Give a Boy a Gun Read Free

first moved [to Middletown]. It was the middle of the school year, and here comes this minivan packed to the roof, and about an hour later the moving truck shows up. The moving guys started bringing furniture into the house, and the family was kind of going back and forth too. It must have been a weekend, because I went somewhere with one of my friends and his mom. I remember leaving my house and seeing Brendan out in front of his house. He just stared at me. No hello. No wave. No nothing. I think I kind of nodded at him and then got into the car and left.
    A little later I come back. I’m getting out of the car, and Brendan comes out of the house and heads straight toward me carrying three tennis balls. So we start to talk, and he’sasking me what school I go to and what grade I’m in and did I like this [video] game and that. You know, kind of feeling me out. And all the while he’s juggling these tennis balls. It struck me as a little bizarre.
    â€” Dustin Williams, a neighbor of Brendan’s in Middletown
    I don’t think he said a thing for the first two weeks. The only reason I even noticed him was because I sat in the back and he was back there with me in science and English. The way he looked, it was, like, wide-eyed — like a rain-forest dweller dropped into the middle of New York City. I bet three-quarters of the class didn’t even know he was there.
    â€” Ryan Clancy
    We started talking in the hall. I mean, I was hyperaware of him because he was new and I was new, and your antenna is up for things like that. Like feeling all alone and trying to connect with someone you have something in common with, no matter what. It’s likeyour boat just sank and you’re in the water grabbing desperately for anything that floats.
    â€” Emily Kirsch, a former friend of Brendan’s
    I’ve always made a special effort with those [students] I sense are in distress. Believe me, no one comes into this school in the middle of the year without a lot of distress. After the first day of class I took [Brendan] aside and told him I knew it would be hard to adjust and that he should take his time and not worry too much. And I remember the way he looked at me. As if I’d caught him completely by surprise. He may have even blinked back tears.
    â€”Julia Reingold, a teacher of Brendan’s at Middletown Middle School
    Here’s this cute boy who didn’t say a word for the first three weeks, but once he started talking, it could be hard to shut him up. At first all he could talk about was how big the school was and how much he missed all his old friends and his old school. I mean, Ididn’t mind it so much, because I felt like I was about the only person he had to talk to, and, frankly, I was in the same boat. But after a while it did start to get kind of repetitious, and I told him so. It was like day and night. After that, he never said a thing about his old friends or his old school.
    â€”Emily Kirsch

    Each day fourteen children under the age of nineteen are killed by guns. (National Center for Health Statistics, 1996)

Eighth Grade
    I tried to think back to what it was like in eighth grade. It was different. I mean, it got really cliquey. But I think Brendan and I felt like, “That’s okay, we’re new here. They just have to get to know us.” But it didn’t work that way. They got to know us, but nothing changed. Instead, this whole jock and cheerleader and designer name thing just got stronger and stronger. They were like the Sun, and the rest of us were all these little planets stuck in orbits around them. After a while I think a lot of us didn’t even want to be in that [popular] crowd. All we wanted was to be left alone.
    â€” Emily Kirsch
    Things in school definitely changed in eighth grade. At least for us guys on the team. Maybe it was because we knew we’d be inthe high school next year. Maybe it was that some of the guys were starting