Disclaimer: I do not own Enterprise or it's characters. I make no financial gains from this.

Author's note:

Below, there are two quotes by Marshall McLuhan. For those unfamiliar with this person, he is the man who coined the term "global village," though he is most remembered for his quote: "the medium is the message," (the technical ramifications of which I will not discuss here… if you wish to discuss them, feel free to contact me via email). The Internet allows this global village to exist… its anonymity cannot serve as a shield and prevent us from being responsible for our actions. Just as we are responsible to our neighbours (and don't kid yourself… in most places, under the law you can be held responsible…) in the "real world," so too, are we responsible to those we meet online. It takes courage for any person to post their work… that courage should not be belittled simply because you do not like it, or agree with their premise or interpretation.

C.

Chapter 6: The First Day

Everybody experiences far more than he understands. Yet it is experience, rather than understanding, that influences behavior.
Marshall McLuhan

It is the weak and confused who worship the pseudosimplicities of brutal directness. Marshall McLuhan

I'm nervous: I've never been in a human classroom before. According to the assessment test, I am well ahead of my 'age peers' in reasoning skills, mathematics and science… but I have knowledge gaps in literature and history and culture. This, along with my 'special support needs' means I've been assigned to a 'Special Needs' class… whatever that is. Daddy was a little upset with this assessment… he said he'd rather home-school me than have me marginalized as 'Special Needs,' but Jon said for him to stop hovering… that I needed some socialization, and it would only be until I caught up with everybody else… which wouldn't take long. He told Daddy that no matter what, I was going to face prejudice, so I might as well learn how to handle it.

I see why Daddy was worried about the 'Special Needs' class, not because of the people in the class, but the people outside it. It's at recess that I get my first real lesson in human prejudice.

"A new dummy." A fat boy leans in close, breathing into my face. His breath is nasty, and makes me want to gag. "What's your problem, dummy?"

I answer him with one of the words I learned from Daddy, one of the ones that Jon said I'm not supposed to use. But since I'm not in the house… I use it anyway.

"What's the matter, dummy? Can't talk?" He places his hands on my shoulders and pushes me backwards. I try to remember what Jon said about not solving a problem with my fists, but it's hard.

"I probably have a better command of language than you, actually." Unfortunately, it's a different language, and only confirms his assessment of me.

"Poor wittle baby… can't talk. Dumb, dumb, dumb."

I manage not to explode, by reflecting that he is technically correct… but is too stupid himself to realise it.

Some of the other kids are gathered around now, and are laughing. They are afraid. I make myself think this, so I can sympathise, rather than hate. They are afraid, because I am different. It's not working, however… I can feel the rage rising…

He shoves me again, and my shoulders scrape against the rough surface of the school walls. There's no way out, except through him, now. I feel the sharp stones that coat the wall digging into my back, and they hurt. He's more massive than me, which means that there's more force behind his pushes than I could ever manage. He thinks this makes him more powerful, that it makes me an easy target, but I know that the less distribution there is to an impact, the greater the force of that impact on that point. I bring my hands down hard on his collarbones… if I hit him more toward the centre I'd have to work my way through all those layers of fat which would distribute (and thus lessen) my blow. He screams and falls, and one of the teachers comes running over.

"She hit me…" He starts crying to the teacher, and points at me.

"He was assaulting me first, I defended myself." I try to explain, but she doesn't understand.

"I don't believe this… your first day here, and you're already in a fight." The teacher glares at me, obviously ready to believe the testimony of the bully over me. Maybe it's because she can't understand me, or maybe it's because he's crying. Nobody else seems willing to say anything, either.

"To the office with you… we're calling your parents."

My heart sinks as I hear this. Jon is going to be very mad…and Daddy will be too. Daddy trusted me to behave myself, and I really did try… but he was pushing me around, and I don't like to be pushed.

They leave me in the outside office while they call, and then I have to sit and wait. It's nearly half an hour, and then Jon walks in, alone.

He walks past me and up to the desk. "Hello… I'm here to pick up Charley Tucker."

This is not good. If Daddy was here, I'd have a chance to explain, but without him… I don't think Jon wants to listen to any explanations. He was a captain… captains give orders and those orders are obeyed.

The lady looks over at me, then back at Jon. "You're her father?"

