Every single bullying victim hurts.
Some kill themselves.
Those who survive bear hidden scars forever.
Finding Light in the Darkness
by Lisa Schroeder
Write It
The Sandwich Fight
by Steven E. Wedel
The noise of the lunchroom was loud, rising and falling as the lower grades of Coolidge Elementary talked and ate, ignoring the illuminated red of the traffic light that indicated it was quiet time. Being a picky eater, I’d opted to bring my lunch. I took my sandwich—thin sheets of beef lunch meat with mustard on white bread—from my Charlie Brown lunch box and brought it toward my mouth.
“Give me a bite.” The voice belonged to Kevin. Something inside me squirmed, looking for a deeper place to hide.
A few days earlier, Kevin had demanded one of my mom’s homemade chocolate chip cookies. I refused. He stole one. When I complained to my mom, her response was that I should have shared my cookies. Now, I’m not opposed to sharing. Never have been. But it goes all over me when somebody demands I give up something that is mine. Kevin had stolen my cookie, and now he was sitting there in his yellow button-down shirt, his own lunch in front of him, insisting I give him a bite of my sandwich.
There was more to it, of course. This was second grade, 1972, and only the first year for Enid, Oklahoma, schools to have a hot lunch program. I tried a hot lunch the second day of school and hated it, so I took my lunch every day from then on. Looking back, I suppose it was fitting I carried a Charlie Brown lunch box, considering how much ol’ Chuck and I had in common. Something inside made us easy targets for harassment. Charlie Brown had his Lucy, and I had Kevin.
Earlier in the year, he’d stolen my eraser. Our teacher, Mrs. Patton, was leading a group of kids in reading while I was whispering to Kevin to give back my eraser. The girl next to me was trying to help resolve the issue. Next thing I knew, Mrs. Patton was swatting Kevin, then the girl, and then had me by the ear and was dragging me out of my desk and lighting up my butt with her wooden paddle. Hey, it was the early seventies and that stuff was still allowed.
Classroom, playground, he was always there, always picking on me about something. But nowhere was it worse than the lunchroom.
I lifted the thin sandwich toward my mouth for a second bite, and he grabbed my wrist. We struggled, him pulling my hand and food toward his open mouth. How long until a teacher noticed? Would I get in trouble for this, too? Another swat?
He got his bite. No way I was eating that after his mouth had touched it. I dropped it back into my lunch box and ate whatever else Mom had packed. But it wasn’t over. He loved the idea that I wouldn’t eat the sandwich now and amped up the harassment until, finally, I agreed to settle the matter with him on the playground after school.
The rest of the day was horrible. I was a bundle of nerves. We’d get caught. That was certain. I’d get in trouble at school. They’d call home. Mom would be mad. Dad would be mad. I’d probably get spanked and grounded and Dad—my Pentecostal father—would give me a lecture about turning the other cheek while my mom would settle the issue by making an extra sandwich or cutting mine in half so I could share it.
