The girl who would wear green

Chapter Four

When she woke in the morning Essie decided she would be wearing green also, because surely that would make her feel lots better. Off she went to school, her hair tied in green ribbons, and wearing a green skirt with green socks. She really did have quite a lot of green in her wardrobe once she looked!
Her teacher took one look at her and sent her to the office, and detention that afternoon. Essie had quite forgotten that she was only supposed to wear the school colours of blue and black, but somehow her day didn't seem to be quite so bad, knowing that there was someone else like her.
From then on, Essie wore green somewhere, only a little more carefully when she was at school. Sometimes it was a singlet and sometimes a T-shirt under her uniform, or green socks under her school socks (which got quite uncomfortable at times, especially in summer, and were quite difficult to hide). It did make her feel better and she thought that wearing green did make her hair look a little less red, and her freckles not quite as noticeable.
At school, the taunts from Hallie and her friends just kept on though.
Even when Essie and Amelia tried to hide in the Library to avoid Hallie, she and her friends followed.
"Hey, Essie!! Essie the green Martian with crazy eyes" they called, laughing as they followed her, making horrible faces at her as they did. Hallie had not let up on the "green Martian" bit ever since Essie's mistake of wearing all her green ribbons and skirt to school.
Hallie thought she was so clever changing Essie's name from Martin to Martian....as if!
Then she bumped Amelia, and when she almost fell, Hallie grabbed her glasses and ran off! Amelia and Essie had to rescue them from on top of the library teacher's bag when she was not looking.
Essie's thoughts were steamy again.
It was not much later that Hallie started on Essie's family as well. She'd just had her eleventh birthday party (Essie and Amelia were not invited of course) and it had been the biggest party in the village. She'd been given a pony by her grandparents and Hallie had talked of nothing else except her pony, her party, her family and her presents.
"Where's your granny then?" she asked Essie "off in outer space maybe?" Hallie's grandparents lived in a huge mansion on a hill, not far from the Donald family's own mansion. "Maybe you are all green aliens" Hallie screamed with laughter at her own joke.
"Your dad's only our gardener, sweaty and stinky all the time and he's got dirty hands" was another of Hallie's taunts, and "My dad says your mother is a damned troublemaker" followed by "he's going to get her kicked off her job, you'll see."
Essie wasn't sure Hallie was allowed to say that word, but no one ever seemed to be around to hear what Hallie said to Essie, only her friends who always laughed, or Amelia who didn't know what to do either.
Essie even mentioned it to her dad, not so he would worry or anything, but she just asked him if there was any way for someone to handle a person who was unkind and sort of horrible. She made it sound like a general question, not about her.
His reply was rather surprising.
"Is it Hallie causing you problems, being unkind?"
How did dad know? Essie was astounded, and didn't really know whether to tell him how bad it actually was.
Her dad saved her having to reply by saying:
"It's almost your 11th birthday so maybe it will be a little clearer after then. For now, ignore Hallie if you can. Everyone knows that she is difficult and spoiled, it's just that we have to tread carefully at the moment.
Soon we will follow up on the story and then maybe some of your questions could be answered, including the problem with Hallie."
He understood more than Essie realised when it came to Hallie, he said.