Hollywood City Lights

By Melvin Yoshio Tanouye

Jonathon Tanner, only fifteen, is so desperate he decides to run away and boards a bus in Phoenix, Arizona bound for Hollywood, California, in search of his father. Hes running to escape the violence and abuse in his mother, Cheryls home. But the outside world isnt any safer than his home. Hes targeted by a sexual predator on the bus. He narrowly escapes, only to become the victim of bullying thugs who take his wallet with his fathers Hollywood address and telephone number inside.
Now alone and broke, he accepts a ride to Hollywood from Marvin, an older man who wants to help him. He lies to Marvin about where hes going and tells him to let him out by Graumans Chinese Theater. Now alone on the streets of a strange city, Jonathon hooks up with the raw underbelly of Hollywood street life when he meets another runaway, Brandy, and her crowd.
You, the reader will ache for these youngsters who are trying to survive by any means they can.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jan 6, 2014
• ISBN: 9781493106158

Melvin Yoshio Tanouye

Melvin Yoshio Tanouye was born on April 13, 1958 in Japan. At the age of three, he moved to Hawaii with his family, where he lived until relocating to California. While living in California he decided to join the Army and was sent to Afghanistan to serve the country during Desert Storm. Following discharge from the Army he returned to school to become a teacher. Teaching became his passion. “If I can make a difference in one student’s life I feel I have done a good job.” This book is the realization of Mel’s dream to write a book. Initially Mel was only able to work on the book part–time while teaching full-time. In 2005 Mel’s life changed dramatically when he was diagnosed with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease. When the disease forced him to an early retirement, he saw this change as the opportunity to work on his book full-time. Because of the disease progression, Mel accomplished his goal, finishing the book by using a special computer with eye tracking capability used for writing and communication. He completed HOLLYWOOD CITY LIGHTS on October 20, 2009.

Book preview

Chapter 1

Nov., Sat., Around 5 PM, The Bus Ride

Earlier that Saturday, the boy had boarded the bus in Phoenix, Arizona alone with only a change of clothes stuffed in his backpack. Surprisingly, there were few passengers on his bus, and most of them sat up front close to the driver. Who could blame them since the odors drifting from the latrine were stronger at the rear of the bus? The boy, however, decided it was best for him to sit as far away from the other passengers as possible. Feeling a little paranoid, he did not want to risk anyone suspecting that he had run away from home, fearing that adults would go out of their way to turn him over to the police. After all, he knew he had done wrong by running away, and he naively believed that strangers would take time from their own busy lives to try to stop him. If that happened, the prospect of success in a second attempt to live with his father would be even more difficult if not impossible.

The fact of the matter was that he ran away from his mother in Phoenix, Arizona, to live with his father in Hollywood, California. However, his father did not know it at the time. The boy planned on telling his father when he arrived in Los Angeles. That way, the boy figured, he had a better chance of persuading his father to take him in if he was already in California instead of trying to talk him into it from Arizona.

Back at the bus terminal, purchasing a bus ticket had turned out to be easier than he’d thought. He remembered how his mother purchased his ticket through the kiosk last year when his mother allowed him to visit his father for a week during the summer. Little did he know at the time that the experience would prove useful? He knew approximately how much he needed to buy a one-way ticket from Phoenix to Hollywood. The kiosk allowed him to avoid face-to-face contact with an adult when purchasing his ticket.

Fortunately, he had enough money, most of it saved and the rest stolen from his mother. He even had twelve dollars and fifty-eight cents left over to buy some food and drink when needed. And to his relief, very few people paid any attention to him and none of the employees questioned him about his business at the terminal.

Even boarding the bus turned out easier than the boy anticipated. On the bus, the driver appeared old and cranky. He did not seem to be having a good day, and it showed. He only looked at the boarding tickets as they were handed to him instead of meeting the gazes of his boarding passengers. This act was against company policy. However, it worked out well for the boy.

Finding a suitable seat, on the other hand, proved a little more complicated. If he sat too close to the other passengers, the boy feared he would be more noticeable to them. Any one of them could become suspicious about him being too young to travel alone and turn him in to the authorities. Besides, he was not in the mood to be around strangers, especially on an old, smelly bus.

