HATRED

Eve and I were driving home from Jerry's Deli last night, both of us wondering why I am hated so.

She brought it up. It all stemmed from her ex-boyfriend Dick's latest stunt: showing up at her acting class, even though she has a restraining order against him.

I have offered many times to go up to the dumb kid and talk to him, but Eve insists that, in the state he is in, it would only make things worse. I asked her how it was so.

"He hates you, James," she said, as she drove me to work. "He really, really hates you."

"I know he hates me," I asked. "But why?"

"Why does anyone hate anyone?" she asked aloud.

"You know, it's funny-- I never get a straight answer on that one. I know that I've been hated at various points in my life by certain individuals, but I never knew what the reason was. It always seems to change, from person to person."

"My dad hated you," Eve said. "Because you were Mexican."

"Yeah, but that's not really a good reason," I said. "That's the easy route-- hating someone for their race. Plus, your father didn't mind Tai [the guy Eve dated immediately after me] and he was half-black..."

"True," she said. "I guess I don't know why my dad hated you."

"I think I might know why-- because I was messing around with his daughter, that's why."

"I feel bad," she said. "I don't want Dick to do anything to hurt you."

I laughed. "You've got to be kidding, Eve. I mean, I know he's all fucked in the head right now, but that guy has always been afraid of me. I never have feared him, and he's lucky that I'm a mellow guy, because if anyone ever had a reason to hate someone else, it was me towards him. I never stepped to him in a hostile way, whenever we'd pass each other on the street, and yet he thought I was trying to jump him or something."

"All I know is, he hated anything that had to do with my life before him. You are a part of that, and so being as insecure as he is, he quickly held a grudge against you."

"I'm used to it by now," I said. "There's always someone who just doesn't like me, for whatever reason. If I had a nickle..."

"I know," she said, almost laughing. "You are always the one that people hate, aren't you? I wonder why it is..."

"Have you ever hated me?" I asked her.

"No, but you have annoyed me in the past. That's not the same as hatred, though."

"I know I can be irritating, but I never have been able to figure out why some people just hate me like there's no tomorrow."

Eve paused, then asked me, "Have you ever hated me?"

"I wanted to, once upon a time," I replied, as honestly as I could, "but I just couldn't do it."

I thought long and hard about the instances of outright hatred that I have encountered in my life. Ironically, the Number One cause for most hatred in the world-- race -- has never been much of a factor for me. A lot of people have no idea what kind of mutt I am, and if they ever hated on me for being a minority mix, they never said it to my face.

In matters related to race, I've received the most flak from my own peoples: Mexicans dislike the fact that I don't speak Spanish, while the Japanese consider my mixed blood an anathema. But whites and Jews have been relatively good to me-- even the racist ones. Blacks are 50-50 with me, while other races just don't give a damn who I am.

I get a lot of women hating me for various reasons. Prominent among their complaints is that I am a misogynist or a chauvinist. Of course, I do nothing to alleviate their worries, but then again I know in my heart that I am far from a sexist, so once again these reasons for hating me seem silly and superficial to me.

Occasionally, I get a girl who might hate me because she secretly likes me, but I'm terrible at divining those kinds of intentions. I think it's egotistical of me to assume that a girl likes me if she is acting hostile towards me. I take things on their face value, and if a woman hates me, I don't care what the reason is-- she just hates me, and I know to stay out of her way.

If there has to be a common reason for a woman hating me, it's most likely because I dated her best friend, and she is being protective of her, having heard the "horror stories" first-hand.

Guys hate me for whatever reasons they can come up with, but the Survey Says that it usually has to do with women. Nine times out of ten, a guy hates me because (1) I was once intimate with his girlfriend a long time ago, (2) he fears that I might steal her away from him, or (3) he thinks I'm trying to make him look bad in front of his girl. You don't know how many explanations I've had to give to jealous boyfriends, laying out my platonic terms to them, in order to get them to stop trying to mad-dog me non-stop.

I'm rarely ever hated for my political beliefs, because my style of argument hinges on my smart-ass, wise-acre delivery. Being online is a different story-- the lack of context adds fuel to the fire, to be sure, but even then I usually only get a rise out of someone, which is not the same as all-out hatred. The fact that I don't get mad is probably more irritating than anything that comes out of my mouth.

The one quality of mine that I am positive stirs up the shit is my arrogance. I can be downright smug, and it doesn't help that I know how to push people's buttons effectively. This is the sociopathic part of me having a go, detaching itself from my decency and decorum to wreak mischievious havoc on some poor literal-minded shlub who doesn't realize that I'm just fucking with his/her head. That I don't get bothered by my conscience-less attempts to make people mad only goes to show that I have a lot of growing up to do.

Here's a short list of people who have hated me, and their reasons for doing so:

Charles "Mac" Chong: He and I worked together at the old radio network, and we had our eyes on that girl Mary Jane whom I used to be crazy over. I had no idea he was after her, and when I would talk to him about how I tried to get her number or whatever, he seemed disinterested, almost bored. One day, out of frustration, I said I was through trying to hook up with her, and then later on she finally came around to giving me her phone number. The next time I saw Mac, I told him how I was back on the case, and he got all pissed off. "I thought you said you were through with her," he practically yelled. That's when I knew he was into her, and to tell the truth he had no reason to be mad at me-- he should've been more honest about his feelings for her. I would've understood if he saw me as a threat, and I may have even stepped aside to let him take a shot at her.

