For Him Marlow Simmons

This is more a story of a boy than my own. A little boy named, well let's call him Avery. Dirty blonde hair, too long for him to take care of, rosy cheeks just beginning to sprout acne Just standing there, he’d look like any average twelveyear-old boy. Lanky, confused by his newfound height, stuck in a perpetual state of movement, jerky limbs reminiscent of those of a foal. That is where the normalcy of this boy ends.

“Just hit him if he tries to touch you.” What?

Turns out Avery was the reason none of the female staff or clients liked to wear skirts. When he first arrived at the facility, he was mute and would behave like, in all the ways that counted, a baby. He’d crawl on the ground, cry and wail when upset, glued to his favorite octopus Jellycat stuffed animal, soaked with various bodily fluids By the time I got there, that had begun to fade, and in its place were grabbing, groping hands, a boy who knew how to pretend to act sweet and sick just so he could touch you. When he wasn’t sexualizing someone else, he was sexualizing himself, making vulgar gestures, and generally presenting himself in inappropriate ways And so people did. Hit him, to be exact. Never more than a slap or a push, but it was still a beating. A hand on your ass, elbow him.

A brush of knuckles on your breast, shove him and scream. It was essentially like training a dog, yell enough and the poor thing realizes what he’s doing is bad. And it kind of worked, but I always felt bad. I hated this kid, really truly hated him, but I did my best to never lay a hand on him. Usually, a stern voice was loud enough to make him clam up and sulk off somewhere I remember the clinical director’s expression as she would claim he's made no progress, that he was a lost cause. I can still hear the crackling of the intercom as his mother held his adoption over him, making him feel guilty for being given parents, insinuating that she wished she never signed those papers that made him her’s Avery was used as a baseline insult “You don’t want to be like Avery do you?”

“Avery’s a retard, you’re not a retard.”

“If you keep acting like this you’ll end up like Avery ” There’s a game you're forced to play in treatment. It has no official name. See, the premise is, HIPAA ensures nobody’s reason for being in the facility is common knowledge, so we are left to guess. When I arrived, sunken cheeks, a chronic case of tachycardia, flesh that clung to my bones, my plates being reviewed after dinner by a clinician, it was easy to discern my demons Another person starts to show signs of withdrawal, anger, heightened emotions, you know their vice. The best clue you can get is if ‘the bell’, a Christmas decoration with no inherent insidious values, is hung on a client’s door. We all know what ‘the bell’ means.

Avery had very few clues

He was autistic, that much was obvious, and clearly tormented by something His parents weren’t dead, just out of the picture I was nearly certain you can’t get admitted to inpatient for being a creep, so what was it?

And then, in the second month, he told us.

Avery was being threatened with long-term. To those who don’t know, long-term is the scariest thing you never knew could happen to you. You’re sent to a hospital, a real one, where you’ll be forced to stay until you’re eighteen, in round-the-clock care, trapped in white walls and wire bed frames with real padded rooms for years on end Usually, those places can figure out how to keep you past your eighteenth birthday It’s as close to a life sentence as you can get as a teenager Remember, Avery was twelve That’s at least six years of sterilized rooms, needles in the ass, and socks with suction cups on the bottom That’s six years of no lace-up shoes and no hanging out with your friends. You could get weekly visits from your parents and a trip to the park if you’re lucky. Six years of not eating at your favorite restaurants, being poked and prodded and zapped and strapped to mattresses, no jewelry, no birthdays, no internet. Everything you take for granted, gone in an instant. In a fit of desperation, to appear more open and willing to participate in treatment, to be redeemable, to be anything but a ‘lost cause’, anything but a ‘retard’, Avery told us what happened to him It was mumbled, said in short sentences, ashamed, and so very quiet

He deserves better than me telling you all what happened to him But let’s just say, he didn’t just learn how to grope women on his own. No, he was taught. Turns out the best students are the victims themselves... and a child’s best teacher is their father.

At that moment, I thought back to how this boy has been hit, and screamed at, treated like an animal, but I also thought back to those once dreaded nights when I agreed to teach him how to play the piano, his talent for swimming, how he loved to make us the world’s shittiest lemonade, but we drank it because he looked so proud, how every night he would say goodnight to every one of us and leave little trolls all around, how, after all this, he loved God so much, that he would pray late at night

I decided I would try and be kinder to this boy

Sometime later, all of us sat about in the nurse's office, playing dungeons and dragons, and waiting to get our meds.

“I want to show you something.”

He looked so excited, the other clients shook their heads, begged me with their eyes to say, ‘no, no please go away,’ but I couldn’t. So, instead I said, “Okay, sure! I’d love to see.” Another boy, my age, he’d been there longest, gave me a look that very clearly said, ‘whatever happens next is your fault’ The foal-like boy came galavanting back into the room, something round cupped between his scabbed, calloused, sticky palms He proceeded to present to me, with great drama and flair, a small Nemo plush, gesturing for me to pick it up.

“Do you want to hold him?”

“Yeah! Thank you so m-” I screamed.

The plushy was caked with a substance that made it rock hard to the touch, rough and crusty in my hand, and he smiled maniacally up at me In that moment, sheer disgust took over I screamed at him, I’m sure I called him names He was never the same around me after that

And I don’t think I’ve ever washed my hands so many times in one day

Two weeks later he was pitched onto a bus, and driven to long-term.

He’s still there today, as I enjoy the sunshine and the company of my friends, he sits in a controlled hell, with four more years to go. Avery will not leave that place until I’ve graduated college. A lot of the time I try not to think about all the ways that I failed Avery, how we all failed Avery, but it’s telling that my first instinct when I’m told to write about my own life experiences, is to, instead, write about him

Lucine Stephan '25

When I was younger, I used to love watching Planet Earth. I remember what I loved most was how it told several stories of the animal kingdom and of all the remarkable things that such creatures did to survive.

I learned that a species of ants support their entire colony underground by cultivating fungi, something that no other creature could do. They taught me to work hard Great sea birds, albatrosses, migrate across huge distances, and still, they have a partner for life. They taught me endurance and patience.

However, at the end of every show, the narrator would always say how much help our planet needed. How it was slowly in decline. How these small, beautiful wonders wouldn't last forever.

I always dreaded hearing this. I would stick my fingers in my ears, close my eyes, curl up into a tiny ball if I could. I was knee-deep in denial. It was hard for me to accept that the icebergs will eventually melt, and with it, all of the life that depends on them. It hurts me to even consider deforestation in the Amazon, and that the Great Barrier Reef is slowly losing its rainbow hue.

To me, there was only one possible thing left for me to do in those instances. I would ignore it. I couldn’t bear to hear it. I would block out the noise while the rest of my family watched in solemn silence. I couldn’t watch the beautiful pictures and knowledge that I built up all around me crumble so easily.

And then, sometimes after the show, my parents would say a phrase that echoed in the crevices of my mind. I was to “be the generation to fix the past generation’s mistakes.” In their eyes, my generation held onto the weight of fixing this overbearing issue that was to come We were to be the first act of justice, the morning light.

No one should be measured by burdens just because they are younger or have more time to complete certain goals. For humanity, the only possible solution to be let out of problems, such as quarantine, was for tons of people to take the vaccine, and even then, it is still going on to this day.

We’re all responsible for how we treat our planet. The only way to ever progress is for people to cooperate We can’t just acknowledge it, sit on the sidelines and let other people feel burdened because of such.

After all, this is our one and only earth Our fragile, delicate home. One planet in 60 billion that has the capability of sustaining life.

No one should ever have to feel like they have to walk alone to be the change