I’m pretty sure the girl I used to be is still lurking somewhere inside my head. But her voice has been crushed into a squeak, a whisper . . . a breath above silence. Funny— inside the curtain, my thoughts roar like thunderbolts. But thoughts just aren’t enough to make them go away. And whispers are never heard. And squeaks are for mice.
The bell rings. I jump to my feet and dart out of the cafeteria, hidden behind my veil of hair, silent as a ghost. If only I could have known then what I know now (now that I’ve arrived safely, but not without battle scars, on the other side).
That one day soon, words won’t be weapons. Instead, they’ll become friends.
That one day soon, those inner thunderbolts will crash mightily overhead.
That one day soon, being different from them will be a gift.
That one day soon, it won’t matter what they think.
Or say.
That one day soon, the beautiful girl hiding behind the curtain will be strong enough to step out into the light.
If only I could tell myself to just hold on until then.
Hold on.
Regret
The Eulogy of Ivy O’Conner
by Sophie Jordan
As senior class president, it’s my duty honor to say some words on the life of Ivy O’Conner.
Ivy attended our high school since freshman sophomore year, and although I never spoke to her we weren’t the closest friends, I remember everyone making fun of her. How can anyone forget Creepy Ivy? I’ll always think of her with guilt fondness.
Students were always teasing complimenting her about her acne eyes. She had a funny mothball smell a way about her, too. Everyone talked about noticed her. She had such a creative personality. I remember her doodling stupid little shapes on her notebooks she was a great artist. She loved the flute the clarinet music.
Not everyone was nice to her. Not everyone understood her. Creepy Ivy was so strange different unique. Whenever she was called on in class, you could count on her to say the weirdest most thought-provoking words. Even the teachers laughed looked forward to hearing her thoughts. She was a freak an advocate for protecting the environment. She wasted devoted a lot of time to that crap stuff.
Creepy Ivy wasn’t your average nut job girl walking the halls of our high school. The girl had no style. In my mind, I still see her in that heinous lovely green sweater. She was so unaware when people did mean things to her tolerant of others.
We might not have known what we had in her, but we will never forget her. We don’t know what could have prompted her to take her life, but I wish . . .
I wish I could have stopped her. . . .
Regret
by Lisa Yee
I learned a lot in elementary school, like fractions, linking verbs, and that the capital of Iowa is Des Moines. From time to time, our class even performed plays. It was fun wearing a costume and pretending to be someone else. However, the real drama took place on the playground. It was a festering cesspool of innuendo and gossip. . . .
“Sarah hates Liz.”
“Jenny loves Tim.”
“Andy ate his boogers again.”
Okay, so maybe it wasn’t too dramatic, and the gossip was minor. Still, there was something thrilling about whispering about others, although it was miserable when you were the one being talked about or teased.
I made it through elementary school relatively unscathed compared to what some others went through. The most torment I received had to do with my height. I was short. (I still am.) Everyone seemed to find this funny, and kids, including those who were only a millimeter taller than I, made it a point to call me names.
Shrimp.
Shorty.
Midget.
Putting someone down was a sport. Like dodgeball, it could be fun or scary, depending on where you stood. However, instead of balls being hurled at you, it was insults. If you were lucky, eventually the teasing would move on to someone else and you could exhale.
The entire school must have released a collective sigh of relief the day that Madge Cutler came to town. In our middle class suburb on the outskirts of Los Angeles, we didn’t get many new kids. Like all my friends, my family had two cars and we lived in a tract home that was within earshot of our neighbors. Except for the slightly varying colors of paint from the same tasteful palette, every fourth house looked just like the other.
Soon enough word spread that the new girl lived in an apartment near the shopping center. Madge was too tall, boney, and the palest person I had ever seen. Her hair was stringy and the color of dust, and she kept it in a ponytail, which only served to accentuate her gaunt face. However, it was more than looks that set Madge apart. Maybe it was the way she hunched over, or the fact that she wore the same brown plaid dress with a frayed collar almost every day. Then there was the matter of her name. My classmates answered to the likes of Linda and Susan and Sandy. “Madge” sounded like a name that belonged to someone’s aunt.
I’m not sure when it started or who started it. Before Madge arrived, all the teasing had been buckshot. Making fun of someone here and there. It didn’t last long, and it wasn’t too mean, and it certainly wasn’t organized. However, when Madge appeared on the scene it was as if she wore a giant target on her chest and everyone took aim. No one ever physically hit her—we were too civilized for that. Instead we used our words.
There was something about her that empowered even the quiet kids to say mean things. Perhaps Madge’s crime was that she was different. She was poor and acted the part. One afternoon I was with friends at Thrifty’s drugstore getting a pistachio ice cream cone when we spotted Madge and her brother. They were dragging big stuffed pillowcases. Behind them was a woman who looked tired. It took us a while to figure out that they were going to the Laundromat. If Madge saw us, she didn’t say anything. However, we dutifully told everyone that we saw her.
