Were you ever bullied at school? I've been victim and perpetrator, both are inextricably linked.
It's winter, 1969. A skinny twelve-year-old high school girl – let’s call her Judith - paces along the footpath next to the tram tracks. She's on her way to the bus stop around the corner; on that particular day, a very long block away. She and a quiet companion, Jill, in grey school tunics and blazers, are just ahead of a hunting pack of vixens from their class. Jill, stares ahead, solemn-faced, despite knowing she isn’t their target. The pack taunts and brays at Judith. 'Whaddarya? Cow! Think you're too good? Not so tough now!" Judith's hunched shoulders and white face betray her fear as she hurries along, hefting the weight of her enormous grey vinyl school bag.
The day
before, their form 2 teacher had needed to leave the classroom. Before going,
she’d handed a pupil, Laureen, one of Judith’s primary school friends, a piece of
chalk instructing her to write on the board the name of anyone who talked while she, the teacher, was out
of the room.
The class
erupted into chatter once the teacher was out of earshot. Laureen joined in the
fun, daring with her powerful chalk, cheekily writing names to peels of
laughter and protest, then quickly dusting them off. It was fun. Unfortunately,
Laureen hadn’t removed one name quickly enough. The teacher returned and on
seeing it reprimanded the whole class and gave them detention the following
afternoon.
As they
left the classroom that day, Judith gave Laureen a harmless push. Well, Judith
had been ‘going with’ Greg, whose name was left on the board and who’d been
singled out for a vicious, undeserved telling off. As his girlfriend at the
time, it was her duty to stick up for him. The detention meant they’d miss the
dedicated school bus, have to walk a couple of blocks to the bus stop and get
home an hour later than usual. So unfair!
Judith,
twelve, oblivious, had poked a bear.
Next day, a
miasma of menace swirled through the classrooms and the B block corridor where
they had their lockers. It snaked around her. Now, Middlemarch, not Laureen,
was the unwitting offender. How dare she have pushed Laureen who’d only been having
fun? Who did Middlemarch think she was? She should be taught a lesson. “Hey, no
one talk to Middlemarch, that’ll teach her; that’ll teach that smartarse bitch.
Hey, let’s get her after school. Yeah!”
After the detention
on her way to the bus stop, Judith knows she’s in for it. There’s no escape; no
rescue. Jill is keeping out of it and daren’t draw attention. She’s brave even
walking next to Judith. Judith is defenceless.
The pack was
straining to give Middlemarch what she had coming.
One of the
pack broke ranks and overtook Judith on the footpath. Brenda, with her sharpie swagger
and hitched up school tunic, seemed to be walking ahead. Suddenly she turned. Smiling, she sashayed back and slapped Judith hard across the face with an open hand. Judith
felt the sting on her teeth and her eyes filled with treacherous tears. Jill said
nothing. Stunned, only faltering slightly, they continued their determined
march towards the corner bus stop. Once there, Judith, heart racing, knees
shaking, was backed up against the shop window. surrounded by vicious, slavering
teen-girl delinquents.
“Throw down
your bag and fight! Whaddarya? Chicken! Fight! Bitch!”
Clutching
her bag, trying to look unfazed, Judith held her ground despite her trembling
legs. She dared not move, waiting for the pack to attack and rip her hair
out. Fortunately, sticks and stones didn’t break her bones but the words left permanent bruises. Eventually
the bus arrived and Judith scrambled on, sitting at the front near the driver to
avoid the scowling mob who’d sauntered to their usual back seat. With snarled threats
and insults, one by one teen girls alighted at their respective stops. Judith’s
was last and she was home free.
The threat
passed and within a few weeks the pack, the curiously attractive rough girls, had another victim lined
up in their sights. Anne hadn’t done anything, but she’d unconsciously entered no man's land merely by being in that school corridor at that age – twelve,
thirteen - and somehow being noticed. Parting her hair ‘wrong’, wearing her school
uniform wrong, being quiet, being loud, being dumb, being clever, looking at
something? “Whatcha lookin at?” Who knew? Getting above herself, not quite
understanding the vagaries of pubescent etiquette, Anne, too, needed to be knocked
down. Judith, subdued, had watched from a safe distance across B Block locker
bay as a mob formed, hoping for an impromptu bash-up before third period. Judith
didn’t step in to help her primary school friend, Anne, whose blonde hair framed
a face drained of colour while Sharon stood over her, berating her, wanting to
fight. Judith was simply relieved it wasn’t her.
So here I sit, 54 years on, wondering why I’m attending the 50-year reunion of that high school where I formed those hellish memories.
