Written by Zary Fekete (and a little bit by Esther)
Not her real name, of course.
…just the one they gave her after stage-management to sound less like a Hebrew girl raised by a
Leviticus-quoting older cousin.
Her real name was Hadassah. …”myrtle”…
…fitting because the flower is hardy and bred for deserts…good for healing. Dry it, steep it,
parade it before royalty in a borrowed dress. Best of all: it retains its qualities when crushed
underfoot.
They told her to be quiet.
Gave her standard Miss Persia advice: “Wait your turn.” “Smile more.” “Don’t tell where you’re
from.”
Assignment? No waves. Look demure. Win a pageant against your will. Say thank you when
perfumed for twelve months waiting for the king.
Oh, yeah, there was a king.
His name? …long with many syllables…not to be said aloud unless she had to.
Men don’t like hearing their names. …reminds them of their mothers.
When he finally asked…she went. He liked her. …gave her the crown to wear. He also issued a
tax break, and for the first time she wondered if the king’s favor might be her ticket out.
So, when Haman’s decree got stamped, she didn’t go Full Joan. She listened to her cousin. She
was afraid. Sensibly afraid.
You know this story. Three days of fasting. A shift in the air. Royal robes, finally hers,
fully…and gets the scepter nod.
No screams. No storming. She invites. …curates. …leads the king and his enemy to a table she
sets herself, twice.
Because remember finishing school? To flip the story, you hold a cup without spilling it…and
know where to place the knives.
In the end, the gallows for her cousin swung a different man.
Her story is still told every spring.
Children dress in paper crowns. Triangles of dough hide jam in their centers, like secrets tucked
away. Girls are named Esther and wonder if they, too, hold secrets.
Hadassah whispers to them from the pages: courage doesn’t blow its own horn. Sometimes it
enters in soft slippers and waits until just the right moment to say, “If I perish, I perish.”
And then she doesn’t.
.
Zary Fekete grew up in Hungary. He has a debut novella (Words on the Page) out with DarkWinter Lit Press and a short story collection (To Accept the Things I Cannot Change: Writing My Way Out of Addiction) out with Creative Texts. He enjoys books, podcasts, and many many many films. Twitter and Instagram: @ZaryFekete Bluesky:zaryfekete.bsky.social