There aren’t very many good people in this world. I used to think otherwise but, as I age, I become surer of this.
There was even a point in time, I think, where I believed that everyone was good. Which actually made me feel worse about myself.
I’ve been bullied since I was five. Which is ridiculous. No one ever cared enough to stop it, though. Now I’m turning 16 in two days and I don’t know whether I’ll stay in school after that. I want my diploma so badly. I’ve worked so hard for it. I’ve worked so hard to be so resilient and nothing ever changes.
No one wants to hear the truths I tell. Perhaps it’s that, like the alligator, we have a second eye covering under the lid. One that protects it from the truth that we don’t want to know. Perhaps I’m simply lacking that layer. Maybe my tormentors pulled it off.
Whatever the reason, I am not sure why I can’t ignore the world, as everyone else seems to. Whenever I express my emotions, I seem to get punished for it. Sadness means you’re weird, depression means you’re crazy.
I could say that it’s not my fault. That, after being bullied as much as I have, you would feel this way, too. I shouldn’t.
I tell the truths you don’t want to hear, but I don’t need a backlash.
Still, we all love to blame the victim. Think about it:
If a person commits suicide, they’re going to hell. If a person gets raped, they were probably wearing the wrong clothing, walking on the wrong streets at the wrong time. If a person cuts or burns or scratches themselves, they’re emo, they’re crazy, and they’re freaks. And that is what people see, it seems.
But my vision is not blurred by that second eye covering. I know the truth. It is not shameful to be a victim. It’s not wrong. And, often, it can’t be helped. No one asks to be raped, miserable, hopeless, or addicted. No one thinks it will happen to them. Not even the victim.
I am a victim. I never asked to be bullied. I tried to stop it. I really did.
And no one heard me screaming out the truth. No one saw me waving my arms as I fell.
I’m getting up now. I’m not ashamed. And, in the course of this, now, I realize the truth:
I deserve that diploma far more than those who led me to this. I can’t let them deter me from what I’ve worked so long to get. All along, I’ve been a victim. But, when I hold that diploma in two years, I will be a victor.
I will wait until then to run from my pain. For now, I will try again and again to be heard. I will scream, I will cry, I will sing at the top of my lungs. This is my battle cry. I am so much more than a victim; I am so much stronger from my pain.
I see with a clarity of my own.
