Bitter Sweet Sixteen

1995 was the first worst year of my life. I destroyed many friendships. I destroyed a chance for happiness, a chance for love. I brought my world down. I drowned in depression, annihilated before my last year of high school. It all began with a boy. It all began with one mistake, a mistake that became the beginning of the end. My story begins back in 1994.

I was turning sixteen. My parents pushed me to invite my best friends out to dinner and a Broadway show, but my heart was set on having a party. I wanted a sweet sixteen party, so I didn't listen. The date I picked clashed with a party already planned by my best friends, so I decided to invite my classmates instead, classmates that were neither friend nor enemy. Or so I thought.

Back then, my school district deemed that I was Special Ed. I had low scores in Math and Science, but I could have excelled in English, if I applied myself. It didn't matter. I joined my brother in Special Ed, which failed to help with my education. All that was achieved was the introduction of Wilson, a boy that I almost didn't invite to my sweet sixteen party.

I saw the disappointment etch across his face as I handed out invites to the rest of the class. Something told me to leave it be. Don't invite him. It was a voice that I would later wish that I had listened to, but I invited him anyway. I saw no harm in inviting him to a party, which would soon become a disaster.

You hear people talk about bad omens. You think that it's all superstition, but a major snowstorm the day before the party should have been a red flag. If that wasn't enough of a flashing danger sign, the wild goose chase in picking up two other boys from the Special Ed class the day of the party should have been the final straw, but I thought it would be fashionable to show up late. And later, the party moved from a local Italian restaurant, now closed, to my house, where we would settle down and watch Innocent Blood.

I made a lot of mistakes on this day and before. My report card arrived in the mail. They were mostly D's but a few C's. I remembered the look of disappointment on my father's face, but he would not lecture or punish me on this day. This was my day, and my sweet sixteen was supposed to be a good day. So, why did I have this horrible feeling twisting in the pit of my stomach?

For my birthday, Wilson gave me a 14-karat carousel horse on a gold chain. That should have been another red flag. He asked me to hang out, so I agreed. I was smart enough to invite two other classmates along with us, which he didn't like. Something told me to be careful. Run. Run as far as you can, but again, I didn't listen.

Wilson thought he fooled me. He started to talk about how he liked me since the day, where he first saw me. He saw me before I saw him, and he started to follow my every move. When the Special Ed class went on trips, the teachers took pictures and hung them up in the classroom for all to see. A few pictures went missing, and I never realized that those pictures were of me. And he admitted to taking them.

He wanted to be my boyfriend. He said that he could make me happy. He would be everything that I wanted, but all I heard was a siren screaming in the back of my mind. I tried to cut off my ties to him, but I was bound by one class, Special Ed. I was stuck, but I couldn't remain his friend. My skin crawled every time he was near, and my gut twisted further into a knot. Run. Run as fast as you can.

When he realized this, things took a turn for the worse. He joined in with the bullies, tormenting and teasing me. It didn't phase me. Take a number. Stand in line. Everybody was tormenting or teasing me, and when he realized that this was not working, he switched tactics.

Wilson was on the football team. None of the school district's players liked me. In fact, most of them hated me, so all he had to do was stir up the bee's nest by bouncing around my name. A note was written, a note he wrote, pretending to be me, and it was left in the men's locker room. Whatever contents spilled out was met with an outburst of rage, a rage that he kindled in hopes of destroying me. I barely survived that onslaught, but I survived. And that only infuriated him more.

My Special Ed class had a brainstorm, deciding to take its students to Boces. We had a choice. Finish our education, or find a trade. At least, with a trade, we were guaranteed some kind of future, but I felt like it was more of a write-off, cut off those that would not rise to the top. There was nothing that met my interest, but I was asked to find something. Cosmetology. Sure. Why the hell not?

On orientation day, I was allowed to leave school behind. No bullies. No tormenting or teasing. No mindless classes with boring homework. No Wilson, or so I thought. As I entered the room and took a seat, there he was, waiting for me, and his eyes locked on target.

It didn't take long for people to figure out why he was really there. Maybe it was because he was one of the few guys trying out the class. Maybe because he liked me and was trying to win me over. Little did they know that this was the guy, who dropped a heavy textbook down a flight of stairs, aiming for my head. Lucky for me, he had poor aim, but again, I was trapped, enduring a long day with him. And no, he did not win me over, no matter how hard the rest of the class tried to get me to warm up to him.

The school year was winding down. Summer was coming, and I could hardly wait. Just a couple of more months, and I would be free of him. Next year, I would finally be free of Special Ed, and he knew this. He knew time was running out for us, so what was he going to do?

My mother had to buy groceries one day, so we took a ride into town. My baby brother was with us. My mother and I argued inside the store. We argued about trivial things, and by the time she was done shopping, I just wanted to go home, go into my room, and lock the door. I was done talking.

We stepped outside to a bright, beautiful day. She pushed the wagon ahead. I strolled behind lost in thought. BANG. My mother took off like a horse at the races, bolting for her car with wagon and brother in hand. I stood still, trying to figure it out what just happened. BANG.

Something whizzed past my neck. Glass shattered behind me. Silence. An eerie, cold silence held me, and then I saw him crouched behind a car. He stood up with gun in hand and mouth dropped open. I forgot that he lived near this grocery store, up the road actually, and he contemplated his next move. I could have sworn that he was about to raise his gun again.

"Hey! Hey! What the hell are you doing?" A man emerged from the store with the broken glass window. "What did you do!" I turned to see Wilson running away, probably heading for home. "What did you do!"

My mother's car pulled up in front of me. She screamed for me to get in, and I obeyed. The man remained standing nearby, yelling at us, but my mother floored it. She flew all the way home without asking one single question, and all I did was rub my neck, thinking that was close. But would he do it again?

I hardly saw Wilson after that. He made himself scarce. When he realized that nobody was coming to ask him about what took place on that day, he emerged, completely disinterested in me. I heard he moved a year later, and the only evidence of what took place on that day, the day, where he tried to kill me was in the local paper. The man that had screamed outside the store gave a description of the assailant, a description of me, but my mother told me to leave it be. Forget about it. The monster was gone, but as time rolled on, there was another waiting to find me again, another story for another time.