Alone in the dark, I asked Esme a question: "Is Susie mean to you?"

Susie (of course, I've changed her name) is an older girl who rides the bus with Esme. Best I can tell, she's in second or third grade. She often sends Esme home with treats: bubble gum, a plastic necklace, candy. Some days she gives Esme "homework:" printed words that she asks Esme to trace, instructions to draw different shapes, basic addition and subtraction problems.

Most days, Esme seems thrilled with her older friend. 

Others, she gets off the bus with droopy shoulders and a sad face. So, I wondered.

"Is Susie mean to you," I said. I was sleeping on the empty bed in her room -- on guard against the "trolls and the mice and all the bad things" that she asks me to keep out every night before heading to bed. 

"Yesss," she said with some hesitation. "Some times she makes me do things I don't want to do."

I felt the pit fill my stomach, felt a slow dread creep from my center out to my limbs. 

We spend so much time as parents exulting over the milestones our kids meet: the first time they smile, roll over, walk and talk. We follow them around with cameras and notebooks recording their triumphs. We call the grandparents. We clap and cheer. Tobias just learned to kiss and, the way it makes me feel, you'd think he won Olympic gold in Vancouver.

We forget about the unwelcome milestones, though. The rites of passage that nearly every kid slogs through. The ones that break their heart, shake their confidence or test our faith. The ones no one wants to record. 

The first breakup. The first test they fail. The first time they get drunk at a party. The first time they lie. 

And this: the first time they're bullied...

Read the rest at Feast After Famine.