Jessie's husband divorced her a little over a year ago. Today she lost her sons in court. She was understandably upset. And as all women do, they rallied around her and told her things that were meant in the best possible way but fell very short of being comforting. Jessie was saying that she wanted to leave. She was going to move to Colorado, that her uncle lived there and she and her sons had gone there this past Christmas on vacation. She said that he had extra room. The only reason that she didn’t want to go was the kids. She repeated that a number of times. But that wasn't really a good reason. She had no custody rights at all. She did it this to herself really. She had Child Protection Services called on her three times within the last four weeks leading up to today. She had to leave work early one day to go clean her home before they came out to visit. But she kept talking about Colorado.

"I have to move to Colorado. I just have to. I'm gonna just start over again," she said and it made me think of you.

I hadn't thought of you for quite some time Mother Fucker. You did things to a ten-year-old boy that no sixteen-year-old boy should ever do. All the kids knew what had happened to me. Casey was your brother and the same age as me. I had no idea then that you had done the same things to him. But when Casey found out, he told everyone that I had gotten his brother arrested. Being that you were sixteen you were sent away to a juvenile detention center. But to Casey that was arrested. He was also the one that started the name calling.

At first, he just called me "cock sucker". Then the names got worse. Of course, Casey was no different than me. I was his only outlet for his anger but I didn’t know that. He told all the kids and then all the kids started using those names and coming up with new ones. Then one night a brick came through the front window. It had one of the current names that I was being called written on it. My mother cried the whole time the police were at our home filling out their reports. She couldn't even look at me. I sat on the floor beside one of the side tables feeling responsible for something that I wasn't responsible for.

It was then that the school told my parents that it might be good for me to transfer schools. They said a change would be beneficial for me. And maybe then the name calling and teasing and the vandalism on our lives would stop. My parents took the advice one step further. They decided moving schools would not be enough. They decided that we had to move away. The kids in the neighborhood still knew. The school that was suggested would feed into the same middle and high schools. They thought that I would never get away those kids and those names. They thought that it was the best choice for all of us. So we moved away.

My grandmother lived in Phoenix. We moved out there planning on getting our own place once my parents found jobs. I didn't go to any school right away. My parents figured that I would repeat the fourth grade and get a fresh start once the new year began. And besides, the current school year had only four weeks remaining. So I stayed home all day with grandma and watched the soap operas with her.

I started with a new counselor around that time. His name was Tim. He wore polo shirts and jeans. He wanted me to be his friend, he even told me so. He wanted to talk about things that had happened, how I felt about them. That was when I gave you the name Mother Fucker.

Tim didn’t approve of me calling you Mother Fucker but I didn’t care. He called you by your Christian name. I only called you by your real name, Mother Fucker. But the really strange thing was that we didn’t only talk about you. We talked about baseball and cartoons. We talked about my grandfather's death the year before and what that meant to me.

My grandfather had polio 30 years before his death and a couple of strokes when I was little. I cannot remember him being able to walk or talk. But I hear great things about him. He owned his own furniture store. He would take things like new carpeting and lay it in people's homes even if they couldn’t afford it. He would tell them to pay it when they could. He lost a lot of money doing things like that, but he gained many friends. But I never got a chance to hear those stories from him.

We also talked about my parents too. Tim would take a different pen out when he started asking me questions about my parents. I would tell him about my relationship with them. I was angry at them for giving you the opportunity to do what you did. They worked too many hours and did not show me enough attention. My dad rarely played catch with me. He would come home after it was dark outside or would tell me that he was too tired to play. My mom blamed me for everything that had ever happened to her.

Then one day during our session Tim asked me the question, "What would you say to [Christian Name] right now if you had the chance?" And I thought about that for awhile and I wouldn't have said a thing to you. I had nothing to say to you. You did those things to me without thinking of what that would do to me. What on earth could make you, Mother Fucker, want to listen to anything that I could have to said to you? And then that thought made me realize that I was wasting my time. I decided that I was tired of Tim and his questions after that. So I decided not to talk with him anymore.

Tim would ask me questions and I would think to myself, "Just don’t answer. Don't say a thing." I would repeat that over and over in my mind. You see, I do blame my parents for giving you the opportunity but you, Mother Fucker, never should have done what you did. You cannot imagine what you did to that ten-year-old boy. I wished for you to be dead for quite some time. Now, I really hope that you are alive and suffering. I hope you live the most horrible and long life that anyone could endure.

A few months went by at grandma's home and nobody had a job. We had outstayed our welcome and grandma reminded my dad at every chance she got. It wasn't that my parents were not trying to find work but there just wasn't anything out there. So then my dad contacted his old employer back home and found out he could get his old job back. I was so excited. I really wanted to go home. But my dad, he did not want me back home. He remembered what the other kids had said and done. But most of all, he did want my mother home. He was not interested in his life that he led anymore. He decided that my mother and I would stay in Phoenix and he would move back home. He would send us money to support us. Grandma told mom that he would never be back. I asked her why she would say something like that. She told me to remember it and I could never forget it. My dad never did come back. The money he sent only last about six months. My mom tried to work as a waitress, a maid, and a cashier. Nothing ever worked out for her. And that was always my fault of course. She would cry all the time and yell at me.

When I went to school that first year, I knew that no one knew anything. None of them knew what had been done to me or what names I had been called. I knew all of it though. I tried telling myself that I could be normal there.. But the thing is, moving didn’t change a thing for me. You had taken something from me Mother Fucker, that I never have and will never get back. My mother would tell me, "All you need is to find one good friend and everything will be alright. Just one friend and you will be fine. That will fix everything." The thing was, I never wanted a friend. You tell a thing a to friend and that friend tells a friend of theirs that thing and then the name-calling would start all over again. I couldn't allow that. How could I trust anyone about anything? So I didn’t talk to anyone about anything and I would remind myself all the time, "Don't say a thing."

I tried to kill myself when I was thirteen, after my parents divorce. My mother had slapped me in the face that night. She told me that I was no good and that all of her issues were my fault. So I said the word that was written on the brick that came through the front window and that was her fault for letting that happen to me. That was when she slapped me. If grandma had found me thirty minutes later I wouldn’t be here. Do you know how many thirteen year olds try to commit suicide? I bet you don’t Mother Fucker. I can’t imagine that you would. I can't imagine that you care at all. But don't try to kill yourself Mother Fucker. Don't you dare try it. You live and I hope your life is as miserable as mine.

Then Jessie came over to my desk and told me her sob story personally today. She asked me if I thought moving to Colorado would be good for her. She told me all the good things that would happen if she moved away. She already knew that she was going to move and I knew that it would never replace what she had lost today. I looked her straight in the eye and I did not say a thing. I know that she didn’t understand why I did not respond. And I know that she wanted an answer. But I was thinking of you, Mother Fucker, and I wasn't going to say a thing.