January
2007
Belle
Today’s entry credits its inspiration to RSM’s post about bullies.
It’s not an American thing, that’s for sure. In high school, I was average in terms of popularity - not the queen of the prom, but not the outcast either. I gravitated mostly outside the class’s social system, with a few good friends and a few girls that didn’t like me much. However, there was this girl called Sanda who for some reason one day decided I was a good target. Mind you, I wasn’t the only one - she picked on about one third of the class on various occasions. For me, to be the receiver of constant, unprovoked hostility was a new sensation though.
It started with the glasses - I have a good eye and one with a fairly mild myopia, so I need to wear them only when I read or work on the computer. I wore them during classes and sometimes I heard a quick “four-eyes!” whisper from her bench. I brushed it off as too insignificant to matter but something deep in the mind’s basement started ticking.
Then were the puns about my name. Out of the blue, she wouldn’t use my given name, and call me only by the family name. Which is a nice name, except that she sometimes changed its ending, twisting it into a semi-obscenity. I never answered to it, so she either called me a few more times and then gave up, or started snickering with her clique. I minded my business, but the ticking got a little louder.
And one day, a few weeks after she struck a friendship with the twins I had as benchmates (we were seated 3 / bench) she came near me and commanded me to get out so she can sit down. And the clock started ringing on a near-deafening level in my mind.
My family, friends and most of my patients know me as a woman with a sweet, child-like voice.The simulating patients and some of my exes, however, know another, entirely different tone. One full of cold, annihilating, I-can-kill-with-my-soundwaves anger. I think I discovered that I had it right at that very moment.
I stood up, facing her.
“No”
“No what?” laughed she.
“I’m not getting out of this bench”
“What’s the matter with you? I have to talk to them .. get out”
“You see clearly that I’m writing here. Why should I get out of the fucking bench? I’m fed up with the countless four-eyes and the snickering. I’m not your friend so I don’t have to please you. And by the way ..the name’s Ada. You’re not that dumb to remember only my family name. Use it in the future if you want me to answer you.”
… and I went back to writing.
The twins went out of the bench at Mach 3 and rushed her away from there. The look in her eyes was worth a million bucks - sort of an incredulous fright. She spent the rest of the high school keeping a respectful distance, never again trying to pick on me.
I wish I’ll be able to tell Timi this memory in a way that she’ll believe me when she’ll be picked on. To be able to convince her that yes, all the crappy teen magazines are right, and if you show that you’re not afraid, and that you’ve had enough, the bullies get scared and run. After all, I’ve been there, done that and got the four eyes to prove it .