While it's good to know that they wouldn't send me away with a stranger, I know that if I don't let Jon take me home, that it will probably cause more problems – and the last thing I need to do is cause Daddy more problems than I already have. I nod, and she takes my confirmation as proof, offering no protest when Jon and I leave together.

He says nothing to me until we are in the car. "What did I say to you the other day?"

I pull a pad out of my knapsack. He was…

"I don't want to hear excuses, Ivy. You were told that fighting was unacceptable behaviour, were you not?"

I nod.

"There must have been some other way to solve it…"

Like what? Scream for help? He was hurting me.

"You could have walked away… gone to a teacher. Hitting that boy only made things worse. I don't like bullies, Ivy… and while I admit that it sounds like that boy is one, you can't make things better by beating him up. Because right now, in their view, you are the bully. You hurt him."

But…

"Ivy," Jon interrupts me before I can finish. "All they know about you comes from your assessment test, and any information they might have received from Vulcan. And I happen to know that back there you were perceived as being violent and irrational. That's what they're working from… and you gave them no reason to think otherwise. You couldn't even get through one day…one day, without getting into a fight. What am I supposed to believe? I already know you don't think before you act… to me this just looks like the same thing."

I pull my feet up onto the seat and put my head down on my knees. I want to disappear right now… I wish I'd never been born. It seems that no matter what I do, it only causes more trouble. I've broken the rules, now Jon will probably send us away… or maybe just send me away. I don't want to cry… I won't cry. Because Jon is right… he did tell me that there would be consequences for fighting, and I did it anyway. I'm a big girl – as Daddy says – and I will take my punishment.

"Get your feet off the seat and put your seatbelt on." Jon starts the car, and I do what he says. I'm in enough trouble as it is… I don't need to make more.

We drive downtown, to Dr. Lewis' building. I assume we're here to wait for Daddy, but Jon gets out of the car, and tells me to come with him.

Dr. Lewis' office is on the twenty-second floor, and Jon says nothing to me for as long as it takes to get there. Even while we are in the waiting room, he doesn't say anything. After a while, Daddy comes out, and stops dead when he sees us. "Jon… Ivy… what?" He looks at his watch, confused.

"Ivy was in a fight." Jon doesn't waste any time explaining, and Daddy's face crumbles.

"Ivy. It was your first day." I've disappointed him, which hurts even more than Jon's anger. Daddy's usually so proud of me, that his disappointment is the worst thing in the universe. I've always feared it: more than his anger, more than Mother's disapproval. He had faith in me, and I have betrayed that faith.

"Is there a problem?" A lady emerges from the hallway behind Daddy. She's tall and skinny, and she has the darkest skin I've ever seen – it's almost the colour of the sky between the stars. Her hair is curly and white, and she keeps it short. This contrast in colours makes her beautiful, and she moves with an easy grace.

Daddy looks a little startled. "This is Jon, and this is my daughter Ivy. Apparently Ivy was in a fight today."

The lady nods, and goes over to speak to the receptionist. She returns a moment later.

"I have a short time before my next client… would you mind if I took some time to speak with Ivy?"

Daddy blinks rapidly… this clearly wasn't what he expected. "Certainly… go ahead." He crouches down to put himself on my eye level. "Ivy, this is Dr. Lewis. She just wants to talk to you about a couple of things, okay?"

I nod, and Dr. Lewis leads me down the hall to one of the rooms. There's a couple of chairs, and a soft couch, and a small desk in the corner.

"So… you were in a fight today, Ivy?" She speaks with her hands, letting me know with a few simple gestures that she can understand me.

"Yes. A boy pushed me and called me names."

"And why did this upset you?"

I'm confused. If Dr. Lewis is a psychiatrist, like Daddy said, then shouldn't she know that already? "Is it not supposed to?"

"It can." She says gently, "I just wanted to know if you knew why in particular the names he called you upset you so much."

I don't know how to explain it… I just know that they hurt.

"It's not easy, being different, is it, Ivy? Not being able to fit in?"

I shake my head. I didn't fit in on Vulcan because I'm emotional… I thought I might fit in on Earth, but I'm still too different. It seems like I know all the wrong things, that I am all the wrong things. Like I am a mistake, and I don't know how to fix it. I tell this to Dr. Lewis, and she nods.

