...I tried to escape when I could. I joined the art club (even though I don’t have an aesthetic bone in my body!) so that at least one day a week I wouldn’t have to take the bus home. I set up chairs for band practice during recess time so I wouldn’t have to go out with the other kids. I stayed inside whenever I could. When I had to be in public, I tried to make myself disappear, become invisible. I would hide behind the rest of my family when we went out together. I would run from the front door to the car when we left the house, and did the reverse when we came home. I begged to stay home from school at every possible opportunity (in my defense, I did feel genuinely ill all the time thanks to the bullying) and had my wish granted often enough that my report cards were full of complaints about my absenteeism.
But only so much physical escape was possible, so I had to complement it with mental escape. And while I’m embarrassed to be so dramatic, there’s only one way to put it: I died inside. Often days would go by without my ever opening my mouth to speak–I spoke so rarely that my voice felt rusty with disuse when I did. I stopped playing even solitary games. When I got home from school most days I would sit on the floor of my room and just stare into space, opening and closing my fists, hating myself, hating everybody, hating everything, and trying to numb out to get away from all that hatred. And I would do that for hours and hours on end, coming out only when summoned to eat dinner or do chores. ...
I think part of what made the antigay bullying so awful was the way it dovetailed with my family’s and my teachers’ attitudes.
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