Monday morning, March 18, 1974
It started as just another normal Monday morning: Alarm clock trauma, hygienic duties, and then breakfast. It was during breakfast that I realized that my father had died exactly one year ago. I mentioned that fact to the Svalbergs; at first, they all just looked at me. Beth (Eric’s mother,) gave me a look of pity, and said, “We’re here for you, Johnny. I’m sure your father would want you to be strong—for him, and for your mother.”
“Yeah. He would. I miss him terribly. But..I’ll be OK.” Then, looking at Liam (Eric’s father,) I said, “I sort of feel like I’ve got an adoptive father, now.”
Liam smiled at me, then replied, “It would seem that Eric has adopted you as a brother, so I guess that that also makes you my adopted son”, he stated.
I got all choked up, but replied, “I’ll never forget your kindness.” That earned me big, warm smiles from all three of the Svalbergs.
Eric and I set out on our walk to school; he briefly held my hand while we walked. Other than that, the day seemed to be starting out normally: Get to the first class of the day, then the second, then PE with Eric and the gang. But that’s where the usual routine began to be different: After PE, instead of heading to the cafeteria with Eric and the gang, I headed to the administrative section of the main building, to see whether I could just put in my request to take the SAT test right then, or whether I’d need to make an appointment.
I needed to make an appointment, so that’s what I did. The appointment was for the next day—Tuesday—after the last class of the day.
That taken care of, I headed for the cafeteria, to belatedly get lunch, and to re-connect with Eric and the gang. And that’s where things really veered off course: On the outside walkway connecting the main building to the cafeteria (among other things, such as the gym building) I was stopped by a group of three students who stepped in front of me, blocking my path. One of them spoke up: “Your kind’s not welcome here, faggot”, he announced.
For whatever reason, instead of scaring me, that just made me angry—very angry—so angry that I failed to let my intellect choose the smartest course. So, I replied: “Well, you have nothing to worry about: Your dick’s far too small to interest even the most desperate faggot.”
Of course, that enraged them: So all three of them assaulted me—they, too, were too angry (and perhaps also too dumb) to choose the wisest path forward. My retort had, apparently, really struck home.
While beating on me, they started to call me all sorts of anti-gay names and slurs—loudly, too. And there were other students nearby who saw, and heard, the altercation—some of whom started yelling. Fortunately for me, Eric and his friends also heard the commotion, and came out of the cafeteria to see what was happening. When Eric realized that I was being assaulted, three to one, he went ballistic, and came running over to fight the three thugs off. His three friends—Greg, Brandon and Mike—were not far behind. So it became a mêlée.
The noise drew official attention. The school authorities, once they had arrived, were able to stop the fighting—more, I think, because they were authority figures, than because they used much actual force.
Eric rushed over to me, saw that I was bruised and bloodied, embraced me in his arms, and then asked, “Johnny, are you OK?” I noticed that just about everyone was staring at Eric and me. Some had heard the ugly slurs that the three bullies had been calling me.
One of the school authorities—the Vice Principal, in fact, as the senior official present—took charge, inquiring, “Does anyone want to volunteer to explain what happened here?” Several of the witnesses all spoke up at once. The Vice Principal queried all of the volunteers, one by one. Their testimony made it clear who had been the main participants in the altercation: The three bullies, Eric, his three friends—and of course, me. For whatever reason—perhaps just because of my reputation as a nerd who didn’t cause trouble—the Vice Principle then chose me as the next interview target.
I dispassionately told everyone what had happened—hateful slurs, and all.
The Vice Principal chose then selected Eric as his next interview target. Eric told what he had seen, and claimed that he had gotten involved in order to protect me. He wasn’t apologetic about it, but defiant. Greg, Brandon and Mike all corroborated Eric’s version of events. They, too, made it clear that they were trying to protect not just me, but also Eric.
Next to be interviewed were the three thugs. Of course, they lied—but they weren’t very clever about it: They falsely claimed that I had stepped in front of them while they were walking past, and when they had complained, that I had called them “stupid faggots, too stupid to walk upright.” The rest of their story was reasonably close to the testimony of everyone else.
The Vice Principal then returned his attention to me, and asked, “What’s your response to that, John?”
Without hesitation, I replied, “Why would I—all alone—try to provoke three tough-looking dudes like them in that way? It doesn’t make any sense.”
Two of the witnesses spoke up, saying that what they saw was that the three thugs (my term, not theirs) were the ones who had blocked my path, not the other way around. Like I said, the three bullies just didn’t seem to be all that smart.
The Vice Principal seemed to be satisfied—perhaps, even convinced—by my rebuttal, which was backed up by two independent witnesses.
Eric had been holding me in his arms the entire time, by the way. And that had been noticed.
