I Am Not Esther (9 page)

‘Your uncle has decided on Bartholomew for a boy and Zillah for a girl.’

On the whole, I hoped it’d be a girl. Bartholomew, unshortened — what a handle! ‘Do you like those names?’

‘Of course. They are what my husband has chosen.’

I chopped onions and cried. I wanted my own mother who had called me Kirby because she said it sounded strong and modern.

Uncle Caleb and Daniel came home and we had dinner after Uncle Caleb had said grace. We ate and the twins talked about their teachers. They were in different classes and Rebecca had a man called Mr Fitzsimmons and Rachel had a woman called Ms Terry.

‘You will call her Miss or Mrs,’ Uncle Caleb said. ‘She is either married or not. I suggest you call her Miss.’

‘Yes, Father,’ said Rachel, her eyes wide.

Luke had the same teacher as last year, and Abraham had a new one. ‘She’s cool!’ he said.

Uncle Caleb skewered him with his eyes. ‘Do not use unseemly language, Abraham. Try again, if you please.’

‘Miss Rivers is a very nice person,’ Abraham said, screwing up his face.

Then my uncle turned his attention on me. ‘You wore your hair unbraided today, Esther.’ A statement, not a question. So how did he know? Daniel gave me a quick look, a tiny nod. Admit it?

‘Yes,’ I said.

‘At least you are honest.’ Thanks Daniel! ‘But in
future, you will keep your hair braided. The women of our faith are modest in thought and appearance. Braided hair does not draw attention to itself.’

It was too much. I’d had enough of what I could and couldn’t do. Mainly couldn’t. ‘It’s my hair and I’ll wear it how I like!’ I jumped up and glared at him. There was a sizzling silence. Nobody defied him like that, at least not until I’d arrived.

‘Resume your seat, child.’ He put down his knife and fork and placed his palms flat on the table. All his concentration was beamed on me. I sat down, anger boiling in my blood. ‘That was a most unseemly display,’ he said and it was the way he said it that got me. It was impersonal. He wasn’t even mad. ‘We will pray for you after the meal.’

I jumped up again. ‘No! I won’t be prayed over! I won’t wear my hair in a dumb plait — it looks ghastly and I hate it! No dumb man is going to lust after my hair, it’s the most stupid rule I ever heard!’

Dead, stark silence. Shocked faces. Maggie’s mouth open. Daniel’s face white. ‘Go to your room and wait until I call you for prayer,’ he said in that same impersonal voice. ‘You will spend tomorrow in the discipline room and you will braid your hair.’

And not go to school? To hell and back with him! It really got to me that he didn’t react. He was just giving the standard response and there wasn’t a scrap of emotion. At least, that’s what I felt afterwards, when I was trying to work out why I did what I did next.

I leapt up from the table, my chair went flying. I rushed to the sink, seized the big knife that I’d cut up the meat with and with my other hand I grabbed my hair in its Godly braid. ‘If you think my hair is a temptation then there’s a way round that!’ I hacked at the plait, sawing the knife backwards and forwards across my hair. Aunt Naomi kept her knives sharp, but even so, it hurt, pulling and tugging. I thought I’d cried enough that day never to cry again. I was wrong. I howled and hacked and my hair lay in my hand, still in its braid. I felt the stuff left on my head frizz out into a wild halo.

It was plain they didn’t know what to do with me. None of the children moved. Aunt Naomi sat staring at her plate. It wasn’t up to her to work out what to do with me. She waited calmly for Uncle Caleb to decide. ‘Go to your room and wait,’ he said at last. I noticed a slight wobble in his voice and I was fiercely glad. I threw my hair and the knife on the floor and left.

It was a long prayer session that night. We didn’t have any singing, it was all praying for me and how I had transgressed and needed to see the light and walk in the paths of righteousness. Praise the Lord. The whole damned Rule got recited with Praise the Lords after each one.

I was sent to bed at the same time as Maggie. ‘Do not talk to your sister,’ Uncle Caleb ordered. So I winked at her and made shadow animals on the wall. When the twins came to bed, I whispered, ‘Please
can you look out for Magdalene tomorrow? Give her a hug and stuff?’

They nodded. Rebecca whispered, ‘Your hair is a mess!’

I pulled a face. ‘An ungodly mess!’

All three girls giggled, their hands over their mouths. Then Rebecca stopped giggling and whispered, ‘Beulah would have narked on you. She’s a cow, that girl.’