He felt relieved to have found the perfect seat towards the rear of the bus close to an elderly couple. Sitting back there within a few seats from the couple would make him seem less of a loner or person of interest for anyone who happened to notice him. The couple, having a quiet conversation, paused to look up only as long as it took the boy to make his way past them before they resumed their conversation. Two rows behind the couple, he sat next to the window and placed his backpack on the seat next to him to discourage other passengers from sitting there.

From where he sat, he watched for any of the other passengers who might get out of his or her seat to approach him and challenge his presence on a cross country bus. When he became convinced that no one would bother him, he felt safe enough to take a nap. He hadn’t slept well the night before with the thought that he would run away from home in the morning. The boy pulled the hood from the grey sweat shirt he used as a jacket over his head to try to take a little nap. This way, he figured, people would not be able to see his face very well, and newly boarding passengers on their stops to L.A. and passengers passing him to go to the latrine would not be able to see him well enough.

Much later, the elderly couple disembarked the bus at the last stop, Pomona, California, before the bus started heading towards Los Angeles. The boy decided to stay where he was despite the fact that the remaining passengers were seated up front by the driver. The bus trip so far had been uneventful, so he felt secure enough to sit alone the rest of the way to Los Angeles. The only time he had some concern with the attention of the other passengers was when they passed him on their trips to and from the latrine. However, slumping against the window with his hood covering most of his head deterred passengers from giving him more than passing glances on their way to and from the latrine.

In fact, the few passengers, making the trip to the latrine, would have vaguely recalled that there was a person seated by the latrine alone. They would not have recalled if the person had been a male or female, adult or child because of the person’s hood and the manner in which the person was slumped against the window.

At the Pomona terminal, only one person boarded: a stockily built, five-foot five, thirty-five-year-old white male wearing dark glasses. He had a clean shaven face, receding wavy black hair cut short and parted on the left side, and a brownish button down shirt tucked into khaki pants. His presence would not have been noticed or remembered for long if the man had not worn a pair of very dark sunglasses at dusk, which made it very difficult to see his eyes. The man needed the dark glasses to observe people around him without their knowledge. Enemies and prey had to be identified and kept in view inconspicuously.

The man feared people’s attentions because that could mean a sign of recognition of what he had become, which was something even he could not fully understand. Nevertheless, it drove him, like an addiction, to be on a lookout for his next victim. The success of making contact with his prey, he felt, depended, in part, on his ability to move among people without being noticed. But, he was so used to wearing the glasses that he unwittingly wore them even during the night, so he attracted everyone’s attention.

Stepping into the front aisle of the bus and facing the other passengers, the man’s heart skipped a beat when he saw everyone’s eyes were on him. Too much attention so suddenly triggered a reactionary fear that made him think the passengers knew who he was. His mind froze, his body went rigid, tiny droplets of perspirations formed on his forehead. The man braced himself for a passenger to point an accusing finger at him and yell out, pervert!

A few days ago, for the fourteenth time in his life, someone did just that at the park close to where he had been staying with a gay couple, Peter and Matt. Hardly friends since they met in a gay bar while the man was passing through, they were more acquaintances with similar horror stories of growing up gay in small towns. Peter and Matt were always willing to help out other gays whenever they could. So, they offered the man a temporary place to stay. However, when they discovered that their guest had been preying on little boys in the park across the street from their townhouse, they kicked him out, which led the man back on the road again. Gay child molesters, the couple felt, were no different from straight men who molested little girls: deranged criminals. And, they gave weak minded heterosexuals another reason to unjustly condemn all gays.

Back on the bus, when nothing happened immediately, the man forced himself to relax enough to allow his rational thoughts to prevail. How could anyone know what I had done here? Everyone must have come from out of town, he thought, because I’m the only boarding passenger. No one outside of Pomona could have found out about me this early.