The school nurse had arrived early during the investigation; she had been listening to much of the testimony. She came over to check on me, inquired about my condition, and then requested that I follow her to the nurse’s office, so she could administer first aid. She invited any other students, who thought they needed to be checked out, to also follow along, and wait outside her office.
The Vice Principal informed us—me, and the others who had injuries (including Eric, his friends, and the three thugs)—that we were all excused from any further classes for the day, and that our teachers would be so informed. He also told all of those involved that we were to come to his office, once the nurse was done with us. I noted that the Vice Principal had only needed to ask the names of some of the students involved, but had not needed to do so for some—myself, included. Interesting.
I also wondered where the Principal was, and whether he, too, would want to speak with any of us.
Eric followed me and the nurse to her office. He looked like he had been injured—he had a bloody nose. Greg, Brandon and Mike also came with us. They, too, were at least bruised.
Once the nurse was done with me, I headed straight to the Vice Principal’s office. I was immediately admitted. Right away, he asked, “Do you wish to press charges, John? That was legally assault.” I had already given that some thought, so I replied, “I really don’t want for this altercation—or the reasons for it—to become any more public than they already are. I wouldn’t want my mother to ever know, and I’m quite sure that Eric feels the same way, for the same reasons.”
“I thought that might be how you felt about it,” he replied. “If Eric and his friends agree, and also those other three—which seems rather likely—then I think that we can respect your wishes”, he assured me.
“You mean, as long an no one wants to press charges?”, I asked.
“Correct. If anyone does, they have that right, in which case there’s nothing I’ll be able to do”, he answered.
“I see”, I said. “Thank you, sir.”
“I assume you’re going to want to wait until I’m done speaking with Eric?”, he asked me.
“Yeah”, I replied.
“OK. Have him come in next, once he’s available,” he said. “Oh, and John: You and Eric should be more careful”, he advised. I knew exactly what he meant. I also knew exactly what it meant that he thought it wise to give me that advice.
“Thanks”, was all I said—and then walked out of the VP’s office. Eric and Mike were already outside, awaiting their turn. I told Eric that the VP wanted to speak with him next. So in he went.
While I was waiting for Eric to come back out, Mike whispered to me, “I guess your secret’s out, now.”
“Looks that way”, I replied. “Is that a problem for you?”, I asked him.
“Nah”, he replied. “Brandon, Greg and I pretty much already knew. For one thing, we’d heard about Eric’s activities at [he named the school in the same city from which Eric had transferred.] There are students here who have friends who are students there.”
“Thanks for the info. And also for being a friend—to both me, and to Eric”, I replied.
“You’re welcome, Johnny”, he replied. “And by the way, you can call me ‘Misha’ now, if you’d like.”
With a big smile, I told him, “Я был бы рад сделать это, Миша” (“I’d be glad to do so, Misha.”) He returned the smile. I knew then, that I’d made a real friend.
While Misha and I had been speaking, Greg had arrived. I explained to both Misha (“Mike”) and Greg what I had learned from the Vice Principal about pressing charges, what the consequences might be—and that I absolutely did not want to go there, and that Eric almost certainly did not, either. Greg just said, “I understand, John. Don’t worry, we won’t put you guys through that.” Misha added, “Of course not.”
Eric came back out of the VP’s office, not long after that. He walked up to us, and proceed to begin tell us what he had learned from the VP about pressing charges. But, before he could get very far with that, Misha interrupted him with the fact that I had already explained the issue with pressing charges, that I did not want to do that, and that we had all assumed that Eric didn’t want to do that, either. Eric confirmed that that we were correct.
It was only then that Eric remembered that he was supposed to send someone else in to speak with the Vice Principal. So he informed Misha that he was up next, so Misha went in to have “the discussion.” Right after that, Brandon arrived. So we had to have the same discussion with him. Fortunately, he was equally understanding. Not that we had had much doubt about that.
It then occurred to me that the three thugs would be showing up next—one at a time, but still—and that it was probably not a good idea to leave any of us alone outside the VP’s office with any of those dudes. I said as much.
And that’s when the Principal showed up. The Principal had apparently heard the ‘elevator speech version’ of events—enough to know that there had been a fight, that some students had needed to see the nurse, and also who the key participants had been. And that was probably why he zeroed in on me, to get my version of events. So I gave him my version of what had happened.
In response, the Principal simply asked the others—Eric, Greg and Brandon—whether they agreed with what I had said. They all answered in the affirmative. I then informed him that the Vice Principal had been handling the matter, and that he was currently interviewing Mike Svoboda about it, and that Brandon Mitchell (to whom I pointed, just in case the Principal didn’t know him by name) was scheduled to be the next one interviewed.
After a pause, the Principal announced that, in that case, it would be preferable to have the Vice Principal continue to take the lead, and that if he (the Principal) needed to speak with any of us on the matter later, he’d let us know.
