My High School Bully Just Called Me 25 Years Later

So here’s what happened a few hours ago: While utterly consumed with the now-harrowing process that we used to call “just going grocery shopping,” I missed a call on my cell from a 201 area code, the numbers of my northern New Jersey homeland. After I de-masked in the car, I listened to the voicemail.

MALE VOICE: Hey Ken, can you give me a call back? [Insert Number] I’d appreciate it.

The message was 12 seconds total and the male did not identify himself.

My parents still maintain my childhood home in that area code, so I figured I had to call the number back just in case it was something family-related.

Here’s what I can transcribe word-for-word from that call.

KEN: Hi, this is Ken returning your call.
MALE VOICE: Yeah this is [Insert Name].

And that’s all I can reliably remember. Because the name he said was exactly the same name as my high school bully from 25 years ago.

Which makes sense, because it was my bully from high school calling me. 25 years later.

Quick recap: high school sucked. Though I was not out, I was a J-Crew-wearing tennis player who sat with girls during lunch. Immediate connotation to anyone who encountered me? He’s gay. I never expressed any attraction to the same sex, but the—ultimately correct—conclusion had been drawn.

I threw myself into every conceivable extracurricular activity to avoid having a social life, because I really didn’t know how to play the part of a straight kid. By my senior year, the word “faggot” was thrown at me every single day of the week. It all came to a climax on a snowy Friday night, sitting in my parent’s basement, when Duran Duran’s “Ordinary World” came on Z100 and I tried to smother myself with a pillow. My feeble life-ending attempt was happily unsuccessful.

There’s still a part of me that isn’t quite sure how I made it through that time, as I held everything inside with no one to tell about my struggles. But I did make it through and I’ve done pretty darn well for myself, not just in life, but in LGBTQ+ life. I get to work with this amazing platform that helps amplify LGBTQ+ voices. And I am almost never in an environment where I have to pass as anything other than an out gay male, a privilege so many of my Ohio LGBTQ+ siblings simply do not have.

And then my bully called me from high school this morning.

My phone tells me that we talked for 12 minutes, but even these few hours later, most of our conversation is blurry.

Here’s what I know happened from his end:

• He told me that he has a gay friend and that his gay friend stumbled onto an article I wrote 7 months ago mentioning my bully by name in a throwaway sentence.
• He kept asking, “Did I really do that?” because he was not able to reconcile his behavior then with who he is now.
• He apologized profusely.
• He asked if there was anything he could do to make it up to me.
• He asked if I could please take his name off of that article.
• He relayed that it would be terrible if—as a high school teacher!—his students or administrators saw his name in that article.
• He asked if I could please take his name off of that article.
• He apologized profusely.
• He asked if I could please take his name off of that article.

Here’s what I know happened from my end:

• I said that I appreciated his apology.
• I highlighted that most people would not have made the call and that picking up the phone speaks volumes about who he is now.
• I told him that I do not want to minimize his actions and their effect on me. I reminded him that he called me a faggot daily, that being in the locker room with him was habitually and legitimately a terrifying experience for me, and that I barely made it out of high school.
• I let him know that I’m doing really well now, kicking ass even! I explained that I have unbelievable opportunities to support the LGBTQ+ community, including helping to scaffold LGBTQ+ youth in a way that I wasn’t supported when he was bullying me.
• I informed him that the publication in which I used his name doesn’t even exist anymore, so I don’t know if there’s anything I can do. But that I would let him know.

The call was overwhelming, and I know that I got choked up at one point, but I was desperate to not let my voice crack. There was talk at the end about us writing something together. He finished the call by asking me to please let me him know if I am indeed able to get his name off that article.

So…yeah. How do I navigate through this one? Here’s where I’m at:

• I feel grateful that my high school bully just called me to apologize.
• I feel enraged that my torment meant so little to him that he doesn’t even remember that behavior.
• I feel guilty that I used his name in an article about my experience being bullied.
• I feel nervous that using his name in that article used my platform inappropriately, making me the bully.
• I feel confused as to what percentage of the call was genuine contrition, and what percentage was making someone’s Google search yield more positive results.
• I feel proud that I stayed on that 12-minute call.
• I feel proud that I didn’t minimize my experience with a “No worries,” but instead explained to him in great detail what I experienced back then.
• I feel proud that I repeatedly acknowledged his apology, and commended him for making the call.
• I feel proud that, when I explained how kickass my life is as an out gay man, I really meant it.
• I feel proud that I didn’t get off the phone and think, “Ugh! I wish I had said something different!”
• I feel proud that I get to write these words.
• I just feel proud.

I have no clue what happens next, what I’m supposed to do, or feel, or write. I know this doesn’t happen every day and that most people don’t get a call 25 years later from their bully with an actual expressed apology.

It’s been 25 years since I attended Pascack Hills High School. That quarter century feels like a lifetime ago. And, right this second, it feels like yesterday. Yes, he wanted his name omitted from a piece that didn’t speak well of him. But I really do believe that he heard me describe the bullying I experienced at his hands.

I don’t have a big impact statement or society-altering conclusion to insert here. But that moment of feeling heard doesn’t feel like nothing right this second. It actually feels like something, and it feels like something good.

Ignite Action:

• Read the latest GLSEN School Climate Survey to find out how LGBTQ+ youth are faring these days. 
• Check out research being done right here in Ohio on LGBTQ+ youth. 
• Find a local chapter of PFLAG, and support the work they are doing to create supportive networks. 
• Memorize the info for The Trevor Project, a national 24-hour, toll free confidential suicide hotline for LGBTQ youth, so that you can offer forth that resource to anyone in need.