The Face of a Hypocrite

It’s nice to know that after 26 years, some people can still illicit a negative response from me.

So here I was a few minutes ago, while looking at Facebook I had a wave of curiosity hit me. I navigated to my profile and taking a deep breath, I clicked on my high school to see if I could find out how many of us were still around. I had been having some intimate talks with a friend the last few days where he revealed that some of the people we went to school with were dead. The one in particular that seemed to bother me the most was finding out that Ryan Bobo had died back in 2006.

I remember being in earth science with him and Jason and all three of us being super excited for the release of Final Fantasy 7. Wondering who else was still alive was what drove me to check Facebook. I was not prepared for what I found.

I happened first upon the profile of Myra Bivens. She was still alive and well and had apparently gone into nursing. Definitely not a career for the faint of heart. But then after her, I somehow navigated to the profile of the woman pictured above.

Misty Burdette.

I still remember her after all these years because as soon as I saw her face, I remembered what she did and said like it had just happened.

I was sitting at a table in Mrs. Buchanan’s earth science class (same one I mentioned above with Ryan and Jason) at a table by myself doing some school work. Jason, who I normally sat with and used to goof off with during class, was at another table with Misty and some other classmates doing whatever. All of a sudden, Jason comes back to my table and is visibly upset about something. I ask him what was wrong and he refused to talk, he just sat there staring at the table’s surface where I was sitting. I immediately turned around and asked the others at the table where he sat what happened. They all clammed up and just stared at me. I asked again, rather angrily, what they did or said to him and that’s when Misty decided to open her mouth.

“We don’t want people like you around here” was her reply.

See, I knew I was gay back in high school and I suspect other people in my grade knew as well, though I did nothing to confirm or deny any of it. Teenagers being the pieces of human garbage that they are, were of course, merciless in teasing about it. The misfits didn’t really care, but then there were the jocks, the preps, and various other cliques that had an opinion about it. I still remember one of my algebra teachers telling me that “gay people should be lined up and shot in the head.” Needless to say that after that I never interacted with him again unless I had to.

“What did you say?” I asked her in response. I don’t remember her exact wording or anything she said in response, I just remember getting into an argument that Mrs. B had to break up because I was about to beat this girl’s ass. To this day I still don’t know what was said, I just know that she was permanently on my shit list after that.

The next incident occurred when we took a field trip in the same earth science class to hunt fossils in Virginia. On the way back, we made a pit stop and some random strip mall to get food and get off the bus for a while when Jason and I spotted a shop that had ‘cards’ in the title. We had hopes that it sold Magic: the Gathering stuff but were dismayed to find that it sold greeting cards instead. On our way back to and getting on the bus, Misty again decided to take the opportunity to make a comment about “people like me” to which I loudly proclaimed to her to shut the fuck up.

The rest of school passed without another incident with Misty (that I can remember, anyway).

Some time after graduation and some shitty life events happened to me, I found myself at Walmart with my sister and who do I spot wearing the signature blue Walmart apron checking out customers but the worthless walking fecal matter herself. As soon as I spotted her I went to a different register to check out. Once I got through and had my bags, I stood in the waiting area on the other side of the registers and just stared at her while I waited for my sister. Eventually she noticed and we made eye contact. All I could think to myself was ‘not so high and mighty now, are we?’ as I walked away. I never saw her in person again after that. Life moved on and years went by, but every now and then the events at school crept into my thoughts and I was reminded how I severely disliked her so.

Then came my little revelation on Facebook. You see, not only did I stumble upon Misty’s profile but what I found was a surprise but not a shock:

It turns out that Misty Burdette was a fucking lesbian. You fucking cunt bitch hypocrite. It’s always the ones with the biggest mouths and the loudest voices that are the biggest hypocrites among people.

Knowing this, do I forgive her? No. Do I plan on doing anything to her or say anything to her? Also no. I prefer to let sleeping dogs lie, but I will never forget the awful way she treated us and made me feel.

It’s people like this that seriously need to shut the fuck up and admit things to themselves instead of taking it out on other people.

All I will say is, I wish you well you carpet munching sow.

Now I’m left to wonder if the similar behavior of some of the boys I went to school with will lead to similar findings…