In our day to day lives sometimes things can become dull, boring, or mundane. Sometimes events in 0ur lives can even become painful. This is particularly true in a high school setting, where sometimes the dorky, nerdy, highly-intelligent kid is subject to intense bullying. Some stories, however, are heartwarming, and they show the good side of human nature. This is one such story:
There can be no question I would have been considered a jock in my extremely large freshman high school class. I was very popular with the ladies, I played football, and I partied on the weekend. One day, I was walking home from school and saw one of my classmates who I did not know very well. He was carrying all of his books.
“Why would anyone bring home all of his books on a Friday?” I pondered. “Dude must really be a nerd.” I had a busy weekend planned as usual, so I was just going to let it go. Something happened immediately after that, however, that stopped me on a dime and changed my mind. As I was walking, a bunch of kids approached my classmate. They started roughhousing with him and beat him up. They overpowered him, laughed, and threw his glasses in the dirt. When they saw my large frame, they immediately ran off.
I grabbed the kid’s glasses and handed them to him. “Those guys are real creeps,” I said.
He smiled kind of sheepishly. “Thanks,” he said. As I looked at him, I noticed that he had really moist eyes. He had been crying, because tears were welling up in his eyes. After I helped with his books, I asked him where he lived. Surprisingly, he actually lived near me and so I was a bit taken aback at why I hadn’t seen him before.
“I went to private school for a while,” he said lowly. The kid’s name was Kyle, and I decided to carry his books to his house. We had a nice, long conversation and talked all the way home. We could definitely say we hit it off, so I asked him if he wanted to play football with my friends. He said yes, and the weekend went by real fast. Kyle has a nice, easygoing nature behind that intelligent façade, and the more me and my regular athlete friends got to know him, the more we liked him.
The one thing that almost became his trademark during those early days was the fact that he would always be seen in the morning with that big stack of books. The second I saw him with those books was Monday morning. “You sure are gonna get some big muscles carrying all these books!” I joked with him. He laughed and handed me half of them.
To make a long story short, me and this kid literally became the best of friends. As our senior year rolled around, we both began to think about college. Kyle was the Brainiac, so he decided to go to Georgetown to study medicine. I was the athlete, so I decided to go to Duke on a football scholarship.
Kyle had done very well in high school and actually looked better than me in some ways as a senior. He even got more dates than me sometimes! He was the class valedictorian, and he had to deliver a speech. I smiled and said, “Go get ‘em big guy!” He just grinned, before stepping on the podium to deliver his speech.
Words left me as he began delivering his address. He started recounting that first we met, and I finally realized the reason why he had so many books: he was planning to commit suicide over the weekend. Everyone was speechless as he recounted his story.
All I have to say is this: never underestimate the power of your actions. One small gesture is all it takes sometimes to change a person’s life forever.