Anyway, he ended up making her feel awkward by barging into her office and demanding to know what was going on between me and her. She was so freaked out that she stopped talking to me for a week. I couldn't get an answer out of her, and Mac wasn't talking either. He seemed to be happy about the silent treatment I was receiving from Mary Jane, which was the tip-off for me-- I knew he'd done something but I had no proof.

Well, I found the proof by sheer accident, when he logged off the company computer one day and forgot to erase his e-mail password. I know, it was a shitty thing to do, but I opened his e-mail account, and lo and behold-- I found a series of messages to her, harassing her about me. I never told him what I discovered; instead, I wrote Mary Jane a letter, telling her to not listen to a word Mac had to say about me. She started speaking to me again, and after that Mac and I were less than friends.

Last I heard from him, he moved to Seattle.


Rob Kramer: Rob was the boyfriend of a platonic friend of mine, a girl named Wendy Adelson. I met her when I was living in Valencia during the summer before my Junior year of high school. At the time, I was seeing a girl named Vera, and I was faithful to her. Despite our obvious chemistry (and the fact that my mother totally adored Wendy), she and I never hooked up.

I moved back into the Valley when school resumed, and Wendy and I would occasionally make plans to see each other. She started seeing a guy named Rob Kramer shortly after school began, and when her birthday rolled around in January (she was an Aquarius like me) I was invited to a party at her house. She wanted me to meet her new man, and I was more than happy to oblige her.

What I didn't know was that Rob was sure that she and I had been a couple, judging from the way she talked to him about me. He was nervous about my staying the night in her guest room. When I finally met him, he tried to be nice, but eventually the alcohol started to speak to him. He ended up cornering me in the backyard, with a bunch of his friends in tow, asking me what my connection to Wendy was; I laughed and told him not to worry. After realizing what a dipshit he was being, he relaxed and apologized for his possessiveness. We ended up getting along after that.

However, Wendy broke up with the guy after six months, because he was jealous of every single guy in her life. I was just the one he confronted about it.


Mark Bradley: The VP of Technology at the old radio network, Bradley and I never got along. He was (and still is) an overbearing prick, with the kind of face that would fit perfectly on the villain in any National Lampoon/John Hughes movie set in high school or college. He had a thick Texas drawl, and didn't respect anyone who didn't have a college degree, even if they were knowledgable about all the systems in the Network Operations Center.

We waged a mini-war of words during which I found my weekend studio hours cut back and some of the shows I used to engineer taken away from me. He was always trying to break my balls, and I must admit that I threw back an equal amount of hate at him, going so far as to tell him to shut up one night when he was trying to figure out what I'd done on a show that went out over the air. When I left for home later on, I was positive that I would be fired. Instead, he took away my extra hours to teach me a lesson.

I still have a healthy contempt for him, and he for me. We crossed paths in Tower Records recently, and he saw me and took the long way around one of the aisles. I smirked at him and nodded, making it known that I did indeed see him. I'm sure that, after I was laid off, he was wary of what I might do as "retaliation", but I really can't waste my time thinking about things like that. Besides, the best revenge is living well, I always say.

I have more, but those are the three that pop into my head immediately when I think of haters I've had the displeasure of dealing with; I guess I have that kind of face that makes people mad, or maybe it's the lack of concern for all things conventional. Maybe I remind people of someone who did them wrong once in their lives. I really can't sit here and think what it is about me that makes people mad, so I'll just say that it's because I act like a jerk sometimes.

However, I've never been a jerk to Dick. He just hates me because... no reason. I never did or said anything to him directly that would make him hate me. And, even though I'd like to belt him in the gut for hurting Eve, she has asked me to refrain from any drama. All that means, to me, is that I won't egg him on, but if that little weasel ever brings it to me, he's going to get it back in spades. I won't instigate anything, but I will defend myself if necessary.

If he's smart, he'll leave my ass out of this. He doesn't want it with me.

Before we reached my work, Eve recalled a moment when all of our paths intersected, some time ago. Since Dick worked at the Italian restaurant across the street from the radio network, I'd occasionally see him with Eve and it would make me a little bit angry, but not enough to do anything about it. I held no beef against Dick, I was just peeved about how Eve was revolving her entire life around him.

Anyway, one day I was crossing the street, and I heard a car honking. I turned to look, and saw that it was Eve, driving with Dick sitting shotgun. She was yelling at the top of her lungs at the car in front of her, who was taking a long time to make a right turn at the busy intersection of Sepulveda and Ventura.

I had to laugh, because I was the reason that the car was taking a longtime to turn right. He had to wait for me to cross before he could go.

I made eye contact with Eve and Dick, and I quickly turned away, smirking like the cat who caught the canary. I didn't look back to see her reaction.

Eve told me that she had laughed as well, realizing how ridiculous she was being. This didn't make Dick too happy at the time. But then again, who cares what he thinks, then or now? He had his chance, and now he's making a mess of it all. And he probably hates me more than ever, while I feel nothing but sorry for him.

Eve doesn't hate him, but she is tired of him terrorizing her. I'm getting tired of it too, but it's up to her to take the necessary actions. She can call the cops anytime, but she is trying to give him a bit of slack because, even though she no longer loves him, she still cares. And even though Dick never let Eve communicate with me due to his jealousy, I figure I will not interfere with her relationship with him. I will not make a demand that she stop caring for him, because I'm not like that. Yes, Dick didn't afford me the same opportunity, but that's him-- he's petty and hateful and he's going to have to hit rock bottom before he starts getting a clue.

All I care about is that Eve is happy and safe, and so far I think I'm doing an okay job of it.