“Here’s the truth. I want someone. I do. I want someone to turn to when my arms are bleeding on the floor and I’m too depressed to get up and bandage it. I want someone who will talk to me when no one else does. Someone who knows that when I declare I want them gone from my life I don’t mean it, that as soon as they try to leave I’ll plead with them to stay. Please forgive me, I’ll say. Don’t leave me here, I’m begging you.”

He sighs.

“My mom took me to a psychiatrist when she found out I was cutting. They diagnosed me with borderline personality disorder and threw pills at me. And they helped--for a few days. A week maybe. Then I went right back to the way I’d been. Yelling, threatening my mom with a knife. Slashing my arms and thighs with a razor blade. I liked to see the blood well up. It eased my anger.

“They gave me more drugs, stronger ones. I hid them under my tongue and spit them out, crushed them and flushed them down the toilet. I wouldn’t let those stupid, un-empathetic doctors take over my life like they did everyone else. Slap a label on you, drown you in drugs until you’re nothing but a sedated old man who can’t even remember his own name. It’s like that’s their only solution to anything. Force pills down your throat till you’re addicted to the shit.

“Want to know one symptom of borderline personality? No sense of self. No sense of identity. I’m a fucking shell of a person. I’m no one. Do I care if you live or die? Why do I hurt everyone? Why am I slicing my arms with little blades? Why am I so afraid you’ll leave when I’m not even sure I want you here? Why am I devastated that you’re suffering? Do I want to die for you? Does your pain erase me? Can I fix it? Why am I screaming ‘I hate you’? Why am I shoving you away when I wanted you here? Why do you not see what I see?”

His eyes are wide, angry, afraid. There are tears at the corners. 

Benjamin DeBattista, my bully since the fifth grade, just revealed the inner workings of his mind to me.

Oh God, what is this, some parallel universe?

“I would say I understand,” I say quietly, my heart pounding, “but then I’d be lying. Because I don’t know what it’s like. We lived our whole lives apart from one another. Different parents, different friends, different experiences...we detested each other. But we didn’t know beyond each other’s appearance. Because, good Lord, if I’d known what you’d gone through...”

His fists are clenched at his sides. I lift his left hand, uncurl the fingers to see the little pink crescents in his palms. I press it to my cheek. It’s so big it cups my face like I’m a child. I reach out, up, and do the same with my left hand on his face.

Ben sees my face in his hand. He feels my fingers on his cheek. He looks into my eyes, searching for the joke, the lie, c'mon, the prank is up, where's the hidden camera?

And, inexplicably, Benjamin DeBattista, the emotionless, brooding, quiet kid, starts to cry.