Maggie and Rachel stared at her. Such unseemly language. ‘Sorry!’ Rebecca didn’t look sorry. ‘But watch out for her. She is fifteen and thinks she can boss us all because she will be getting married next month.’

‘Poor Eli,’ Rachel added. ‘Except that he is so wet, he deserves her.’

‘I don’t know her,’ I whispered. ‘So how can I watch out for her?’

‘Yes, you do!’ Rachel said. ‘She is the one at the fellowship meeting who thought she was too old to come outside with us.’

‘Oh!’ I did remember. ‘Skinny with buck teeth and pretty hair.’

‘Outward appearance does not matter,’ Rebecca recited. ‘It is the purity of the soul that should concern you, child.’

‘The price of a good woman is above rubies,’ Maggie added, then asked, ‘What does that mean? How much was Ruby’s price?’

We giggled again, heard footsteps. Leapt to our
respective beds and tried to look holy and seemly and Godly.

Aunt Naomi glanced around. ‘Good night, girls. Say your prayers and may God keep you until morning.’

I had to learn two psalms the next day. Uncle Caleb came to see me before he left for work. ‘You will pay particular attention to verses three and four of this psalm.’ He jabbed a finger at them, ‘And to verse eleven of this one.’ He didn’t look at me once.

I stayed in that room and hated it and Uncle Caleb and the whole world. My hair stuck out round my head and I knew I looked a fright. Verses three and four went like this:
Who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord? or who shall stand in his holy place?

He that hath clean hands, and a pure heart; who hath not lifted up his soul unto vanity, nor sworn deceitfully
.

I imagined having a conversation with Uncle Caleb along the lines of: Uncle, I find it difficult to relate to the psalms — they are all about men. He, his, him all the way, Uncle.

But I figured I was in enough trouble right now. My eyes flicked to verse eleven:
For thy name’s sake, O Lord, pardon my iniquity; for it is great
. I had never even heard of words like iniquity and transgression before I came here.

I learned the psalms but at first I didn’t have the heart to yell and shout. I gritted my teeth. They wouldn’t grind me down. They wouldn’t destroy me. I took a deep breath and shouted, ‘Let me not be ashamed. Let not mine enemies triumph over me.’

All day, my fingers kept straying to my hair. I tried to look at my reflection by running water into the basin when I went to the toilet, but it didn’t work. I wished I hadn’t done it. But I was glad I’d got under Uncle Caleb’s skin.

Aunt Naomi brought me my midday bread and water. She looked awful. ‘Aunt, I think you should lie down. I promise I will be obedient — or would you like me to prepare dinner?’

‘I am well, Esther. You do not need to concern yourself and you must stay here all day.’

Mum would have hugged me and said, thanks for being so concerned and yes I’d love you to cook dinner, you’re a wonderful, wonderful person and what have I done to deserve you?

Nobody ever said thank you for anything in this house. Except for passing the bread and stuff like that. I had never once heard Uncle Caleb or Aunt Naomi say thank you to any of us kids. Not to Daniel for always looking out for the little boys, not to the twins for doing the ironing every day, not to Luke and Abraham for working in the garden, not to Maggie for doing more round the house than most teenagers do. And definitely not to me.

I sighed and learned another verse. Wondered how Mrs Fletcher was getting on with tracing Mum. Wondered why she ran away when she was sixteen. Was it because she didn’t want to marry the guy they’d chosen for her? What had she done? Where had she gone? I knew so little about her life.

The twins cooked dinner that night. I was allowed to do the dishes all by myself. Daniel asked if he could dry them, but Aunt Naomi said, ‘You must ask your father.’

‘Thanks, Daniel!’ I flashed him a grateful smile. ‘But it’s okay. Really.’

He smiled back briefly, before his face resumed its normal, solemn expression.

The twins set out homework on the table and Maggie, full of importance, joined them. Abraham and Luke rushed through theirs and when I’d finished the dishes, they were taking a plug to bits and had pieces of wire and tools all over the deck. Daniel mowed the lawn. Then we prayed and sang and I got to say my psalms. My uncle prayed some more and he demanded that vanity be expunged from my soul. Where did he learn these words?

Aunt Naomi said to me, ‘Take these with you into the discipline room, Esther. You may work on them seeing you have memorised the psalms.’

She handed me a couple of squares of heavy, white material. ‘What are they?’ Certainly not handkerchiefs.

‘Table napkins for Beulah.’ Rebecca pulled a face. ‘You have to hem them with a herringbone stitch.’

Oh, what fun! ‘What is a herringbone stitch, Aunt?’

