Summer reading: Boomerang Bully

[Times photos: Lara Cerri] Meadowlawn Middle School teacher Michael Taylor had no trouble finding talent, motivation and good ideas for this summer reading series. The writers, from a variety of Pinellas County schools, all had witnessed or experienced bullying. At a meeting of the group at the St. Petersburg Main Library are, front row: Katherine Workman, 13; Audrey Clarkin, 13; and Alex Zimmet, 10; back row: Matthew Thomas, 11; Ally Sikora, 11; and Eddie Kulp, 15. Behind them is Taylor. At right is writer Nicole Shutt, 13.

Editor's note: Today we begin our summer reading series, a joint offering by the Xpress section and the Newspaper in Education department of the St. Petersburg Times. Seven young Tampa Bay area writers have been chosen to collaborate on this project, each writer contributing a chapter under the coordination of Michael Taylor, language arts teacher at Meadowlawn Middle School in St. Petersburg. Our summer serial is a fictional treatment of what are very real problems faced by too many students: bullying, intimidation and harassment. Our central characters, Amanda and Nathaniel, are victims, but because often individuals who are picked on find outlets for their distress, they are also perpetrators.

Chapter 1: Back at Ya

By EDDIE KULP

[Times photo: Lara Cerri]

ABOUT THE AUTHOR Eddie Kulp, 15, will be a sophomore at St. Petersburg High School. His favorite book is A Spell for Chameleon by Piers Anthony. His ambition is to publish a novel. He was writing director of Impressions Teen Magazine and his work has been published in the St. Petersburg Times. He defines bullying as: “The zenith of all things bad that peers can put one another through, as well as a character builder which usually yields poor results.”

"Hatred is a boomerang which is sure to hit you harder than the one at whom you throw it." -- Author unknown

"I have always been at the sword's end of an assortment of bullies, Amanda."

Nathaniel kicked at the dirt under the massive oak tree at the edge of the school parking lot as the story spilled out to his sympathetic friend.

"The bullying began when I switched schools in the fourth grade," he said. "But it didn't stop with my classmates breaking in the "new' kid.

"I bore the baneful wrath of bullies throughout grade school."

"Poor Nathaniel!" Amanda crooned.

Amanda Bichard and Nathaniel Flanagan had become good friends last year, and she knew a lot about him. But she'd never heard this story.

"I have always been one of the biggest kids around. I was the tallest in my entire school by the end of fourth grade, and the smaller children loved to pick on me to make themselves look that much bigger and more powerful."

"So you were a wimp?" kidded Amanda, who knew Nathaniel could tolerate her teasing.

They both were in eighth grade, and rode the bus to school together. There was a bit of time before the bell rang, and they sat under the tree.

"No! But in fourth grade, two of my classmates, James and Rawlings, took it upon themselves to see how often they could humiliate me. Whenever I jogged around the P.E. field, one or the other of them would try to trip me. Each time I kissed the Astroturf, they laughed hysterically."

Amanda put her hand on Nathaniel's shoulder.

"I bet being the "big guy' helped once you got to middle school," she said.

"Not really. Middle school just meant a whole new degree of pressure and prodding from bullies. Bullies always seemed to find some minuscule detail that separated me from the majority, that group of popular, Hollywood-esque people of which they all considered themselves to be a part."

"Like, what would they pick on?"

"Primarily, their reason was my hair: It was long, a bit greasy and always messy. Some people enjoy picking fights for any stupid reason. "Haven't you ever heard of a comb, Nathaniel?' my beloved classmates would ask me."

Amanda grinned at him. "Well, your hair is a trip!" she said with a laugh.

"An eighth-grader had been making my life miserable all year. Constantly poking at me, taunting me and publicly insulting me. Brian was the type of kid who loved to show his superiority."

"Not Brian Miller?" Amanda asked, astonished at the thought.

"The same," said Nathaniel. "I never knew what to do about his bullying. While I figured that I would get into trouble if I took matters into my own hands, I also knew that simply telling an administrator would only make Brian's provocations worse.

"So, I grinned and bit the bullet as Brian continued to plague my social life -- and lack thereof -- for the duration of sixth grade. After all, he'd be gone for good once I was a seventh-grader.

"But by March, I'd had enough. One morning before school, my friend Tony stood talking with Brian not far from where I was watching the buses arrive. The conversation ground on between Tony and Brian and I ignored much of it, but my ears perked up as I heard Brian say my name.

"I don't really remember what Brian said to me, but I remember the sneer on his face as he tore open a small package and brandished an alcohol wipe pad. After jabbing it at Tony a few times, he decided to try his luck with me," Nathaniel said.

"As I looked back and forth between him and the wipe pad, he did something I didn't see coming: He shoved it into my mouth.

"I spit it out immediately, wiped my mouth with the back of my hand and glared hard at him. Not until my second step did he realize I had charged."

Amanda sat up straight. "What did he do?" she gasped. "And what did you do?"

"He turned and fled like a squirrel with its tail on fire, but my pent-up anger from nearly a year's worth of insults and demeaning treatment fueled me on. I caught up with him and sailed with my right, twice. Feeling my fist miss its mark both times, I clasped my fingers around his head. Spinning through the crowd of people arriving at school, I swung him to the ground. The bell rang. Without so much as looking at him, I walked into class."

"You got away with that?" Amanda gulped.

"No. I was stopped by a faculty member, Ms. Owens. Brian and I were both marched to a disciplinary conference. Since that was my first referral ever, I was only given an after-school detention. But Brian had a sheet of disciplinary referrals a mile long, so he got three days suspension. AND he knows I'm not putting up with his intimidation any more.

"Hey, in the end, what goes around, comes around."

They had started walking again, and had almost reached the school's front hallway as Amanda stopped, her brow furrowed. "You're not the only one who gets pushed around," she said.

The first bell of the day clanged loudly over their heads.

NEXT: Friends?

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