I decided that it would be a good idea to make sure that the Principal understood how Eric and I very much wanted to minimize any public exposure due to the incident, so I did. He gave both of us a penetrating look, and then said, “Understood. Did you let the Vice Principal [referring to him by name] know that?”, he asked. We told him that we had. He replied that the school would make every effort to respect our wishes. He then left went into his office, and closed the door.
I got the very strong impression that the Principal believed me and Eric, without any need to interview anyone else. I thought that that was interesting.
The first of the three bullies arrived. And soon afterwards, Misha emerged from the VP’s office, and Brandon went in. The second, and then the third, bully arrived while we were waiting for Brandon. There was no conversation between us and them.
Finally, Brandon emerged, and the four of us walked off of the campus together.
Standing on the sidewalk, just outside school grounds, Eric commented that he just hoped that his parents never got wind of what had happened. Brandon, Misha and Greg all assured him that their lips would be sealed. I commented that, if that was now the goal, that it would be best to do and say as little as possible publicly about the relationship that Eric and I had with each other, in spite of the fact that we could no longer plausibly deny it.
“So John, what about your parents?”, Greg asked me.
“I definitely do not want my mother to know,” I replied. “As for my father, that’s not an issue: He died…a year ago today, in fact.”
“Oh, wow…”, Greg replied.
“Holy shit, no way!”, said Brandon.
“Man! Really sorry to hear that, Johnny”, said Misha.
Eric just put his hand on my shoulder, and said, “The last 24 hours have been something else. For both of us.”
“There was something else that happened?”, asked Brandon.
Eric and I explained that Eric’s father was taking the lead in getting me admitted, on a full scholarship, to [‘University X’—referencing by name the famous university where Eric’s father is a full professor, and which Eric will be attending next Fall.]
Misha, Greg and Brandon got very wide-eyed, and Greg whistled. Misha said, “That seems to be a much more important happening than the fight today.”
“I think you’re right…provided the downstream effects of the fight don’t out Eric and/or me to our parents”, I observed.
“True”, said Misha.
“But do you know for sure that that would actually be a problem?”, asked Greg.
I just looked at Eric, who replied, “No. I don’t actually know. I just don’t want to take the chance. Especially not now, given what my father committed to doing for John, last night”, he replied.
After a minute of so of silence, Brandon suggested, “Well, I guess we might all just as well head on home.”
We all agreed, and so that’s what we did. Eric and I arrived home to Eric’s house more than an hour earlier than usual, thanks to having been excused from attending any further classes for the day. But neither one of us felt like having sex, nor did we feel like doing any weight training, nor any homework. So we just sat on the couch in the living room, and watched TV. We needed to de-stress.
After about an hour and a half, I commented: “If we don’t have our homework done, and don’t act like we normally do, your parents are going to wonder what’s up. They might start to ask questions.”
“You’re right”, he replied.
“As long as you have your homework done, they probably won’t be all that suspicious”, I theorized.
“True”, he replied. But I don’t have the assignments for my final three classes.”
“Your father won’t know that”, I said. “And as long as you have your math assignment, we can at least do that.”
“That’s my second period class”, he said. “So yeah, we could get that done.” So that’s what we did. I also took the opportunity to give him some deeper and broader insights into math, given that we had nothing better that we wanted to do.
Looking at Eric, I noticed that I could see some signs that he had been injured. I told him so. So he looked at me, and said the same. Giving that some thought, I suggested that we just admit that we had gotten into a fight, but invent a different scenario that doesn’t lead where we don’t want the story to go. He agreed, so we came up with an alternative account of the events that avoided introducing any implications that would be problematical.
When Eric’s parents got home, we just told them our alternative storyline, straight up. They seemed to just accept it. Our story kept us in the clear in more ways than one, including the fact that it would align with what they might hear from other sources, and that it also made it clear that we weren’t in any trouble with the school authorities. His parents did drill into that specific issue—as we had suspected they would. Later in life, I would learn that there’s a term-of-art in intelligence work for what we did in order to protect ourselves from the impact of the actual events: It was a “limited hangout.”
We used the aftereffects of the fight to justify our desire to go to bed early. So we did just that.
Once in the sleeping bag (on the floor of Eric’s basement bedroom,) Eric and I talked for a while (and no, we didn’t mess around,) before even trying to go to sleep. He made it very clear that he had been terrified that I might have been very severely hurt. He also said he now wanted to get martial arts training—and that I should do the same. He felt really bad that he hadn’t been able to protect me better. He also made it quite clear that I was his, that I belonged to him now, and that that meant that he was responsible for my safety and well being.
I was very, very touched by his protectiveness and possessiveness. It made me feel some kind of way—a way that I really liked.
I slept really, really well.
