This is a kind of coming out story. A young man shares his memories of what had led him to this day. Starting with a group of bullies that began his seventh-grade year to the end of his struggle his senior year in high school. The bullies would accost him in gym class forcing him to injure himself to ensure that he would never have to take another gym class while he is in high school. He took some incentive and started talking to the school counselor. He tells her just enough for her to give him the assistance that he needs but not so much that she feels it is necessary to call his parents. Eventually everything come crashing down when the boys follow him home from school. After being bullied: in school, online, via text messages and finally they have followed him home and because he wouldn’t give them the power they wanted they got out of their car and terrorized him at the door then he loses it and picks up a shovel and hits one of the boys in the face killing him. He comes in and locks the door and prepares what he always knew he was going towards, taking his own life. In his final life moments, he writes his suicide note and shares it with us.
PR- Life Shift
“Hey fruit boy, where’s your boyfriend at? You know I saw you online last night doing what gay boys do. Damn shame.” That is how my days started. The moment that I walked onto campus someone somewhere yelled out something about me being a homosexual. There was absolutely no history behind it. I never had a coming out party like it’s a bar mitzvah or something. I never told my friends and my family that I wanted to date guys. For some reason when they looked at me what they saw was a gay teenage boy. I don’t know why that’s what they saw, but that’s what they saw. And they never let me forget it. Kids are cruel. It was always interesting to me when I was younger watching my older brother and sister go through high school. They were all popular and they were active in sports and my sister was the head cheerleader and I sat on the bench watching them and thought to myself I can’t believe that my siblings are so cool. I can’t wait until I’m in high school. But now those are the people that bully me the most. The popular kids. I don’t even know why they care. And the first day I walked in the doors of my high school was the first day that I stopped looking at myself in the mirror. I didn’t want to see myself because I was well aware of how other people saw me.