Michael

He always sat alone. He didn't have friends. So what was I supposed to do about it?

by Crystal Kirgiss

It's lunch hour. And the cafeteria is a zoo. At a round table near the edge of the room, I'm brown-bagging it with six of my friends. We almost always sit together, at the same table, in the same seats.

We talk about our teachers, our classes, our parents, and the cute guys sitting a few tables away. We talk about what we'll do together after school or over the weekend. We decide homeroom is kind of fun and accelerated classes are manageable, but what about that weird biology teacher with the bad hair and squeaky voice?

Lunch hour for us is safe and predictable and routine. There's never any stress or worry about where we'll sit, who we'll sit with, or what we'll talk about.

But over there, a guy named Michael sits alone. Every day. I've never seen him sitting with anyone. For that matter, I've never seen him walking in the hall with anyone, talking to anyone between classes, or hanging out with anyone after school.

I only see Michael alone.

Michael is tall and thin. His shoulders sag. He walks slowly. His brown hair is straight and long. His face looks sad and hurt. Michael doesn't hide his loneliness very well.

Michael is in my P.E. class. He is not athletic. He can't throw well, he runs awkwardly, and he obviously doesn't enjoy the class. By the end of the semester, after being laughed at and ridiculed by nearly everyone, Michael's face begins to look more guarded. He seems to keep all his feelings on the inside.

When I see Michael in the hall, he seems lost and confused. Instead of going to his locker between classes, he carries all his books, so he's always dropping stuff. He walks along the wall where he can avoid all the crowds.

Sometimes I wonder if anybody ever even notices him.

Sometimes I notice, but I don't do anything about it. What does it matter, anyway? I don't have any obligations toward him. He's just another kid in school who really has nothing to do with me. Right? …

Halfway through the year, while I sit in the lunchroom with my friends, I glance up and notice Michael sitting alone—again. Silently, I [struggle with myself] about Michael because surely there's someone else who could befriend him. For me, it would be so inconvenient, so uncomfortable, so embarrassing. …

And so after a few miserable days, I walk into the lunch room. I walk past my table of friends, without telling them what I'm up to. And I sit down across from Michael.

My heart is pounding. My face is burning. I feel like everyone is staring at me. And for some reason, I am afraid.

I say, "Hi."

Michael says nothing.

I say, "How are you?"

Michael says nothing.

I want to shrivel up and die, but I eat my lunch and make small talk while Michael just eats his lunch in silence.

I do this the next day and the next. Soon several days have passed, and I am beginning to feel a little resentful because, after all, I am doing my part. I am Reaching Out. I am talking about school and classes and stuff. But Michael is not doing his part by being grateful or friendly or nice.

I wonder, What's the deal? I'm doing the right thing, aren't I? Why aren't things going more smoothly?

The next week, I no longer see Michael in the lunch room. His schedule has changed, and now he has 5th-hour lunch.

So my lunches with Michael have ended.

I go back to sitting with my friends. We talk about school and classes and teachers and what we'll do after school or over the weekend. They never pry about the whole Michael thing. For now, I just tell them it seemed like maybe he needed a friend.

Michael never stops me in the hall to say thanks. He never acknowledges the fact that, for a few days, we were lunch partners. He never says I really changed his life and now he's a brand new person because someone took the time to reach out to him. I have no idea how he feels about the whole thing, or if he even noticed me.

But as I think about it, I realize that I've changed. And I've learned:

[I have to obey that small voice incide me]. Obeying it isn't always easy or comfortable or fun. And it doesn't guarantee recognition or a tangible reward. But if I do it, something inside of me will be right.

And that's a good enough reason for me.

"Liar!"

by Liz Kral with Crystal Kirgiss

Carrie was spreading nasty rumors about me. I was so angry, I didn't think I'd ever forgive her.

Carrie and I weren't very close. Not friends, not enemies, but somewhere in between.

We went to the same school …, so we saw each other a lot. And even though we weren't close, we were always civil to each other. That is, until high school. That's when Carrie started telling lies – first about my best friend, and then about me.

It seemed to start when Carrie was dating John, the ex-boyfriend of my best friend, Emily. For some reason, Carrie started gossiping and telling awful lies about Emily, things that were so untrue it was ridiculous. But sometimes people are willing to believe anything, and the gossip about Emily spread like fire. It was obvious Carrie really wanted to hurt her, and though Emily hid her feelings well, she was angry at what Carrie was doing.

I should've been smart enough to stay out of things, because the problem really was between Emily and Carrie. But I felt like I needed to do something, since my best friend was the one getting hurt.

So I confronted Carrie about the rumors: "How could you possibly say things about Emily that are so untrue? Don't you care about other people at all?"