Then he became aware that he did not step into a busload of people looking at him, but only a few. They were sitting so close together up front that they gave him the initial impression that there were a lot more people on the bus staring at him. His fears had played this trick on him before. In his younger years, anything that caused fear in him caused him to run away before his brain could overcome the initial shock and properly analyze the situation. Then as he had gotten older, heavier, and wiser, he became more proficient at suppressing his panic and flight tendencies to assess the unexpected situations better.

These people, he thought, can’t know who I am. They’re only looking at me because I’m the new passenger coming on board. If I don’t panic, I’ll be able to ride this bus without any trouble.

As he started noticing that the passengers were turning their attentions away from him, he regained enough of his composure to make his way down the aisle. As he walked, his old habit of searching people’s expressions for danger signs returned. His dark glasses allowed him to do that surreptitiously as he walked by them. Keeping his face in the forward position and moving only his eyes from left to right also helped. For his own piece of mind, he had to be able to identify the ones he could ignore and those he had to watch.

The passengers, on the other hand, were not very impressed. Despite his preference for wearing dark glasses during inappropriate times, he appeared quite ordinary. It was strange, however, that for a moment he appeared to be terrified. If they could have seen his searching eyes through his dark glasses, they would not have readily dismissed him from their thoughts.

As the man cautiously made his way past the passengers up front, he caught sight of a lone person sitting by the latrine. That’s strange, the man thought, why is that person sitting so far away from everyone? Since people sitting behind him would make him feel uncomfortable, he decided to sit at least across the aisle from the person. That way, he could be sure that no one could scrutinize him without his knowledge.

As the man moved closer, it became increasingly clear to him that the sleeping person was a young male and not a female or an old man. His heart raced with anticipation. He stopped in front of the sleeping person only for a few seconds. To his surprise, he discovered that not only was the sleeping person a young White male, but he seemed to be attractive and alone.

Hot doggy, the man thought in jubilee. Of all the places he figured he would least find an attractive male teenager, it would be on the interstate bus. From his angle of view, the man was able to observe that the teen had a clear complexion, fine facial features and a slim physique. From the strands of hair sticking out from the hood, he accurately guessed that the boy’s hair was light brown, straight, and shoulder length.

Hmmm, the man mused, a pretty boy sitting way back here away from the others. A momentary feeling of anticipation swept over him. Can he be waiting for me? Then his caution resurfaced with the thought, I hope this isn’t too good to be true.

Ultimately, his sexual desires overpowered his caution as it had so many times before. It was like an impulse he could not control. For a few seconds, he stood in the aisle in front of the sleeping boy gawking at him. The man noted that the boy was dressed in worn jeans with a few holes fashionably placed at the knees, and a black tee shirt, exhibiting a sport logo under an unzipped, hooded sweat top. In the seat next to the boy was a nylon, black backpack, commonly carried by students.

Catching himself staring at the sleeping boy like a fool for probably too long, the man jerked his gaze upwards towards the front of the bus, scanning for watchful eyes. He momentarily panicked when he thought he had made a spectacle of himself. This had caused suspicions and unwanted attentions in the past, and several times during his youth, it caused strangers in public to form mobs in trying to catch him and, probably, to punish him for being a pedophile. He did not want that happening here on the bus. If the other passengers and the bus driver became suspicious, they would keep him under close watch, which would make it difficult, if not impossible, for him to make contact with the boy.

Thank God, nobody is paying attention, the man thought with relief. Then the man took a precautionary measure and proceeded towards the latrine. He needed some privacy to gather his wits.

As he swung the door wide open to enter the closet-size latrine, the full force of the chemical sanitizer solution assaulted his nostrils, almost causing him to gag. The shock to his senses would have been enough to knock the thought of sex out of the heads of faint-hearted pedophiles, but not with him. He had moved on from fantasizing about having sex with boys to prowling for victims.

His initial sexual experience with a younger boy from his old neighborhood was so euphoric and gratifying that he had sought out male boys to relive that experience. The male subjects had to be young and attractive. So powerful had his obsession become that it consistently overpowered his moral senses.

Why was the boy by himself and where were his parents had been some of the rhetorical questions that raced through his mind. While relieving himself, his self-questioning turned towards speculations. The boy is sitting by himself; so, he must be traveling alone. He probably wants company. I could keep him company. We can become good friends, he concluded with a joyful glee.

