When I sat down to write this memoir, I had to stop and think for a minute. Of course I have encountered bullying, everyone has. I just didn’t know what to write. I had heard my friends' horror stories and I am involved indirectly in them, but I don’t want to speak for my friends. There was that incident in social studies last year, and nearly everyone in my school was involved in that, but I want mine to be unique. I have been bullied in my life, just like everyone else, but it’s nothing serious enough to be worth writing about. And since I haven’t ever been a bully myself (at least not intentionally), I’m going to talk about my experiences as a bystander, something I’m not inherently proud of.

Every day, as far as I know, everyone in the middle school hallway is a bully, a victim, or a bystander. Even the teachers. More frequently than not, I fall into the latter category, as do too many others. You see it every day, usually with the same people, bullies, victims, and stubborn ignorers. For instance, the day of the student council assembly.
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It was between periods, and we were all in the overcrowded hallway, desperately scrambling from our lockers to class, each of us trying to worm our way through the crowd fastest. I was at my locker, exchanging my royal blue math binder for my lighter blue English one, when I heard it.
“Nerd. Nerd. Nerd. Nerd. Nerd. Nerd. Nerd. Nerd,” someone said, each word accompanied with a locker slam, “Nerd. Nerd. Nerd. Nerd.”
It didn’t take me long to identify the source of the noise. It was coming from behind me, from an African American seventh grade boy who was standing next to another boy who was, like me, trying to get his stuff from his locker. The bully was wearing the most atrocious expression, somehow carrying hatred, malice, and contempt at the same time, all pointing towards the victim. The bully was slamming a locker door next to the boy with such passion I was afraid it would break. I didn’t know either of them, but that didn’t diminish the surge of pity that I felt for him.
A different boy, this one an expression of extreme glee on his face, came up to the pair and gestured to the bully for him to have a turn, and they switched, this time the new bully shouting, “Nerd!” and slamming the locker with more gusto than the first bully. His expression had morphed into one of malicious enjoyment.
This situation caught me off guard. I was unsure, confused as to how to proceed. I glanced around to see if there was anyone else feeling as I did. In my partial survey, as far as I could see, no one had even noticed. Everything was going about as usual. The boy was practically shouting now, and yet no one glanced their way.
I then did something I’m ashamed of, and will be embarrassed about for a long while yet.
I turned my head, my cheeks burning, and grabbed my stuff.
“Hannah, are you coming? We’re gonna be late,” my friend, Beth, said. “Yeah,” I replied. Then I turned and left the boy floundering, his cheeks burning from the humiliation, behind while he struggled.
As I walked up the hallway, my stomach felt like a lead weight and I was so hot with embarrassment, I was worried I’d burn up.
But I kept walking anyway, trying to forget about the boy I’d left behind.
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The thing is, I wasn’t alone in that hallway. There had been plenty of other people to help him besides myself. They hadn’t done anything either. They held just as much blame as me. But I hold myself personally responsible. I had noticed. I should have done something.
The problem with that situation was the little phrase called, “lead by example,” and I had followed the people in that hallway’s example perfectly. I ducked my head and told myself that I couldn’t have done anything and that it doesn’t matter. But I could have done something, and it definitely mattered to the victim, the boy. That wasn’t even the only thing I saw that happened that day.
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Now it was near the end of the student council assembly, and we were on the last batch of speeches. The ones for president. My friend, Rebecca, and I were talking through one of them about how surprised we were at the quality of some the contestant’s arguments.
“I’m surprised,” I said, whispering in her ear, “Adam and Evan’s speeches were way better than I thought they would be. Maybe one of them will win after all.”
“I doubt it,” she said, “Beth’s the only girl running. She’s definitely gonna win.”
“I dunno. Her speech kinda dragged on and on,” I said as we clapped for the ending of John’s speech.
“Freak!” the guy behind us said, “Freak, boo to the freak! Boooooooooo! Freak! Freak!” I turned my head to see what was going on. As I did, a girl laughed, also from behind us. By then I had turned completely in my chair and was facing Adam and his girlfriend, Leslie. Leslie was the one who had laughed, and as she was looking directly at me, I could guess who the laugh was directed at. I could also guess that Adam was the one who had insulted John. As I glanced at them, they continued to look at me, with clear, intimidating expression on their faces. I quickly turned my head and pretended the brief exchange hadn’t occurred.
We soon stood up to leave and I did so with notable relief, still cringing from my embarrassment. I hated being laughed at.
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I don’t think anyone heard him but us, but that doesn’t diminish the insult, or conceal its intent. Remember, this is just what I experienced, on one specific day, out of hundreds.
I didn’t mention all the fights, or cruel gossip, or just flat out meanness that occur all the time. A day doesn’t go by without seeing a fight in the hallway, or hearing someone say something bad about someone else behind their back, or to their face.
All the rumors, hallway brawls, and insults have to stop.