Fares B.

A few years ago I started reading a book series by Cara Black about a private detective in Paris. The first book was set in 1994 and centered around hate crimes against Jewish people and the murder of a WWII survivor. It was a great book and I highly recommend the series. Beyond it being a great book, it resonated with me for a personal reason.
In college, I had two French pen pals. I started writing them during my freshman year. My next door neighbor had three pen pals and she gave me the addresses for two of them. One of them was a blonde haired surfer guy. He was really cool and even visited me once. We lost contact as school got harder and I got a boyfriend. I did look for and find him on Facebook after reading that book. We don't talk much as we're both married with children and working. But he's out there.
The other guy I did not find, though I looked. I really wanted to tell him something. A few weeks ago, this all came back up for me after reading a blog post about INXS. And I still felt like I needed to tell him something.
My pen pal's name is Fares. His last name starts with a B. Part of the reason​ I couldn't find him a few years ago is that I probably spelled his name wrong. He always asked me not to butcher his name but he never would email me so I had it in a readable format. He wrote with a block handwriting that I just couldn't fully decipher.
The relationship had a rocky start. He couldn't understand why my neighbor stopped writing him and I hated being in the middle. He kept asking me what was the matter with her and I didn't know what to tell him that wouldn't be insulting. She thought he was weird. I don't think he was. But he was INTENSE. He was very political and tried to explain it to me. He tried to tell me about the prejudice and hatred toward Jewish people and other immigrants in France, including his family. I didn't get it. I had seen racism. I was born in the South after all. But I thought it was black and white. That was the extent of my experience with racist people. I thought if your skin was light you wouldn't have a problem.
I naively thought antisemitism had been shut down. He tried to tell me how wrong I was. At 18, I wasn't ready for the knowledge he was trying to impart. I just wanted to exchange letters with a cute French boy. And he was cute. He was also more socially aware than I was. It's not that I didn't care. But after he told me, I didn't know what I could do to help.
We tried to talk about other things, likes and dislikes and such. We shared cassette tapes. He sent me an INXS tape once. It was before I really discovered them. I thought they were all Devil Inside and Suicide Blonde. I got into them later. But at the time, I thought the tape, Shabooh Shoobah, was weird. I wound up giving it to a friend. What a jerk move. :/ Who knows what it cost him to send that and it was probably his personal tape! The irony is, one of my favorite songs of theirs, Don't Change, is off that album! After reading the blog about them, I binged listened to them. Don't Change makes me so sad. I was in a funk for days, thinking about 19 year old me and what I'd wasted. Mostly my relationship with Fares.
What I wish I could say to him is that I'm sorry and he deserved better. I'm sorry for being a blockhead. I'm sorry for being put off by your intensity. I'm sorry I stopped writing you. I wish I could find you to see how you turned out. I hope you have a happy home and that you've found acceptance in your country. I hope you have forgiven me. I hope when you think of me, IF you think of me, that you don't think I was a stupid hopeless case. I hope my airheadedness didn't put you off of other people from my demographic. And I hope you're still working for the underdog. I also want to say thank you. Thank you for trying to help me grow.