A Bully’s Lesson

I started sixth grade alongside my best friend, who had a history of making fun of certain other kids and expected me to be her back-up. She’d start telling someone that no one liked them, then want me to say I hated them as “proof”, for example. This behavior made me uncomfortable, but I went along with it because, well, she was my best friend and always nice to me. As time went on, this narrowed to basically bullying one other girl in particular.
Our class had a pet rabbit who everyone was obsessed with, and, one day, someone left the hutch open so the rabbit got out into the school. Our teacher said unless whoever had left it open came forward, we would all get in trouble because the rabbit might have gotten hurt. No one did, so our entire class had to eat at our desks for lunch then stay there through recess. (The rabbit was found, by the way, and it was fine). But my best friend whispered to me that the girl we “hated” had probably done it and that I should say I saw this happen. I didn’t see it happen and I was hesitant to lie to the teacher about this, but my best friend and some of our other friends convinced me to. So later that day, I went to our teacher and said that I “didn’t want to get anyone in trouble, but I saw (the girl) leave the rabbit out of its hutch when we were leaving for music class”.
The teacher quietly pulled that girl out into the hall, and I don’t know what all happened, but we heard her crying after a while. My friends spread the word that it was that girl’s fault we had all gotten in trouble and now she was crying because she had wanted us to suffer “her” consequences. 12-year-olds don’t need much to go on, so everyone apparently believed us. People started swapping stories about dishonest or wrong things they had observed the girl doing in the past, most of which were probably not true, but by the time she and the teacher came back in, the rest of our class was turned against that girl.
I’m sure getting bullied by the few of us wasn’t exactly enjoyable in the first place, but now people would purposefully exclude her, steal and hide her things, etc. There was this rumor that she wanted to change schools, but her parents wouldn’t let her because we only had six months until the end of elementary school for good, anyway. There were a couple kids who had been friends with the relevant girl, and they got teased somewhat because of this relationship—at least one stopped hanging out with the girl to avoid being associated with her.
Then, finally, I got called into the principal’s office, something that had never happened to me before. I had a very “girl next door” reputation, so I was scared what possibly could have gotten me into ~serious~ trouble.
It turned out that the teachers, principal, etc had pinpointed me as the “ringleader” of tormenting this girl. My immediate impulse was to deny it because I was just going along with what other people were doing, but the more I thought and talked about it, I came to realize I was one of the main “bullies”. This probably seems obvious to anyone reading this story, but idk I had always thought of myself as a really good person? And now it was as though I might not be. I had to have this conference with my family, which was super embarrassing for me, and I had to write the girl an apology letter, meet with the guidance counselor a few times, etc. I regretted what I had done.
My best friend, though, who also got in trouble, wanted to basically redouble our efforts against the girl because it was “her fault”. This was the first time I had a big fight with that friend and, afterwards, I was suddenly on the outside. It was as though if I didn’t go along with the stuff she did, she wouldn’t be my friend, and all our other friends went along with her. I found myself feeling lonely and persecuted and felt incredibly guilty that I had been integral in making someone else feel this way times ten. I tried to reach out to the girl I had bullied, but she (understandably) didn’t want to interact with me. I don’t know what happened to her after the year ended.
In Junior High, I basically became a better person, or I at least started paying real attention to how I act toward others. I like myself and I’m happy with my friends and life now, but I’ve learned you can never change the past. So, what I did to that girl will always have happened. I guess what the point of telling this story is that you should be careful how you treat people no matter what is or isn’t going on with you.