Before preparing to zip his pants, he noticed that his penis was becoming erect and smiled. The boy is definitely worth getting to know, the man concluded. He debated whether he should remove the boy’s backpack and sit right next to him; then decided to sit across the aisle, which would be close enough for him to make a connection with the boy and far enough to prevent any curious passengers from suspecting something sinister was going on back there. As the man washed his hands and checked his appearance, his mind automatically started the process of convincing himself that the boy needed him to bring a ray of sunshine into the boy’s dull and gloomy life. Once convinced of his righteousness, he could pursue his lust without being hindered by the immorality of his deed. These ignorant people wouldn’t understand about how loving and caring I can be to this boy. This boy needs me.

After slipping out of the latrine quietly, the man, with an invigorated sense of confidence, slid himself into the seat across the aisle from the boy. The fact that the boy appeared attractive and alone helped to convince him that they were destined to be together. The seating arrangement turned out to be perfect, another reinforcing sign that their meeting was meant to be. He could not figure out why the boy sat so far away from the other passengers; but for the moment, he did not really care as long as it made it easier for him to seduce the boy without interference.

The boy must have known that I would be on the bus, the man fantasized. He waited for me back here, the dear boy. He must have waited for such a long time for my arrival that he fell asleep.

Immersing himself in this sexual fantasy aroused him to a point where he became less and less inhibited. Slowly, the man went from rubbing his crotch through his pants to unbuttoning the top button of his pants and unzipping it to masturbate within his clothing. He kept his loose jacket close by to cover up in case any of the other passengers came back towards the back of the bus to use the latrine.

Pssssssssss. Hey! Hey kid! Look over here! The man whispered with an urgent zeal. His perversion allowed him to believe that masturbating in front of the boy was an inviting gesture.

The boy stirred. Slowly the man’s insistence brought the boy out of a dreamy sleep. The boy, dreaming of being among laughing friends in an open meadow, soon realized that someone from beyond the meadow in the woods was calling to him in words he could not understand. As this confused the boy, the images of his friends, meadow, and the perfect sunny day began to fade away. He questioned how this could be happening right before he reluctantly snapped into the cold, crude realization that he had been dreaming. Then despair set in.

Whaaaa, uhm, the kid murmured as he struggled to keep his eyes closed in hopes of going back to his dream world where he had been truly happy.

Unfortunately, the man’s urgings were too persistent for the boy to ignore. The question of who ruined his dream formed in his mind and had kick started his rational thought process. At that point, he forgot his dream and kept wondering who was calling him as he stirred for a moment before opening his eyes.

Seeing the boy gaining consciousness, the man asked, What’s your name?

The boy, not fully coherent, reflexively answered in a groggy voice, Jonathan as he struggled to focus on the man’s smiling face. A fraction of a second later, he questioned himself, do I know him? Not even the slightest recognition came to him. Jonathan could not help wondering how strange the man looked wearing dark glasses when it was dark.

Hey Jonathan, look over here. I have something to show you, something really nice.

The man sounded strange, as if he was cooing. The boy was not afraid. This is weird, Jonathan thought. This man is wearing dark glasses in the dark, and why is he smiling?

The boy’s mind, clouded with sleep, could not think straight. Jonathan continued to look at the man wondering who he was and what he wanted? Then Jonathan noticed that the man’s left arm was holding on to the backrest of the empty seat in front of him and his right arm was positioned in a manner like he was holding something in his lap.

The boy’s relaxed manner became encouraging for the pedophile. Why don’t you come over here next to me, kid? I won’t bite, the man purred.

Jonathan thought, that’s a weird way for a man to speak. Incited by the strangeness of the man’s manner of speaking, the boy put more efforts in forcing the grogginess from his head and to understand what the man was saying. Then focusing his sleepy eyes on what the man was doing with his right hand, the boy’s eyes widened in repulsive disbelief.

He’s jacking off. The fucking man is jacking off, the boy thought in disbelief. The boy then jerked upright on his seat, tensed, wide eyes staring in horror and disgust. Shit, he managed to say. This isn’t right; his rational mind started telling him, this can’t be happening to me.