Then there was the time when a bunch of kids were playing on the monkey bars. When it was Madge’s turn, her dress blew up. If this happened to any of the other girls, it would be no big deal. We knew enough to wear shorts under our dresses, but apparently no one had informed Madge about the dress code. There was a stunned silence. Then, all at once, everyone broke out laughing so loud that it rang across the playground. Not only was she not wearing shorts but her underwear was worn over her tights. That gave us enough ammunition to last for a week.
On another day, Madge walked into the classroom with her bangs newly shorn. They were too short and uneven, like she had cut them herself. When Curt Wetzel shouted, “What happened, did the gardener mistake you for a weed?” we all roared. Forget sitcoms. We had Madge to keep us amused. In my autograph book Darren Lee wrote: May the smell of Madge Cutler linger up your nose.
It’s been decades since I last saw Madge. From time to time I’ve googled her, in hopes of finding out that she has become rich and famous or, at least, happy. While I never called her names to her face, what I did was just as bad, or worse. Why?
Because I passed along the gossip.
Because when people teased her, I did nothing to stop it.
Because when the crowd laughed at her, I did, too.
Funny what we remember, isn’t it? Or rather, what we can’t forget.
After all these years, I can’t forget Madge Cutler, though I am certain she’d want to forget all of us.
Karen
by Nancy Werlin
In my sophomore year of high school, I had a smart, strong-willed friend named Karen. I’ve been thinking about Karen lately because her younger sister, Melanie, recently friended me on Facebook. Once I figured out why Melanie’s name was familiar, I asked her how Karen was.
“Karen died a few years ago,” Melanie replied. “I’m so glad we have her beautiful children.”
That was all she said. And even though this was only a Facebook message, I could almost feel in its tone that Melanie had the same kind of fierceness that Karen did. I didn’t push her for details, as I didn’t wish to intrude
or cause her pain. Melanie wanted to ask me about my books, and so we talked about that. But I was reeling. Karen died in her early forties? How could that be?
In my mind, I see Karen as she was at fifteen. She was very beautiful, with high cheekbones, huge brown eyes, and a large nose. She also had the kind of blond hair that everyone dreams of. Karen’s hair hung, long and thick and golden, all the way to her waist. If you saw Karen from behind, her hair brushed and flowing, you might think she was a Barbie doll kind of girl. But then she’d turn. I think it was her nose that saved Karen from looking like Barbie; her nose that made her beautiful rather than pretty. That nose told you that this was a girl with character.
Our group of friends wasn’t among the popular; we were a socially middling group mostly known for getting good grades. Boys were of interest, but we were still shy and awkward. Karen, too. At first.
But as in a contemporary YA novel, Karen the beautiful caught the eye of the most handsome and popular boy in our grade. His name was Danny. I’d never put a character like Danny in a novel because he seemed like a walking cliché: tall, dark, broad-shouldered, handsome. Of course he played football.
Danny liked Karen. Karen liked Danny. But then came the inevitable complication: Danny’s previous girlfriend.
I don’t remember her name. She was a year older. Weirdly (or maybe not), she looked a lot like Karen. She had a strong face that spoke of character (including, yes, a large nose). She also had hair. Her brown hair was exactly as long and as thick and as beautiful as Karen’s blond hair.
This girlfriend, who was a popular cheerleader (more clichés), was furious at being replaced. And she had friends who seemed equally furious on her behalf. And so, suddenly, smart, studious, ferocious Karen was the target of a vicious bullying campaign. And Karen’s allies—girls like me—were not equipped to be the kind of support that could really help her much against the older, popular girls who were after her. Karen’s life became abruptly miserable.
But Karen fought back anyway. It was in her nature. Karen fought back as hard as she could.
Where was Danny in all this, you ask? Why didn’t he defend his new girlfriend? Well, that’s where things get even more interesting. It turned out that maybe Danny hadn’t exactly broken up with the old girlfriend before getting started with Karen. It turned out that maybe Danny felt as if he was entitled to all the long-haired beauties he wanted. It turned out that maybe Danny liked being fought over . . . and did things to egg it on, favoring first one girl, and then the other. . . .
I won’t dwell on the weeks in which Karen was under siege, believing that Danny cared for her, and that the enemy was this vicious, older girl who looked so much like her. And I can’t tell you what was in Karen’s mind, because—like her sister today—Karen kept her deepest emotions to herself. And I don’t know what the other girl was thinking, either, as she fought the girl she believed to be her enemy.
But I bet there was one person having a really good time.
Here’s how I wish it had gone. Here’s what I now realize I would like to have seen: those two beautiful girls, side by side, blond and brown hair streaming behind them, as they turned their backs on handsome, empty, cruel Danny and walked calmly away.
Surviving Alfalfa
by Teri Brown
He stands there, a good two feet taller than you, and he seems invincible. Until you look in his eyes and they’re so dark with pain that they’re almost black. The scent of freshly cut hay swirls around you.
Then he asks, “Why don’t you guys like me?”
Your heart thuds in your chest and you feel his hurt and confusion as if it were your own, because you know that pain. But you can’t tell him the truth. You’re too scared, too confused, too insecure. So you lie.
“We like you.”
He knows you’re lying and shakes his head. “No. No one talks to me. You all make fun of me.”
