Birdie was hanging out with Mrs. Maria Nelson at Mrs. Nelson’s house. They were drinking coffee and Birdie was talking Mrs. Nelson’s ear off about the Halloween party.
“And she kissed me!”
“Yes, Birdie, you’ve told me the story about three times now. I don’t know what else to tell you, hon. There is just no way to know who it was unless you ask around,” Mrs. Nelson said wearily.
The two had met at Mrs. Nelson’s house for coffee to discuss her recent firing but Birdie was absolutely fixated on her Halloween experience. There was a silence and Birdie seemed to remember why they had decided to meet in the first place.
“So, can you explain to me again why you were fired?” she asked Maria.
Maria Nelson took a sip of her tea and tossed her blonde hair over her shoulder.
“I came out as a bisexual over ten years ago to my friends and family but I didn’t come out at work. I knew that the administration at Peabody Elementary School was pretty intolerant of homosexuality. Then, about one year ago, a former student of mine stopped in to visit me during a teacher in-service day. He confided in me that he was questioning his sexuality. He was now in seventh grade and had transferred to Saint Mary’s Catholic school after his parents had caught him dressing up in his sister’s clothing. They, being pretty much fundamentalist Christians, thought that he was being tempted by Satan and the only solution was to pull him out of the public school system and send him to Saint Mary’s.”
Birdie sighed audibly. Maria continued.
“His parents then targeted me at Peabody Elementary. They went to the school board claiming that I was corrupting Peabody’s students. I attended a meeting where it was determined that it was fine for me to teach there as long as people didn’t know I was bisexual. Now that people knew though, they had to let me go. There weren’t really any state protections for gays and lesbians in the workplace. No matter how hard I fought their decision, I was powerless in the eyes of the law. So, I had to resign or be fired, and I chose to resign. I work as a receptionist in a vet clinic now and try to focus on my writing.”
Maria stared into her coffee cup for a minute after finishing her story. She was still hurt and angry by the experience—it had been a year but it felt like it was yesterday.
“Well, there must be SOMETHING we can do,” Birdie exclaimed. She had never heard of this kind of discrimination in her hometown and, after recently coming out as a lesbian, this whole issue suddenly felt very personal, and very important to her.
She reached over and took Maria’s hand in her own.
“I’m going to do some research. We’re not going to let them win this,” she said.
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ooo. I like where you are going with this.
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