city from the countryside, and even though it was much closer to the city, it was only twenty-two miles away in the same county— same old suburbs. But something was rotten in this town.
Right from the beginning, they gave me a hard time. The school district administrators wanted to put me back a grade from the middle of third to second. They claimed their school district was on a higher level and argued I wouldn’t be able to keep up. Even though I had state test scores that put me in the top 97th percentile. Even though I had all satisfactory grades. Even though we were in the same county in the same state with the same standards of learning. Even though the old town was far nicer with lower crime and higher ranked schools. None of those factors mattered. Their decision didn’t have any logic. Maybe they just wanted to punish me because they were superior and I was just some new poor punk they could toss around. I was probably just a number to them. They probably had too many kids in third and not enough in second. We didn’t even fight it. I was told, “just accept it and move on.” Is that a strike two or three? You take my old town, my lake, my friends, my cat, and now my grade. My mother couldn’t stand up to those bullies and there were other battles to be fought. Just fitting in with the students was going to be a battle in itself, but this would be for me to deal with on my own.
In school, I was pushed around by several kids the first year. Some of the kids were ruthless. Throwing things, kicking me as they walked by my desk, knocking books out of my hands. A kid named Aaron chased me at recess and then tried to sneak up on me from behind a metal garbage barrel. I kicked the barrel to scare him off and it smacked him right in the face. Aaron held up his hands and then looked down at the blood. I was the only one suspended.
I had broken another boy’s nose and this would cost me more punishment. At one point a mob of kids yelled “get him”-— only extinguished by the appearance of a teacher. The lash back lasted about a week. Kids have a short attention span.
$$$
I’ll never forget the first fight I saw. A kid named Mark in the grade above me took down this other kid named Bobby. Mark pinned him to the ground and hunched over him with punches. Bobby was bloody but refused to give up at first. Mark continued to bash Bobby’s head into someone’s front lawn until he lay motionless. At that moment, Mark seemed like the toughest kid in the world. It was a sickening sight— two little children really— one bashing in the other’s head. Bobby was so humiliated that his family took him out of school and moved away. The whole fight was apparently over something Bobby had said. I guess he misspoke. Better watch what you say around here. At least I didn’t have it like Bobby.
$$$The petty harassment went on until another new kid named Steven Roberts befriended me and chased my attackers off of the playground.
“Leave him alone,” he told them, and they listened.
“Don’t let them dorks bother you.”
“Thanks. I’m Jack.”
“I’m Steven. They don’t like me either. Who cares, right?”
Steven had moved to the town the year before and had had some incidents with the kids, but they knew to leave him alone. He was a loner, but a dangerous one. He was awkward as if he were years older than he really was. If he didn’t fit into the existing scheme of things he was going to start his own clan, and I was the start of it.
We found each other on the playground and realized we had an alliance. Kids immediately stopped picking on me. Though we were still outcasts, Steven and I began a path to respect. Our base of friends was limited, but it was only a matter of time.
$$$
Outside of school there was a kid in my neighborhood, who used to tell me on the street,
“I’m gonna tear your face off.”
He’d tell me this right before he’d chase me for blocks until I outran him through bushes, yards, and across busy streets. I ran like hell. I always managed to escape even when he had the advantage of being older and having a Mongoose bike he’d stolen from Danny down the block. John was about three years older than me and obviously taller. He had messy, sandy blond hair, deep-set blue eyes, and a smirk that terrified me. He always seemed to be waiting to come out of his hiding spot in his yard. Eventually, I realized which house he lived in and got smart by walking home on the other side of the street, but that still didn’t stop him.
Known in the neighborhood as Crazy John, he at least had the courtesy to ask before the chase ensued whether I wanted it now or later, my face torn off, that is. I always answered him with a scream and a run as if he were some horror movie monster, and I think we both played into the drama. Really how could someone tear a face off in broad daylight and get away with it, yet be unable to capture the face in the first place? Of course, I didn’t think about this logic as he came after me like a madman. When the rush of adrenaline subsided, I always celebrated my escape. Crazy John terrorized me for an entire summer and several more months. The ordeal made me realize I wasn’t such a bad runner.
One day our chase ended up right in front of Steven’s house. It was heading right for the highway and who knows what would’ve happened if I had tried to dodge the speeding cars and trucks. Steven stepped out in front of us. He pushed me to the side and motioned John to stop. John went right for him talking smack in his face, but Steven didn’t back down to the older kid. He returned the lip service and then all of a sudden the two of them were going punch for punch. Steven began to double up. For every hit John landed, Steven scored two. John’s mouth was gushing and Steven’s nose was running with red. John attempted to end it all by slamming Steven’s head into the telephone pole in front of his own house. Steven stopped right in his tracks, grabbed the back of John’s hair, and rammed his face into the pole, once, twice, three times, and one final fourth grand slam that turned John around and sent him walking home. Steven shouted at him as he walked away,
“Don’t mess with him again.”
Steven gave me a thumbs up, wiped the blood from his nose with his wrist, and walked right into his house. No one had fallen. Both were a bloody mess. But I and several on-lookers who had gathered from the surrounding houses all knew Crazy John had been defeated, and he had been beaten by a kid three years younger than him. John never chased me again.
$$$
One other kid had bullied me around a little— just for kicks. Paul Roma demanded I do push ups and run in circles, and I obliged. I think he had seen too many military movies. I did the pushups laughing, which angered him more. I enjoyed the exercise. It wasn’t until he threatened to meet me out after school that I became concerned. That day I exited a different door and took a different way home. Outsmart the hunter. I can remember the panic, the rush as I escaped out the other side of the building, and it reminded me of bad dreams I had had of Hulk Hogan in the character of Thunderlips chasing me through the neighborhood and busting down every door I hid behind.
On one occasion, Paul’s older sister even got in on it. I remember looking out the door and seeing Marie waiting outside the school clenching her fists. Once again, I found a different exit. With a big Italian family, I feared he had enough sisters and brothers to block every entrance of the school if he wanted.
One day he came to school with a cast on his arm. He had fallen and broken it. The next day I got there early and left a Mauled Paul Garbage Pail Kid card on his desk. Paul arrived and became enraged when he saw the trading card with a beat up kid who bore his name. He slapped the hard cast into the palm of his other hand threatening to get whoever it was that left the card. This was met with laughter from most of the kids in the room.
We never did fight. He didn’t scare me the way Crazy John had.