The boy’s reaction caught the man off guard. He stopped smiling and frowned. Then he stopped masturbating and asked himself, why is this boy acting this way? This boy shouldn’t be looking scared! I’m not angry at him or hurting him. I’m trying to be his friend.

Petrified by the man’s lewdness, the boy could not help but stare in wide-eyed terror. On the brink of panicking, a series of thoughts ran through Jonathan’s mind. This man is a pervert and, probably dangerous. Why is he after me? Why was he allowed on the bus? Shit, he’s close enough to grab me! Shit! How can this be happening to me?!

Strangely, all his mother’s warnings of child molesters abducting children and doing sick, weird sexual things to them, and sometimes even killing them after they finished with their victims came rushing back to him. Naturally back then, he paid little heed to the warnings because neither he nor anyone he knew had ever been in a situation where they could have been molested. Now he wished he had listened to his mother and had taken some precautions. Jonathan tormented himself by thinking about all the things he could have done to prevent this from happening, but what he failed to realize was that the warning became significant only from hindsight. As a boy growing up without any serious injuries in his life, Jonathan grew up naïve and a little reckless.

Refusing to admit that the boy appeared terrified of him, the man convinced himself that the boy must have had a nightmare and was trying to reconcile it. Thus, the pedophile persisted in a singsong manner, Don’t be afraid, Jonathan. I won’t hurt you. I just want to be your friend. Come over here and sit by me.

Finally, the boy’s mind started focusing on assessing his situation and finding a way out of it. Uhnnnnnn, I can’t, the boy whispered through a mouth that had gone dry. At the moment, he could not yell even if he wanted to.

Should I move away from him? the boy thought frantically. To do so, his mind contended, he would have to move first into the aisle, and that meant getting within arm’s reach of that man. What if he grabs me? Maybe if I just sit here, he’ll get tired of bothering me and leave me alone. Please God make him leave me alone. As dire as the situation had become, Jonathan had been more afraid of drawing attention to himself by calling for help. That would make him appear weak and helpless like a sissy and that was unacceptable, his father and peers had taught him.

Come on little fellow, I won’t bite, the man, with a winning smile, motioned again for the kid to come over to him.

Why wasn’t anyone else noticing this man the boy thought. Surely the strange behavior of this man would attract the attention of the other passengers up front. To his dismay, the boy noticed that the people up front were not paying attention to him in the rear of the bus. He had isolated himself, and Jonathan regretted it.

Jonathan’s natural response would have been to avoid eye contact by looking down at the floor and ignoring the man until the man got off the bus or until the man moved to another seat further away. So, the boy felt very uncomfortable while he sat there quietly, eyes averted as the man continued to coax him to come over to sit next to him.

The man took offense at being ignored. It made him feel that he was being disrespected by a mere child. And he hated that. From an inviting stance, he started moving towards the boy commanding, Come here Jonathan before I get mad at you.

Finally, it became apparent to Jonathan that the man was not going away. In fact, he started to fear that the man would eventually become bold enough to come over and sit right next to him. Then he would really be trapped, and there’s no telling what other obscene things the man would display or even do to him, sitting so close.

He needed to do something before it was too late. Jonathan looked up the rows of seats toward the bus driver hoping to find a way out of his dilemma. The passengers—three middle-aged men, a young male adult with his grandmother, a younger woman with her infant—were minding their own businesses either by napping or gazing out the window. His heart became heavy with disappointment. No one he could count on for help.

The man, noticing that the other passengers were not paying any attention to them, felt bolder and contemplated moving next to the boy. He did not like to be ignored. If he sat next to the boy, he could not be ignored. And, the man felt that he would have a better chance in making friends with the boy.

Maybe, Jonathan thought I can move up front and sit there; at least I will be further away from this pervert and safer sitting closer to where everyone else is.

Even though the bus driver appeared old and frail, Jonathan hoped the driver had a gun or some sort of weapon to scare this man with, or the driver might be able to radio for help. Any little help that he could get at that point would be better than nothing. But first, Jonathan dreaded, he had to move within inches of the pervert to get by him.

