brown had said. 

 “Lost something, retard?” Someone had yelled “Was it your brain?” 

Aussie had fled, with laughter following her out.

Now, Ms. Lee laid the notebook down on her desk. It was a plain blue notebook of one hundred lined pages. Every student had one like it, though perhaps not as used as Aussie’s.

“Is this what you have been looking for?”

Ms. Lee watched Aussie’s eyes focus on the notebook.

Aussie never showed emotion.

Aussie cared for nothing.

Aussie was not human.

Ms. Lee watched as the girl’s face softened, a smile touching her crooked mouth. She mumbled something, rubbing her splotched hands together. She glanced between her teacher and the notebook, her eyes wary.

“Here sweetheart,” Ms. Lee pushed it towards the girl.”It’s yours, I’m not taking it from you.” 

Aussie stumbled forward, taking it in her arms and hugging it to her chest. She ducked her head, murmuring to herself or her teacher, Ms. Lee was not sure.

“August, I saw what is in your book.”

Aussie’s head stayed bowed.

Ms. Lee cleared her throat. “I looked through it last night.” She laughed, rubbing her neck. “Honestly, I couldn’t put it down. I’m sorry, I wasn't trying to intrude. I didn’t know whose it was, but I found it outside, underneath the oak tree.”

Aussie was stupid.

Aussie couldn’t even speak in class.

Did she know anything?

“I knew you were special,” Ms. Lee tried not to linger on that word, “but this is much more than I thought.”

In the silence that followed Ms. Lee gathered her thoughts. 

“You know people, sweetheart. As in, you know people better than anyone else. I have never seen anyone describe me more accurately. I - “ Ms. Lee paused, struggling for words. “I have never seen anything more lovely.”

Aussie had no friends. Whenever Ms. Lee saw her, the girl was by herself. Hiding under the bleachers, standing behind a tree, sitting at her own table. She was never at school functions and Ms. Lee had seen her in the bus, walking down the row to the back.

When Ms. Lee saw her out of class, she had the blue notebook in her hands. 

Pencil hovering, her eyes would dart around the people before her then down to the notebook. She would scribble in the book before her eyes were back up again. 

Ms. Lee had always wondered what her silent pupil was hiding.

Now she knew.

She stood from her chair, circling her desk. Aussie shuffled backward, peeking up at her through her tangled hair. 

“Didn’t do ‘nuffen,” Aussie muttered, shaking her head.

“Honey, you’re not in trouble,” Ms. Lee paused, not wanting to scare the girl. “You are one of my best pupils. You are always on time, you finish all your tests, you excel at all your subjects. And this, your artwork, this puts you far above the average student. Is any of this making sense?”

Aussie shook her head again.

Ms. Lee sighed. Tottering a bit on her heels, she sank down to sit on the floor in front of the girl. 

The teachers in the lounge said that Aussie’s parents had died in a wreck. Aussie, in the back seat, had survived. The girl had never shed a tear, they said. One of the teachers was friends with Aussie’s aunt, so they had all the facts. Aussie did not cry for her parents, she did not miss them nor was she sad they were gone. A person with her deformed mind could not feel like a normal human being, they said.

And Ms. Lee had believed them. She had tutted over her coffee with the rest of them before forgetting all about it.

Now, as she looked over the little figure who continuously wore bright colors despite the teasing it earned, Ms. Lee was greatly grieved. Grieved that she had not attempted to know the girl better, grieved that she had not stopped the harsh words quicker, grieved that she had followed suit.

“August, may you please forgive me.” Ms. Lee drew in a deep breath. “I-I did not realize that - “ 

“No realize, I a human?” Aussie interrupted, her mouth slurring out the words. She still clutched her notebook to her chest as if it were the only thing she had in the world. Her head was tilted to the side, her eyes dull.

Ms. Lee blinked at her. “No - I’ve always known you are a human,” she paused, trying to formulate her words as the girl watched her. “I guess I just did not take the time to fully know you as one.”

There was saliva trailing down the side of Aussie’s face, following the tilt of her head. Ms. Lee reached out and wiped it away with her thumb. 

Behind the girl’s slack face, Ms. Lee knew that she was full of real and pure emotions. Emotions strong enough to create the book that had kept her up all night. Aussie knew people better than they knew themselves. She saw their emotions, she knew their joys and pains, she knew it all by watching them, unobserved from her little corners. 

Ms. Lee had seen Aussie’s heart in her drawings. 

She had felt like she knew Aussie’s parents, she knew them through the smile lines on their faces, the way her father clasped his wife’s hand, the way her mother rested her head on her husband’s shoulder. She had seen their love for the daughter in their faces, and somehow Ashe had felt Aussie’s grief in the pencil drawn figures.

Aussie could not speak, she could not express how she felt, she could not cry for her mother. But she could draw. 

Aussie was scared of Brad, who no doubt had been the one who took her notebook.

She wanted to be included by the girls who snickered at her behind their hands.

She loved her aunt who had no time for her.

She missed her parents.

She loved the little birds who grabbed seeds off the ground outside of her window.

She loved flowers.

And she looked up to her teacher, Ms. Lee.

There had been no malice in her drawings, no obsessions or anger. 

Aussie was just drawing the world how she saw it through her watching eyes. Her watching eyes that saw glory in everything.

“August, can you be brave?”

Aussie stayed still, her eyes on her teacher. She seemed to be absorbing the question, turning it over in her mind, trying to find the meaning to it. After a long moment, she nodded her head.

“Good girl,” Ms. Lee brushed back a strand of hair from the girl’s face. “Because we are both going to have to be brave. The people of this world are never happy to learn that what was once rejected and despised is more beautiful than they are.”