You don’t correct him, because to your shame, it’s true. You have made fun of him. Made fun of him because that’s what she does and you will do anything not to be in his position, because you’ve been there before and, may God forgive you, you don’t have the courage or the fortitude to do anything else.
Now there’s anger under your pain because he’s holding up a mirror and it’s so ugly and scary you want to run away and hide.
You give a little laugh that doesn’t sound like a laugh. “No, we like you.”
And you edge away.
His face changes and you take another step back, the cut alfalfa crunching beneath your feet. He moves away from the tractor and he reaches out and squeezes one of your breasts and you don’t say anything, because this is your penance for lying. Then you see the tears in his eyes as he turns away and you know he’s as trapped as you are—trapped by geography, trapped by age, trapped because all you want in the world is to belong.
Bigfoot crying in the field.
And you resist running the rest of the way to your best friend’s house because you don’t want him to know how afraid you are. Not just of him, but of her. How even at this moment you don’t know if she’s going to be happy to see you or if she’s with one of your other friends, talking behind your back. The thought churns in your stomach and you wonder what’s wrong with you. . . . You’ve just been manhandled and all you’re worried about is whether your best friend still likes you or not.
And you wish with all your heart you lived anywhere but here, in Alfalfa, a tiny community so far away from your high school that it takes the bus forty-five minutes to get to and from school. A lot can happen in forty-five minutes. Just ask Matt. Or Michelle. Or Dina. Or Stewart. Or Bigfoot. Yeah, Bigfoot. You’re pretty sure you knew his real name at one time, and it’s ironic that all you remember is the name that your BFF gave him.
Bigfoot crying in the field.
When you and your BFF are friends, life is magic. Everything is more fun when she’s there; long trail rides in the woods, midnight movies, and sneaking out to swim in the canals late at night.
Then it all ends.
You’ll wake up one morning and for no reason you can discern, you’ll be on the outside looking in. You’re the one afraid to get on the bus. Afraid of the walk home. Afraid of going out riding. Afraid to answer the phone. Afraid, afraid, afraid. But avoiding them doesn’t help. She and the others ride up to your house on their horses and call you out. Taunting you, threatening you.
The first time she turned on you was because you suggested having a club like in Judy Blume’s Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret. Suddenly, you’re the girl who wanted a club about periods (as she announced to the whole bus, boys and all). Humiliation was her weapon of choice, and if that didn’t work, she would have someone dump perfume on the unlucky victim on her way to school. She rarely did her own dirty work.
During the BFF times, you’re by her side as she intimidates others. You just go along. So does everyone else. You keep your mouth shut; you close your eyes and you pretend it’s not happening. Maybe if you pretend hard enough it won’t be true. But it always is and their pain and humiliation only illustrates how you do not want to be in their shoes again. Ever.
So you take the coward’s way out. Live in fear. And wait for your turn at the whipping post.
Bigfoot crying in the field.
Now, as an adult, you wish you could go back and change it all. You see yourself strong, as strong as you are now. You see yourself standing up for Matt and Dina and Michelle and Stewart. And Bigfoot. Especially Bigfoot. You want to wipe away the tears and the confusion and the hurt of that sixteen-year-old boy. And you want to tell him you’re sorry. Sorry that you left him there, crying in the field.
But you can’t change anything and the memory of leaving that man/child broken by the tractor will hurt you forever. But you survived. And all you can do is share your strength with others, with teens who have been bullied or who are afraid to do anything about those who bully. And you try and you try and you hope that you’re helping, but be
hind it all you can still see him.
Bigfoot crying in the field.
When I Was a Bully, Too
by Melissa Walker
When I was in seventh grade, I was nervous all the time. Every day that I went into school to meet my friends in the hallway, I wondered if this was a day that they’d turn on me, a day when I’d get teased and made fun of. Or if it was someone else’s day to take the hit.
There was one girl in our tight-knit group of four, Eliza*, who led the charge—always. It would start with a little comment: “Nice shirt, Mel.” And then Leigh and Ariel would join in—“Yeah, nice shirt. Did you get that at the thrift shop?” It didn’t matter if I’d spent an hour trying to figure out what to wear that wouldn’t attract attention, that would fit in, that would keep them from singling me out.
I have to admit that I was relieved when it wasn’t me who got picked on. Leigh and Ariel took the brunt of Eliza’s seemingly random insults, too. There was no way to deflect them—we all ganged up on whoever was chosen for sacrifice that day.
Until one night, when Eliza was home sick and Leigh, Ariel, and I went to a junior high dance together. We gathered in the corner of the gym, and Leigh said, “Eliza’s kind of pissing me off lately.” She said it tentatively, like she wasn’t sure if we’d agree. But both Ariel and I nodded and smiled. That night, the three of us formulated a plan.
The plan wasn’t complicated, it wasn’t nuanced, it had very few steps. The plan was: Let’s stop talking to Eliza. Just ignore her. Do that thing where you say, “Do you hear a fly buzzing around?” whenever she talks.
And we did. We shut her out in the hallway before the morning bell, we turned our backs to her at lunch, we didn’t wait for her between classes. It was brutal.
Dear Bully Page 8