She gave me one of those ‘didn’t your mother ever teach you anything’ looks and showed me how to do it. I’d rather learn psalms.

Then I had a brilliant idea. I hemmed away industriously but I didn’t tie knots in the ends of the cotton. When dear Beulah washed my table napkins, they’d unravel. Just like my hair did.

I felt like a freak going to school the next day. Charity and Damaris gasped and giggled. ‘I will straighten it, if you like,’ Charity offered. ‘I have some scissors.’

‘Thanks,’ I said gratefully. ‘It must look ghastly.’

‘It would not be so bad if it was not a lot longer on one side,’ said Damaris. ‘What happened?’

I told them while Charity snipped. They were shocked, I know they were. But Charity only said, ‘I have always wanted to cut somebody’s hair, and now I have!’

Damaris said, ‘You look much better now, Esther.’

‘The twins said it must have been Beulah who told my uncle.’

Damaris screwed up her face. ‘Beulah would. She always does everything perfectly.’

‘She never turns up her skirt either,’ said Charity. ‘And she wears her head scarf all the way to school.’

‘Does Eli want to marry her?’

Damaris shrugged. ‘Eli is stupid. She will make all the decisions and boss him around and say it is what he has told her. When she is with child she will say, “My husband says I must take care. He will not let me cook the meal. He says I have to rest.”’

‘Will he cook, if she won’t?’ I asked. Uncle Caleb wouldn’t know a pot from a frying pan.

They giggled. ‘Heavens no! He is a man. No, one of us girls will have to go around to her house and cook the meal for her.’

‘She mightn’t be able to have kids,’ I said. If Eli was that wet he probably wouldn’t know he had to do something other than hold her hand.

‘It is unkind to wish that she be barren,’ Damaris said gently.

God, I hate being so goddamned good!

At school, Ms Chandler asked me for a note. ‘For being away yesterday,’ she said sharply.

‘I’m sorry, I didn’t think. Can I bring it tomorrow?’

‘Very well.’ She straightened up. ‘It isn’t a good start, Esther, to be absent on the second day of term. Were you ill?’

Suddenly I’d had it up to my eyeballs with people telling me off. ‘No.’ I lifted my chin and glared at her. ‘My uncle objected to me cutting my hair off. He made me stay in the discipline room all day and learn psalms off by heart. Do you want to hear them?’

All the fight went out of her. ‘I’m sorry, Esther. And no, I don’t want to hear them — and I’ll get off your back. Bring me a note if you can.’

Wow! That was a turnaround, for sure.

‘You should not have said that,’ Damaris whispered. ‘We are not permitted to discuss home with our teachers.’

‘Are you going to tell?’ I hissed back.

‘Certainly not. It is a matter between you and your conscience.’

That was something, anyway.

Mrs Fletcher came and asked me to pop out of class for a minute. ‘Just to let you know I’ve ruled out the Red Cross and a couple of other organisations she could have been working for. Still trying, don’t give up hope.’ She flicked at my hair. ‘Tough day, yesterday?’ I nodded. ‘Let me know if things get too difficult. Promise?’

I nodded again. ‘It’s okay. I just lost my temper.’

‘Never mind, the hair suits you.’

It was a good day at school. We had P.E. and you can’t imagine what heaven it was to get into the shorts and T-shirt. All the other girls were moaning about how gross they were and how we should be allowed to wear whatever we wanted. I glanced at Damaris and Charity. Charity whispered, ‘I would not want to do P.E. in a long skirt!’

I went to my option classes for the first time. Uncle Caleb had chosen them for me and as near as he could, he’d chosen cooking, cleanliness and Godliness. I was to study Food Technology and Home Economics. I wanted to learn Japanese and Graphics.

I collected Maggie and the boys after school and went home. The twins had made Aunt Naomi go to bed. She looked dreadful. ‘Would you like me to ask Uncle Caleb to come home?’ I asked her. ‘Should you go to the doctor?’

She shook her head. ‘No, Esther. I will be all right. I am just a little tired.’

The twins and Maggie helped me cook dinner. Uncle Caleb didn’t seem particularly worried about Aunt Naomi. ‘I think she should see a doctor,’ I said to Daniel.

‘She is my mother and I cannot do anything,’ he said softly, as if to himself.

‘Do you know what you’re going to do?’ I asked, after glancing round to make sure nobody was listening.

He nodded. ‘Yes, but I will not do it while my mother is unwell.’

‘Be careful,’ I said. ‘You can always find a reason for not doing something as difficult as that.’