"Do you think that made it okay to hit him?"

"I didn't hit him because he called me names, I hit him because he was pushing me." Why can't anyone seem to understand that?

"Is that the only reason you hit him, Ivy? Because he pushed you? Or was it also because you were angry?"

"He was pushing me!" This is a useless conversation, because Dr. Lewis has clearly made up her mind about me.

"Are you angry now, Ivy?" She sounds calm and unflustered, just like Mother always does.

"Why shouldn't I be? You obviously think it was my fault, and you don't even know me. You weren't there… you don't know what happened."

"Are you angry, or are you scared?" Her question stops me cold. Why would I be scared?

"Because in my experience, anger is quite commonly a reaction to fear. When we feel threatened, we get angry. Have you ever heard the term 'fight or flight?'"

I shake my head.

"It's a theory that says when creatures are scared they respond either by attacking or running away. People often react in the same way." She smiles suddenly, showing another contrast – perfectly white teeth. "I bet you get angry most often when people don't understand you."

"I'm used to not being understood."

"I don't think so, Ivy. You might be accustomed to using another language, but that's not what I mean. From what your father has told me, you haven't had a lot of people to discuss your feelings with, have you?"

"I have Daddy."

"Yes," she nods slowly, "but you worry about him, don't you? So, I bet you don't tell him everything."

I shake my head again. No, I don't tell Daddy everything. I can't tell Daddy everything… some of it would just hurt him.

"It's one thing to have emotions, Ivy… it's quite another thing to understand them. A lot of people don't understand them… and that can lead to problems. But when we start to understand, we can start to control…"

I roll my eyes. Why is it everybody is telling me to control my emotions? I don't want to control my emotions. I want to be able to feel.

"Ivy… you do seem to have a talent for jumping to conclusions, don't you?" Dr. Lewis seems to know exactly what I was thinking. "What I was saying is that when we understand, we can start to control our reaction to those feelings. It's not about controlling the feelings themselves… it's about managing what we do when we experience them." She smiles again. "Lord knows, I'm not Vulcan. I believe in the expression of emotion… in humans it can do more damage to repress them. That doesn't mean that there aren't some valid points in Vulcan philosophy, however. You've learned breathing and meditation techniques?"

I nod, slowly.

"They can be very helpful. Sometimes when we get too emotional, we forget to think. Our body goes into a panic mode, and our brain starts operating differently. By simply breathing properly, we can calm ourselves down enough to be able to think. Now… from what I can gather, you haven't really had much of an outlet for your emotions, have you?"

"Outlet?"

"Something to channel them into. Some people use sports… others use artistic pursuits… some people work."

"No." Nobody's ever told me that you could do such a thing. I've seen Daddy work on a problem when he was upset… or fix something around the house, but I never knew that he did it because he was upset.

"Well… I'm going to talk to your father and see about setting you up with a regular appointment. And we'll see if we can't find you something… in the meantime, it might help you to be able to talk about how you're feeling. Is that okay with you?"

I nod, realising that if I do talk to Dr. Lewis, then Jon might believe that I really do want to obey his rules, and he won't make me go away.

"I'm not saying it will be easy, Ivy. It will probably be very, very hard… and you'll have to work at it. I don't have a lot of patience or time for excuses, and you won't be doing either of us any favours. But if you try to fight everybody who hurts you or makes fun of you… well, I'm sorry to say that you can't do that, Ivy."

The problem is, that I don't know what else to do. I've tried ignoring it — like Daddy says to — and I've tried suppressing my anger — like Mother suggested — but none of it works. The only thing that makes them shut up… that makes them go away is to hurt them back. I try telling this to Dr. Lewis, but she just shakes her head.

"No, Ivy. Hurting them back only makes things worse. Are you in less trouble now, or more? And the boy… he's just as likely to try and hurt you more now, because you've humiliated him. Now I know it's hard to do… but you have to make that effort."

She leaves to go talk to Daddy and Jon, and I sit there, wondering how this is supposed to help. I'm willing to try almost anything though… as long as I can keep being able to feel. If I stop… all I know is that that option is worse than hitting back. I can't go that way… I don't have the words to describe it… but I just can't do it.