When a school loses two students to suicide, they have no choice but to finally take action against the bullying that occurs behind its walls. With the thought of bringing more empathy into the school, the teachers assign a project to every Social S...
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As soon as that first tear fell, I knew what was Next. I knew that whatever was about to happen, was a step towards something. Ms. Larregs wipes her tears with the back of her hand, clears her throat, and carries on.
"Just because this was marked off as suicide, doesn't mean in any way, that you have not played your part."
The class visibly stiffened. I could imagine how many are in denial. How many think that because they stayed silent and didn't actively participate, that they had nothing to do with it. Regardless of whether they chose to accept it, at the end of the day, they still played their parts, and James and Harper are still gone.
I've found that with bullying, there are four groups of people.
The first one is the bully. The one that deliberately goes out of their way, just to ruin a person. The ones who talk, push, shove, and punch, just to see the pain on somebody else.
The second is the Bullied. The ones who take the heat for everything when they've done nothing. The ones who trudge through hoping for the day when all of it will end.
The third group is the watchers. These people are the ones who don't acknowledge when a kid is being bullied. They advert their gaze and walk away. These are people that only have time to think of themselves.
The fourth is where the defenders stand. They are the ones who run to the scene to help, not caring about the consequences it will lead to. They don't advert their gaze, and they don't walk away.
I try my best to be a defender. I couldn't be someone to hurt another, and I couldn't be the reason for a life lost. But with James, I couldn't be the reason for a life saved either. I couldn't be the one to save him, and that kills me. I tried, but I had failed miserably. Now he's gone and I can't help but think that maybe if I was more than I am, and maybe if I was stronger and better, maybe then I could have saved him.
I take silent breaths and adjust myself to sit on my hands, attempting to stop the shaking. I focus on breathing and steadying myself. I hate when this happens. It's been more frequent lately, and it's getting out of control. I try to refocus on what Ms. Larregs is saying.
She was talking about how we didn't know James or Harper. We didn't know what their home life was like or what they had gone through. We didn't know their struggles and their dreams. She had told us that we didn't know anything about them.
She then asked for people to raise their hands if they knew as little as their middle names. I looked around but the class was still. Not a single hand raised. This didn't surprise me. Nobody had cared enough to find out.
She looked at everyone in a manner so unlike her usual self, that I had almost forgotten who she was.
But she still remained there. Waiting for a hand. Just one. I was waiting as well, but not for a hand, I was waiting for something to happen.
