Still Mad as Hell

Note: This little tale is here for a reason: there's no sex or romance. There is lots of dramatic conflict played out in cyberspace.

*****

Through the wonder of Facebook do the names come roaring back. Nanette Swartz. Danny Hopewell. Larry Blackstock. Richard Tabb. Jerald Nyborg. Mary-Jo Matlack. Pam Klein. Shelly Cobb. Marc Schindler.

Fran Eisenberg, now Fran Streitman, always had a good memory—people on the upside of the Bell Curve usually do—and so she can name many of those kids that were in her ninth grade class at Hill Top Park Junior High. Unlike in subsequent Hill Top Park yearbooks, the '87 edition fails to list the students' names beneath their headshot photo.

Murray Goldman, also a former classmate who posted the yearbook on Facebook is impressed. "You have an incredible memory," he writes. "Looks like aging hasn't killed too many of your brain cells. lol"

"Hey, I'm only forty-four," she responds. "Check back with me in twenty years." Fran then wonders if in two decades hence she'll have enough brain cells to maintain her career as an attorney in private practice.

She also wonders if another two decades is enough to shake what she still harbors— bittersweet memories of early adolescence, more bitter than sweet in her case. She was short and plump and freckle-faced, with hair best described as a work in progress. Little wonder that a group of cruel kids targeted her for ridicule. That didn't stop her from being involved in extracurricular activities. She edited the school newspaper and sat on the student council. As for her tormentors, she met their verbal bullying with a wan smile and steely silence; that is, when she didn't duck into the girls bathroom to cry. She never let those bullies see her cry.

She trades memories with Murray and others on the Hill Top Facebook site, mostly good memories, many of them funny. Not once does Murray, who on occasion joined in on the bullying, mention what she remembers all too well.

She didn't repress that difficult time in her life—and the bitterness that went with it—though she had managed to place it in hibernation. There's her law career, the great guy she married, the two kids now in high school. She should no longer be bitter. Therefore she's surprised, if not somewhat ashamed, to feel traces of it bubble to the surface as she trades posts with her former classmates. Up to this point, the posts have been kind and gentle, devoid of past grudges. Time tends to soften bitter memories, dulls the blades of hatchets that people wielded years before. But, not always. Dormant volcanoes can always erupt, especially when there's social media to re-sharpen said hatchets while giving one the opportunity to strike back in the relatively safe confines of cyberspace.

Shelly Cobb, now Shelly Gilmore, joins in the discussions. Fran envied Shelly back then, a blond Venus never wanting for male attention. Clicking on Shelly's personal Facebook page, Fran isn't surprised to see that she's still got it. A recent pic shows a still slim, still pretty and smiling Shelly, now living in Florida, posing in a black one-piece by her pool, her blond hair set as if she just came from her beauty stylist. Shelly wasn't one of Fran's regular tormentors, though Fran can't forget Shelly's one big put-down. Fran had made the mistake of confiding to Shelly about a boy she had a crush on, then got this in reply: "Forget about him. You're way out of his league."

Bernie Saiontz was his name, another classmate of hers. He's not on Facebook, so Fran asks Shelly if she's heard from him. "Not since we graduated," Shelly writes back. "Cute guy, always had a crush on him."

"Me too," Fran writes. "Remember when I told you that?"

"Maybe. I mean, all the girls liked him."

"You said I was out of his league." Fran shakes her head, then runs her hands across the keyboard of her Dell desktop. Should she have posted that? Almost a minute passes with no reply from Shelly.

Then: "I said that?"

"You did."

"Oh my, how crass. Will you accept a belated apology?"

"Of course. Only...you ruined my day with that comment. You really did, Shelly."

"Sorry."

"Get over it, Fran." The post is from Nanette Swartz, a girl she hated and knew the feeling was mutual. To Fran, it sounds like the same old Nanette, always the instigator.

Fran writes, "Hi Nan. You're still sticking your nose into other people's business, I see."

"And you still have a rather large nose, I see. With a face like yours and hair that still looks like you've been in a hurricane, you should either doctor your Facebook profile pic or leave the screen blank."

