I knew why I was so angry. I wanted to make amends for what happened with Peter Corkland. Peter was a boy at my old school and his life was hell and one day I made it worse. Even after they clamped down on bullying, little changed for Peter. He was the fattest boy in school, the fattest boy in town, and everyone called him Peter the Pie Man. It’s not cruel to describe him as fat though; it’s just the truth. He was massive. Every part of him was big, even his wrists and ankles. They looked like they belonged to a fat baby, flesh rolling over itself at the joints. He had his own special chair in the classroom because the standard chairs might not be safe. There were only a couple of these chairs in the school and somebody had to make sure that one of them would be in his next lesson. Normally a teacher got one of the other kids to take one because it would take Peter too long to carry it.
He used to wear his dad’s old clothes to school and it was a strange sight until you got used to it. There he was, twice as wide as any of us, in his dad’s shirt and trousers looking ready for the office, but with his school bag slung over his shoulder. He didn’t wear a blazer because they just didn’t make them that big. He wasn’t allowed to do sport with us; the teachers wouldn’t risk it. They were worried he would collapse and die or something so they just made him walk around the playing field while we played football or did athletics.
He eventually got diagnosed with Prader Willi Syndrome, which meant he ate too much, but it wasn’t his fault. He never felt full, even after a big meal. One of our teachers said that trying to stop Peter eating was like trying to stop ice melt in the midday sun. And it was a bit mean the way he said it in front of everyone, but it was true. Sometimes people give excuses for why they are fat. They say it’s because of water retention, glands, big bones or a thyroid problem, things like that. And nobody really believes them. But Peter did have a reason, there was an excuse, but he never bothered to explain, he never used his illness as a reason for his size. Maybe he couldn’t see the point, couldn’t see that it would change anything.
He was always eating. On the way to school he would eat crisps from his left pocket and take swigs from the drink in his right pocket. He kept his chocolate in his school bag. He stashed food in his desk at school and ate during lessons. Nobody else was allowed but the teachers gave up trying to stop Peter. He seemed a nice guy really, but he was a bit shy I think, and I never really got to know him. I had my few friends and my drawing and we just never seemed to be in the same place at the same time. And I suppose it’s hard to be friends with someone who has to stop and rest when walking from one class to the next, someone who can never join in with any games or sport because he gets too tired. It didn’t bother me that he was fat though; I never had a problem with him at all. I was never one of the ones who called him the Pie Man or threw food at him in the canteen. Like I said, my family welcomed outsiders. That’s what makes what happened worse.
It was lunchtime and it was pouring down and it had been raining all day. This meant that the art room was packed. I was here every lunch but on wet days they opened it up to everyone. I hated it like that. People just mucked around and shoved each other about and flirted and argued and you could never get anything done. There were loads of us sat round a big table but only a couple of us were drawing, everyone else was just bored and wishing they could be outside. Some of the boys were a couple of years older than me and my friends. I didn’t know any of their names and they were loud and looking for people to pick on. I was keeping my head down. Just drawing. After a few minutes I could sense one of them was stood behind me, looking. I thought he was going to take the mick, grab my drawing off me, make me plead for it back, that kind of thing. Instead he said, ‘That’s brilliant, that’s really good. That’s him, isn’t it?’ He pointed at my friend, Ian, who was sat opposite me. I nodded. One of the other older boys came round and had a look too. He said that nobody in his year could draw like that. They seemed really impressed. I won’t lie; I was proud, it felt good.
Just then one of the older lads shouted, ‘Look at the Pie Man!’ People ran to the window and watched Peter below, out in the rain, walking slowly towards the school with rain running down his face and dripping off his nose and chin. He seemed oblivious to the weather. He stopped every now and again and leant on a wall to get his breath. As he got closer some of the boys banged on the window and chanted, ‘Pie Man! Pie Man! Pie Man!’ But he didn’t look up; he was very good at ignoring people, and they got bored and things quietened down. I carried on trying to finish my drawing before the bell for the next lesson went. The room fell silent for a few minutes and it was good; it was like it normally was. As I was concentrating on getting Ian’s hair right, spikes in all the right places, I felt somebody’s eyes on me. I looked up and saw the older boy who had complimented my drawing looking at me with a glint in his eye and a smile on his face. He leaned forward. ‘Do you know what? You should draw the Pie Man …’ There was a second’s silence and then, suddenly, that’s what the whole room was saying. ‘Yeah, draw him. It’ll be brilliant …’; ‘Come on, just do it quickly, draw him …’; ‘Get him some more paper. Give him some room …’; ‘Shut up, let him get on with it …’
I had never been the centre of attention before and I never want to be again. And I didn’t want to draw Peter. I really didn’t. The shouting didn’t stop though, and they were all crowded around me, waiting for the picture, telling me how brilliant it would be. I tried to stand up to leave but I got pushed back down. I quickly drew a picture where Peter wasn’t half as fat as he really was. They ripped that up and started getting annoyed. I got a shove to my head. I felt a fist in my back. They knew I could do it well.
I tried to get it over with quickly. I did it fast, in a couple of minutes. A quick, horrible caricature. As I drew somebody shouted, ‘Show him eating!’ So I put the drink bottle in one pocket, the crisps in another, and a hand full of food going up to his open mouth. Crumbs everywhere. It was finished. It was horrible. I wanted to rip it up. One of the older boys shouted ‘Brilliant!’ Tore it off me and ran out of the room followed by his mates.
My drawing was photocopied and pinned up on classroom boards and handed out to kids as they walked between lessons. Someone had written, ‘The Pie Man!’ across the top before it was copied, just in case anyone was too stupid to tell who it was. Before long people were sending it from phone to phone. It wasn’t long until the teachers saw it and I got dragged in front of the headmaster. And not long till they called my mum and dad.
My mum couldn’t believe it. She’d never been so angry and upset with me. She could barely look at me and she couldn’t look at the drawing. When the headmaster pushed it in front of her she ripped it up. When we got home she said she didn’t like me right now, and asked me to leave her alone. I tried to apologise but she didn’t want to hear it and Dad told me that I needed to give her some time, that I needed to let her calm down. And anyway, I didn’t know how to explain. What could I say? ‘It wasn’t me. I didn’t want to do it. I just wanted them to go away.’ It sounded pathetic and it just didn’t sound true. How could I be made to draw a picture? I don’t know if she ever really forgave me properly. Things weren’t right for days after that and I wish I’d never drawn it and I was sorry that I was cruel to Peter. He never said anything though. I think he just thought it was the kind of thing that would always happen to him. There didn’t seem anything I could do to make things right and it still upsets me sometimes, even now. It makes me angry that she knew that I did that before she died and that I never really managed to explain how it had happened.
I should have just let them beat me up. That would have been much better.