Scout has been bothered by one of her classmates.
We'll call him Phil, because he has kind of a plain old name that's kind of like Phil. She's bothered by him because she likes him, thinks he has a goofy laugh. She seems just all around kind of fascinated by him. But he swears too much.
He goes around muttering at no one in particular but so others can hear, words like "bitch," and "shit." As he walks down the hall, he's seen surreptitiously giving people the finger, behind his back.
As I say, Scout likes Phil, and has been complaining to me often about his constant swearing.
Finally one day last week she told me she'd tried to help Phil.
"Phil," she told him, probably after a fair amount of consideration about what to say, how to say it and when, and probably after screwing up some amount of courage, "people don't like you because you swear too much."
"Fuck you," Phil said.
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