I got to go, the boy said awkwardly after finally summoning enough nerve to act on his resolve. As he stood and eased his way out of his seat into the aisle, the boy kept a distrustful eye on the man while the man eyed the boy’s movement. Almost completely in the aisle, body tense with fear, the boy started up the aisle when the man suddenly reacted.

Hey, don’t go, the man reached out and held the boy’s arm briefly.

LET GO! the boy screamed immediately, overreacting to the man’s touch. He could not help himself. The man was creepy, and he made the boy’s skin crawl when he touched him.

That asshole touched me, tried to grab me, the boy thought with alarm and felt disgusted with himself. His outcry drew the attention of people sitting up front.

The yelp took the man by surprise. He had not expected the boy would yell like that. Now the other people’s attentions were on him. For an instant, he almost reacted by bolting as he had done so many other times before when he was younger, but he caught himself with the realization that he had nowhere to run.

Damn that kid, he thought, for scaring me like that. The man had been scared a couple times before in his teens. Once, he was almost caught when the boy he was exposing himself to unexpectedly screamed like a girl. Stop that screaming you sissy, he sneered at the boy. Just when he was about to grab the boy to force him to stop screaming, two teenage boys yelled out, What’s going on! Then like a fool, he bolted towards the woods with the two teenage boys and some others chasing him like an animal. The man’s younger age, leaner body, and a good head start helped him to escape, without anyone getting a good look at him. But, it was a close call that had haunted him since.

Between clenched teeth, the man spat in a whisper, Okay, okay boy, you don’t have to shout, and gave the boy’s arm a squeeze which made the boy flinch before he let go. Don’t forget, I’ll be right here keeping an eye on you, he warned. Don’t say anything to anyone or else!

The malevolence on the face of the man was enough to shut Jonathan up. Once the man released his arm, Jonathan quickly made his way up front to the safety of the crowd amidst their stares and whispers without looking back. It seemed strange to the boy that the people were not doing anything more than staring at him. No one even bothered to get out of his or her seat to investigate what had happened or, at least, to give him comfort and escort him to a safer seat.

The passengers’ indifference made him feel sick and vulnerable. His safety became a real concern. Jonathan became convinced that no one would help him if the man in the back decided to come up front to take him by force to the back recesses of the bus. This became a terrifying thought for a teenager alone on a bus and in a State not his own. When he finally glanced back towards the man, he noticed that the man had not made an effort to follow him to the front.

Maybe if I keep quiet, the boy thought, this nightmare will go away. Unfortunately, although he felt safer among the other passengers, he felt alienated among them.

It did not occur to Jonathan that the people in the front had no idea of what had been going on in the back. In fact, those who did notice the young man and the man sitting close to each other assumed that they were friends. The other passengers, like the bus driver, figured that the young man’s sudden outburst was the climax to an argument between the young man and the man. They did not want the rowdy young man sitting close to them. So, their stares and whispers were not friendly towards Jonathan.

To the boy’s dismay, the driver reprimanded him, Look man, don’t go yelling like that when people are trying to sleep, okaaay?

Ahh didn’t… oh forget it, Jonathan felt that explaining what actually happened would have gone in vain with these people. For the moment, he wanted to be left alone to sort out what had happened.

The boy’s remark only confirmed the driver’s suspicion that the young man was a troublemaker. Another asshole I have to put up with, the driver thought. Twenty-eight days before retirement, the driver assured himself for the eighth time that day.

Stunned by the insensitivities of the driver and passengers towards his plight, Jonathan fell into abrupt silence and an uncomfortable feeling of alienation. What’s the matter with these people, Jonathan thought. That man is a pervert, and he wants to do something nasty to me. Shit if he comes up here and starts to molest me, I’m gonna jump off this friggin’ bus.

Looking back, Jonathan could see the man relaxing his posture and slumping back. Good, he thought, at least, he doesn’t seem interested in making a move on me on this bus.

The man felt smug thinking that he had just dodged another bullet. No one in the front seemed to be paying any more attention to him than he received when he first boarded the bus. It was foolish of him to think of exposing himself to the boy on a bus when there was nowhere to run and hide.

