Her name is Esther.
She sits next to me, no matter where I am. In my tiny bedroom that my parents pray that one day I leave behind, to the psychiatrist’s office, seeping gloom and worry from its walls.
She sits with me, cross-legged on the bedspread that I’ve had since I was three. I know my parents want me to go back to the time when I was carefree and loud, singing and dancing, playing and running.
Esther is always there; she understands. She feels my powerful urge for silence with a companion. She knows I need a friend.
Mommy has never seen me for the way I am now. She wistfully watches the teenagers who walk by the house in large groups--laughing, talking, enjoying life. Her eyes lose focus of the present when the neighborhood children come out to play before sunset and dinner. She wants life to go back to how it used to be.
Daddy’s no better. When he senses me watching him, he turns slowly and his features morph into his “brave” face: a direct look into my eyes, a faint smiles, and chin tilted slightly skyward.
Esther’s normal. She’s a teenager with a spirited attitude, not a ghost of a person who whose mind is cluttered with voices. She has normal brown hair that falls on her normally squared shoulders. Her dark chocolate colored eyes shine with a light that could only be from the stars.
She knows how I feel. She hears the hissing of voices creeping through my ears, weaving inside my head. She understands the agony I live with day after day, week after week, month after month. She knows what I don’t have to say. She doesn’t give questioning looks or shameful glances when I just sit or rock back and forth, back and forth when the voices grow strong, too strong.
She tells me of the things teenagers do, how they really feel. She tells me of the tangle of emotions welling up in your stomach when you first enter high school. She explains the anxiety of getting good grades and making your parents proud. She recalls the days of fun with friends where you could just be yourself, and the rush of adrenaline of playing on a sports team. She teaches me how to survive being a teenager in a world like mine and the worlds of the “normal” ones.
I sit, knees to chest, and stare at her, fixated on everything she says, everything she knows. 
Esther is my secret. Nobody sees that she appears at my doorway or right next to me when I say her name. Not Mommy, not Daddy, and certainly not that lady who makes me sit and waits for me to talk. I would never talk to her. She wants to pry loose the feelings and thoughts that are only meant for me-me and Esther.
I’ve almost slipped up before.
Mommy and Daddy would pound up the stairs, burst through my door whenever they heard me laughing; they always imagined something was wrong. I’d laugh and laugh, and start to say her name until I realized that they were watching me like hawks. Then, I’d stare blankly into space and rock, soothed by the motion to block the other nasty voices that attacked when Esther was silent.
Today, I did slip up. I babbled on and on about Esther this, Esther that.
They raced me over to the doctor lady with the gloomy walls.
This time she didn’t wait for me to talk. Instead, she bombarded me with questions, questions that had no meaning, questions that I had no answers to.
“Who is this Esther?” She fixes her gaze on my parents. “Is she real?” her stare swivels on me. “How long has she appeared for you?” “How long does she stay?” “What does say to you?”
All the while I was being thrown around, the voices came back.
Sssstupid. They said. You’re sso ssstupid.
The psychiatrist’s questions jumbled into one continuous question:
“WhoistyhisEstherIssherealWhatdoesshesaytoyouHowlongdoeshsestayWhydoessheappearforyou?”
Over and over.
Mommy and Daddy’s voices join in the chant. They repeat nonsense, words that they’ve only said to me with their expressions.
I want to scream. I clamp my sweaty hands over my ears, hoping that they will block the angry and demanding voices.
I rock. I want the rhythm to soothe me, just like it did when I was afraid and Esther was around.
I needed Esther.
I scream her name in a long rambling, pleading for her to appear.
I vaguely remember my parents and the lady trying to stop me, to calm me, but I can’t.
“Esther, where are you?” I yell aloud.
But she doesn’t come.
I always knew it. I ignored that little nagging at the back of my head. That tiny point of pressure that I unconsciously suppressed.
I needed a friend. I succeeded.
I wanted her to stay.
And she couldn’t.
Esther was just another voice.