Page 27 of Talk to Me

“The dogs and cats do. A few of the others—but I can never remember them all.”

We were both smiling and sipping our coffee as we thought about trying to give unique names to that many animals.

“I’m guessing you did not grow up on a farm?” I asked. “Your mom’s allergies and all? And if your dad can’t deal with mess—”

He shook his head. “No. Definitely not on a farm. It felt like it sometimes, though.”

“What does that mean?” I couldn’t help but laugh.

“Lots of chaos, I guess?” Theo said cryptically. “I’m guessing farm life is kind of hectic with all the animals and work and stuff?”

“Yeah.”

“There you go,” he said.

We walked in easy silence as we made our way towards the dorms. Sipping our coffee made it easy to feel like we didn’t have to fill the silence with conversation, which took away any awkwardness. Before I could come up with another unique topic to keep Theo talking, we arrived outside the dorm building. I stopped and brought my cup to my lips, desperately thinking of a way to continue the conversation with Theo.

He had given me more real information about himself in the last few minutes than I’d gleaned from hours of his Peepers videos. Of course, free coffee always gets a person to open up. However, I was worried that if I let Theo stop talking, he’d hide from me for another week or more. Why that bothered me, I wasn’t sure. He was a new friend. I had to expect getting to know each other would take a while.

“So,” Theo said, turning to me, “thanks for the coffee. I’ll buy next time.”

“Yeah,” I teased, “but will you go inside and buy them or will you force me to do it?”

Theo’s face seemed to sag and he was suddenly looking at his feet again. Mentally, I slapped myself on the forehead. I’d spent time with friends like Collin so much that it was natural to tease people about their hangups. It made me forget at times that some people had actual, real feelings.

“Sorry,” I said. “I was just…it was a joke.”

Theo nodded. “You know, I know you didn’t mean it to be rude.”

“Right.”

He headed towards the doors.

“People are dicks,” I said, stopping him. “I know that’s not what you want to hear, but maybe just ignoring them—”

“It’s easy for you to say,” Theo said, stepping back over to me. “People always say, ‘oh, just ignore them’ or, ‘turn the other cheek’ or, ‘they’ll get tired of bullying you eventually’. It’s all so easy when you’re not the one dealing with it.”

I stared at him.

“You know what’s worse than being bullied?” Theo asked.

“What?” I managed to reply.

“Not knowing who is going to bully you or when,” he said. “If it was everyone all the time, I probably would just deal with it. I’d know what to expect everywhere I went. It’d be easy to put up some shields and march around campus and not give a crap.”

I frowned.

“But I can be having the best day, and people can be treating me fine,” he continued. “Then, suddenly, I’m standing somewhere, buying a book for class, and someone screams ‘dick’ or some other insult at me. And it’s all the more humiliating because for a few hours that day, I convinced myself that maybe things were getting better. That maybe not everyone is awful. And I was wrong. I caused my own humiliation by believing my own bullshit. That’s what really fucking hurts.”

It was my turn to look at my shoes.

“And, maybe even worse, no one stands up for me,” he said, clearing his throat. “And I’m not sure I would want them to, because that might be even more humiliating. Like I can’t stand up for myself. Or it would prove I was affected by what the person screamed at me. But it still stings, man. Because I know no one is standing up for me because they either believe what the person screamed, or they’re too chickenshit to stand up for me because then they might be a target. They’re fine with me being bullied as long as they’re safe.”

“I’m sorry,” I said.

“Yeah, well,” Theo said.

Then he was walking towards the dorms. At the last second, before he reached for the door to the lobby, he turned to me.