Although Jonathan did not feel too comfortable among the other passengers, he felt better sitting further away from the pervert. For the moment, his seating accommodation was tolerable. In fact, as the minutes passed, fewer people glanced at him. Then he overheard the bus driver telling a passenger that they would be arriving at the LA station in thirty-five minutes.

Jonathan tensed and cursed to himself. SHIT! That’s where I’m going to have to get off.

He took a quick look back towards the man to see if he could figure out what the man might be planning, but he could not read his expression through his dark glasses. He just sat there, dead still, facing the front. Jonathan could not tell whether he was looking at him or asleep. Then he started hoping that the man would not be getting off in LA.

The shit’s going to hit the fan, he exhaled under his breath then took another quick look back.

Chapter 2

Jonathan’s and his Parents’ Beginnings

CHERYL, YOU’RE STILL FAT, Jonathan’s father yelled at his wife.

John, stop yelling at me and leave alone, Cheryl exclaimed. She finally had enough of her husband’s ranting and raging about her failure to reduce her bodyweight to what it had been before she became pregnant with their son, Jonathan. It had become difficult to maintain a calm and rational state of mind while being subjected to her husband’s verbal badgering and abuses. She wanted John to stop.

Momentarily stunned silent by Cheryl’s outburst, John stood immobile. For seven years after his wife gave birth, he nagged her to get back into shape. He wanted to be seen with a sexy wife; not an overweight mother. Much to his dissatisfaction, she did an on-again-off-again diet plan for years with no promising results.

Unwittingly, Cheryl developed a bad habit of snacking as she kept herself busy with the daily household chores and watching her favorite television shows. During dinner she usually ate the least amount of food in the household which made her and John wonder why she was not losing weight. Unfortunately, neither one of them were able to make the correlation. John had not been home often enough to notice his wife’s bad snacking habits, and Cheryl gave little thought to what she snacked on and how often she snacked.

Her inability to lose weight became a frustration that John kept simmering for all those years. John liked to believe that he had been doing her a favor by pushing her to lose weight since her health and self-esteem were at stake. Eventually, he felt he wasn’t getting anywhere with the soft approach, nagging, so he advanced to yelling. After all, it was her health and appearance that suffered from the added body fat. Then she showed her appreciation for his renewed efforts to motivate her into losing weight by yelling back at him.

The ungrateful bitch, John thought. He had grown accustomed to Cheryl’s passive response of being muted or pleading with him to stop raising his voice. Standing up to him had been a response he did not expect nor like.

Unfortunately, little Jonathan had to endure his parents’ unhealthy relationship. Private discussions became loud verbal exchanges in which his father did the ranting and raging while his mother usually pleaded for his father to calm down and stop criticizing her weight. Signs of affection, such as hugs and kisses, between his parents decreased, as well as them showing their affection for him. Jonathan developed unsettled feelings that something terrible and permanent was going to happen to the two most important adults in his young life. Yet he was too young to stop his parents from reaching that point of no return, much less identify the problem.

His father’s criticisms consistently centered on his mother’s weight problem while his mother’s, eventually, centered on his father spending too much time at work and not enough time with his family. Jonathan’s father, John, worked long hours during the regular work week, and he often went to his workplace on the weekend to socialize with the employees instead of spending time with his wife and son.

Although those two issues were brought up repeatedly in their fights, neither parent initiated constructive dialogs on alleviating their issues. The net effect resulted in tension developing between parents and between parents and child.

Seven-year-old Jonathan began wondering if he had been the cause for his parents’ issues. After all, his mother’s excuse for her weight problem had been due to her pregnancy, and Jonathan’s father’s excuse for working long hours was to support a growing family. It was not difficult for Jonathan to make the connection: his mother had been pregnant with him and he had been the only addition to the family unit. Jonathan started feeling uncomfortable around his parents even when they were not arguing with each other. He felt guilty, and he feared that any day soon both parents would know he was at fault for being born. Then they would focus their anger on him for creating their issues. As a result, Jonathan started spending much of his time in his room out of sight where he could, at least, shut out the tensions between his mother and father and hide his guilt.