Fran's old insecurities tumble out like dirty laundry from a capsized hamper. Her rational side tells her to go somewhere else or shut off her computer. But she can't, not with all that once repressed anger that now emerges like a giant monster from the sea, roaring and breathing fire. In her case, spitting invective. She decides to press some buttons of her own. "Tell me, Nan, are you still having problems in math and English? You flunked both if I recall and then spent a summer in summer school for makeup."

"Come on, Fran," Murray writes, "play nice."

"Nice is hardly a word that describes how you treated me, Murray." Steaming now, Fran continues to pound her keyboard. "Recall that day in English class when your less than flattering verbal salvos forced Mrs. Wilner to stop her lecture to admonish you and your minions, your co-conspirators in the Lets Bully Fran Eisenberg Club."

"You're memory is better than mine, Fran. Are U sure U didn't dream this?"

"I only wish I had dreamed it. No, it happened, all right. We were discussing the book

"Ivanhoe." Would I make that up?"

"Ivanhoe. I hated that book," Nanette writes. "Bor-ing. Of course, I'm sure Miss Self Righteous here would have a different take. She was always smarter than the rest of us."

Fran smiles with smug satisfaction. "No, just smarter than some people. The only summer courses I took were in law school. They were voluntary, I might add."

"Jesus, Fran, you sound like your typical internet troll begging for attention," Murray posts. "Nan's right. Get over it."

Nanette follows. "She's having too much fun giving us hell. Isn't that right, Fran?"

"I think you mean cathartic, Nan," Fran fires back. "Or do you not know what cathartic means."

Fran grits her teeth. What she's doing might be cathartic but it also makes her sound like a bitch, something she never was. Maybe if she had fought back all those years ago, she wouldn't feel compelled to go on the attack now.

"Fran, I've been sitting here watching this disturbing exchange," Pam Klein, the group's moderator posts, "and it seems to me that you might be better off, we all might be better off, if you signed out and left our group."

Fran remembers Pam. Nice girl. Petite and cute. Good student, too. Far from being one of her tormentors, she had in fact came to Fran's defense in a few of those ugly incidents. She wishes they could have all been so nice. "Hey Pam, how goes it?"

"Doing well, thanks, but you don't seem so well. Really, Fran, it's been thirty years."

Fran knew she was right. Still, thirty years or not, the feelings she had then remain raw and vivid. She writes, "Bullying didn't get the national attention it gets now. Today, that attention almost forces school administrators to do something about it. Unfortunately, in our day, they did nothing, save for people like Mrs. Wilner who at least spoke up. It was open season on people like me."

Murray posts, "She's mad as hell and she's not going to take it anymore! lol. Sorry, I couldn't resist."

That got a bunch of "likes."

"I wouldn't take it today, that's for sure," Fran writes. "I'd kick you where it hurts."

"So now she's a ball buster," Murray quips.

"All right everybody," Pam writes, "let's settle down and stop acting like we did when we were fourteen. Fran, if you can back off, if you can rid yourself of your latent hostility, you're welcome to stay in the group. Think you can do that?"

"It's not so latent, Pam."

"Whatever, Fran, just do it, okay? If not, I'll have no choice but to ban you from the group. Please don't make me do that. We were friends, remember."

"Yes, you defended me. I'll never forget that." Fran's mind flickers with flashbacks, the times when Pam intervened on Fran's behalf. Resting her fingers on the keyboard, she starts to tear up. She felt ostracized back then and she feels ostracized now. She can't "play nice," not with people like Nan and Murray and a few others that she can bet will throw in their insulting two cents. This site is toxic to her, too many bad memories she can't just toss under the bridge. Past, it appears, is prologue when it comes to contact with some of her old classmates.

Pam's an exception. She was good people. Still is, it sounds like, so why make her play the heavy? Her fingers start to dance on the keys. "You won't have to do that, Pam. I'm leaving the group voluntarily. Have fun trading your stories." With that, she clicks off. Murray's right about one thing: she's still mad as hell.