Discovering the Truth About My Middle & High School Bully

High school was a rough time for me, especially being gay in an environment that wasn’t always accepting. The administration, including the principal, Frank Lay, as well as counselors and other staff members at Pace High School, advised me and other queer students never to confirm our sexuality. I dealt with the same thing at Pace Middle School but on a more low-key level. I faced a lot of bullying and name-calling because I wasn’t exactly like the other boys. For years, I harbored resentment towards a kid in my grade named Kyle Norris, who I believed, and was led to believe by others, was the main culprit of a prank that went on for several weeks. The graffiti in the boys’ bathroom with my name on it and the love letters to Jason McBride, who I never even liked, were just a few of the humiliations I endured.

The graffiti was the start. Seeing my name scrawled on the bathroom wall with a sexual message directed at someone I had no interest in was like a punch to the gut when I walked in to see it. Kyle had come out of the bathroom and made a beeline directly to me to inform me that there was something in the bathroom that I needed to see. It felt like there was no escape from the constant ridicule. Shortly thereafter, there were the love letters to Jason McBride. Someone thought it would be funny to sign my name to them, making it look like I had a crush on him. It was mortifying, especially since I had no feelings for Jason at all. At one point, I was called into the office of Herb Cannon, our assistant principal. Herb presented himself as a bigoted judge with the assumption of guilt and threatened to get the police involved with the accusation of harassment. What really upset me was the fact that he mentioned he knew my family really well and knew they would be really ashamed of this situation. My sister was close with Herb; he was her basketball coach for a few years, taught her how to drive, and helped her get her driver’s license. I was mortified and never mentioned any of this to my family, though I now realize I should have. It’s interesting looking back, seeing the way that people who were in a position to help were blinded by their own bigotry.

For years, I blamed Kyle Norris for all of this. I was convinced he was the one behind the bullying because he always seemed to be the messenger when something would happen. I recently told my friend Jenny Reeves, who has remained friends with Kyle since high school, that every time I thought about high school, my anger towards him would flare up. Jenny decided it was time to clear the air between Kyle and me, and he and I chatted for hours, not only about the situation but our lives during and after school. The truth: Kyle was innocent. He wasn’t the person or connected to the people who tormented me. Kyle was simply the messenger or an individual who was in the wrong place at the wrong time. It was a shocking revelation that turned the way I thought of some of the people I went to school with upside down.

Finding out that Kyle wasn’t my bully was a mix of emotions. On one hand, I felt relief knowing that Kyle was innocent and I had wrongly accused him. On the other hand, I was angry at myself for holding onto that resentment for so long and letting it block my chance of a friendship that could have been. This shows how important it is to get the facts before jumping to conclusions.

This experience has taught me a lot about forgiveness and letting go of the past. It’s not easy to move on from the pain of bullying, but holding onto anger only hurts you in the long run. I’m still processing everything, but I’m hopeful that this new understanding will help me heal and move forward. Now that I’ve cleared the air with Kyle, we are actually friends. With all this said, some good things came out of the love letter situation. I became friends with Terry Kelly, another gay boy in middle school, and we shared each other’s secrets. I began to trust people less, which helped me become less gullible, and I learned how to see through people’s facades. Now that Kyle is no longer negatively living in my head rent-free, I wonder who the actual culprits were during my middle school years.