"I'm sorry but I am not going to be called uncool by a girl who eats yellow mustard"

Yesterday I was swimming laps at our community pool and this little girl swam into my lane. Just as I was about to push off the wall for my next lap I heard a little voice say "Do you mind if I hang out in this lane with you?" I told her that I didn't mind sharing the lane, and kept swimming. During the next lap I wondered why she wasn't playing with the other little girls at the pool and that's when I heard them giggle and say:

"Eww get away from us...you are contaminating the water"

"I didn't know they allowed fat uncool people in the pool"

"I don't want to remember you or your face, go away"

Right then my heart broke for this little girl. I wanted to yell at the mean little girls and tell them to stop. I wondered if I had been that mean when I was little, and I thought about all the bullies that used to pick on me. I wanted to hug her and tell her that someday it wouldn't matter what those mean girls were saying. That someday she would grow up and be skinny and pretty and better than them, but I didn't say anything. I just kept swimming.

She was still in my lane 30 minutes later when I was on my last lap and I knew that I wasn't going to be able to escape the pool without saying something to this little girl. So I stopped, and we talked for a little bit.

At the end of the conversation I said to her "I'm sorry those girls are being mean to you but you don't need to listen because you are better than that," and she looked at me with the innocence of an 11 year old and said "I'm sorry but I am not going to be called uncool by a girl who eats yellow mustard."

All I could do was smile and tell her that I liked her attitude.