Carrie looked back at me innocently and said, "I didn't say anything. I'd never do that, and you know it."

Well, I didn't know it. And the next thing I knew, Carrie was spreading lies about me too – stories about me and guys, about how I acted on the weekends, anything she could think of to make me look bad.

Part of me said, "Hey, everyone knows she's a liar. I shouldn't let it bother me." But another part of me was angry. And even though they were all lies, the things she said about me really hurt.

Somehow, Carrie and I avoided saying "hi" or even acknowledging each other. We just pretended the other person didn't exist. But we were both very aware of each other, and what was going on between us.

OK, so Carrie really bugged me. But something else started bugging me too: My conscience.
I knew how I was supposed to treat other people. But I never really gave it much thought and I always tried to be kind. I never treated anyone badly.

Not even Carrie. Well, at least I didn't think so. If anything, I felt like I was the victim in this whole thing. She was the one who was treating people badly. Not me. But my friend, Annette, didn't agree.

Annette and I were working together at a local youth camp one weekend, making hundreds of bologna sandwiches. We were talking about school and guys, and out of the blue, she says, "So, how are things between you and Carrie?"

I wasn't totally surprised by the question. Everyone knew that Carrie and I didn't get along. But I was a little surprised by the timing of the question. She asks me this now?? I thought. While we're making bologna sandwiches?!? But we had 250 more sandwiches to go, and we were alone, so I guess Annette figured she had my undivided attention for a while. And she must have sensed that I needed to talk. I'd been bottling up my feelings about Carrie for too long, and I wanted to tell someone how I felt, how much it hurt to be lied about.

I guess I half-expected Annette to be sympathetic, to say something like, "Wow, that's really awful. I had no idea things were so bad. That Carrie sure sounds terrible. "Instead, she said, "Man, that hurts. It's awful to be lied about, especially when you've done nothing wrong. You know, though, our part is being willing to forgive, even if you're the one who's been hurt, and even if you're not at fault. …"

For a moment, I was really mad at Annette. How could she be so uncaring? Why should I be the one to fix things with Carrie? I hadn't done anything wrong.

But all of a sudden, I realized I had done something wrong. I may not have talked badly about Carrie out loud, but in my heart, I was terribly angry at her. And never once had I really tried to be friendly.

Maybe Annette was right. Maybe it was up to me to forgive and make things right. But then I started thinking, Hey, I'm graduating from high school in just two months. If I put this off long enough, I can just avoid it altogether. And then I'll forget about it. Problem solved.

Well, that thinking didn't work. My conscience kept bugging me about it. Annette's words kept running through my head. …

Finally, about a week after that talk with Annette, [my conscience] kind of gave me a kick and said, "Get going, Liz. Take care of this now."

There we were, Carrie and I, in our first-hour Algebra 2 class. Normally, we didn't sit near each other. But on this day, our teacher decided to put us all in study groups of four people each. For a whole year, she'd left us alone. Now, all of a sudden, she put us in groups. And guess who was in my group? Carrie. I was so uncomfortable. There was so much tension between us, my heart was pounding. At the same time, I knew I couldn't ignore what was happening any longer. So I took a deep breath … and [tried to talk to Carrie about something safe].

Carrie was visibly surprised. And after a second or two, she actually spoke back to me, and she was civil about it. I don't remember what …we talked about, but it was a pretty rough hour.

Things weren't fixed just like that. But after a few days, it got easier and easier to say "hi" and to make small talk, to actually be nice to each other.

I felt a huge load lifted off me, which was a surprise, because I never realized the load was there – until I took a good, long look at myself. It was hard to accept the fact that I wasn't totally blameless, that maybe my inner bad feelings toward Carrie had been just as wrong as the way she had been acting toward me.

A few weeks later, I was back at camp again with Anette, making – what else? – bologna sandwiches. Somehow, she'd heard that Carrie and I had been talking to each other again. Annette looked at me and said, "I'm really proud of you. I know that wasn't an easy thing to do."

Annette was right. All that bitterness toward Carrie had built up inside of me, and it was hard to give up those feelings. That sounds silly, because I should've been happy to get rid of them. But I think maybe I enjoyed nursing my wounds more than I wanted to heal them. I guess I liked having my own personal pity party.

Swallowing my pride, forgiving Carrie, and then actually speaking to her was one of the hardest things I've ever done. But I knew it was the right thing to do. Carrie and I may never be best friends, but that's OK. … To love people doesn't necessarily mean we have to hang out with them. At least now Carrie knows I'm not mad at her any more. And I guess she needed that as much as I did.

Liz Kral is now a sophomore at St. Cloud State University in Minnesota. She is spending most of this school year studying in England.

Date: 2015-04-20; view: 774