Rosie's Eyes

Rosie's Eyes

I heard my name and looked up at the student greeting me. So used to being greeted everyday by numerous students, that it had become an almost automated response to greet back with a lilting (to sound more friendly), "Good morning! And how are you today?" I looked at a face, yet another of the hundreds of students in the school I volunteered in. Still very new, I see smooth skin in different shades of brown with teeth either white or orange-brown from chewing betelnut and lime from a young age.

I caught a well cleaned smile as the student smiled over her shoulder while climbing down the wooden steps to the playground. I followed her smile up to her eyes. It flashed recognition through my conscience. Like I have seen them before and knew more about the girl behind them. They were Rosie's eyes. I stretched over the splintery railing and looked at the girl trying to walk through the puddle without flooding her shoes. Tall, frail and her friends waiting for her. She wasn't Rosie.

I stood thinking, while I watched her take hands with her friends and walk over to the lunch area, about my teaching profession, about being unprepared for the challenge and Rosie. As a young, inexperienced teacher, Rosie chose me as her mentor. Why? I think it was because I was young, female and still had a life to live. She'd come after school for a quick chat, mostly about her dreams and ambitions. Things most teenagers have until they finish school.

I would sit at my table, glad to take the weight of my feet and listen to her, her feet swinging as she sat on one of the desks. I would get up and wedge some more paper under the door to keep it open and feel the afternoon breeze rustle through the stuffy classroom. Hearing her dreams made me feel young again. Inspired me and made me revisit all those lists of 'things to do before I'm...' How it feels to be young and passionate.

I went in to my shared office and rang my husband, who was at home with malaria. There was no answer. I waited for a few minutes, had some water from my Goldencrush Raspberry Flavour cordial bottle and tried again. No answer. He must be sleeping. A sense of melancholy seeped into me. A sense of loss and helplessness.

Rosie had walked in one afternoon and asked if we could shut the door. She had something private to discuss with me. Naïvely, I closed the door and joked, "Oh don't tell me you're pregnant!"   I waited for the laugh, but turned around to find her with a shocked expression. "How did you know, Miss?" Without anything to say, I held her. Praying and begging for some wisdom. Nothing came. No answers to her questions. Nothing to calm her fears.

And I know teenage pregnancies aren't the world's biggest tragedy. Some will argue that it's not a tragedy, but something wonderful. And some will argue that very few people achieve their dreams anyway. But I had lost Rosie that day. I lost everything she stood for and I became a disillusioned young woman.

Rosie didn't return to school for weeks. She had been in a car crash with her family and lost the baby. And her parents never knew. And she returned to school after. And Rosie was gone.