Unwittingly, Jonathan contributed to the family break up by keeping to himself as much as possible instead of being the affectionate child who could have been the glue that kept his parents bound to him and, thus, to each other. Family time in his household would be when everyone was home doing their own thing. They interacted with one another very little. Their family unit stood on a weak foundation.

Despite his troublesome home environment, Jonathan lived his preadolescent life as best as he could. He went to school, did his homework, and hung out with friends at his apartment complex. His friends became, in effect, his escape from a miserable home, and especially at his friends’ homes where their more stable family relationships provided Jonathan with models for comparison. And the difference depressed him.

Just when he thought his home environment could not get any worse, his parents announced their plans to move to a cheaper accommodation. Jonathan dreaded their decision. Friends, classmates, and thus his support system would be left behind. This made him feel even more apprehensive, but he did not know how to voice his concerns. And even if he did, Jonathan did not feel confident that his parents would listen. So, as he had dealt with previous stressors, he kept quiet and hoped for the best.

Unexpectedly, one good thing did come out of his parents’ decision to move: his parents stopped having their daily arguments. More accurately, his father stopped badgering his mother. Jonathan began spending more time outside his bedroom at night. This became encouraging until the excitement of the move, which lasted for almost three whole weeks, wore out. And then the loud arguments resumed a couple of weeks before he was due to start the sixth grade at a new school. So he retreated to the sanctuary of his room.

C’mon fuckhead, an oversized eighth grader challenged, gimme a dollar or I’ll kick your ass after school.

Surprised by the threat, Jonathan eventually became fearful of the bully and his two cohorts. Never had he imagined that he would become a victim of bullying at school, especially on the first day. Those things, he once thought, happened to other students, the ones whom even he thought of as being oddly different. Suddenly, he had been identified as one of those students, and that made him feel unsure of himself and really depressed.

The bully had no regards for the students’ rights to a hostile-free environment at their school. And what was worse was that the bully believed his deviant behavior was chivalrous. Praise for his deviant behavior from his cohorts combined with his parents’ distorted sense of standing up for his rights at the expense of others molded his reprehensible character.

If Jonathan had had a social network to help him through that life altering experience, his self-esteem would not have been so shattered. In a new school and neighborhood, he did not have friends to provide emotional support. His parents, with no forethought for his social development, decided to move to another apartment complex with comparable amenities for the sake of saving a few dollars on rent. There he had no friends to commiserate with or teachers he could count on to help him out of his situation discreetly. He had no one, and he felt extremely vulnerable.

To make his situation worse, Jonathan did not have any family support. His relatives, like his parents, did not take much time out of their busy schedules to keep in touch with each other on a regular basis. Jonathan did not feel comfortable enough with his relatives to confide his social issues. As for his parents, they gravitated back to their arguments and avoidance tactics.

If he brought his bullying issue to his parents’ attention, Jonathan feared that his father would demand that he stand up to the bully and fight back, even if it meant getting beat up in the process. Weak in empathy, his father would rationalize that bullies avoided people who fought back. It was not the kind of rationalization Jonathan felt comfortable with. Although he never had been in a fist fight, he had suffered painful injuries when he crashed with his bicycle. Jonathan feared that if he fought a gang of older and bigger kids, he would sustain injuries similar to his bike accident, and he did not want to suffer those kinds of injuries again.

On the other hand, his mother would tell him to tell his teachers. Or worse yet, his mother would go to his school to complain about the bullying. He feared that would be the kiss of death. Being accused of being a momma’s boy would be just as degrading as being called a coward. Moreover, Jonathan feared that he would be found out and labeled a squealer, a label that would ostracize him at school.

Students followed unwritten social rules, and rule breakers usually faced social exclusion. Teachers and administrators usually addressed the symptoms of the problem with punishment, but not the roots of the problem. A more effective approach would be for an adult to arrange a sit-down talk with Jonathan and the bully, to encourage them to talk about the incident so the perpetrator would see the victim as a person, to identify the bullying and extortion as being wrong and disrespectful, and to mediate a solution to the problem that must be agreed upon by all parties.