TATER

Mrs. Carlton turned on her heel and started back towards her desk at the front of her 3rd grade classroom.  She had just finished passing back the results of the quiz her students had taken, corrected in bright red ink.  She touched his back, and ruffled his hair a bit as she passed him, a sympathetic and knowing half smile on her face.  She passed out papers and quizzes based on grades, best to worst.  He shrunk a little into his slender frame, a redness appearing like a rash on his fair and freckled cheeks.  He looked down at the mimeographed paper, it's blue and white colors fresh and unmarred by the violent red slashes so prevalent on the wounded pages and faces of those surrounding him.  In the upper right corner, he saw her note to him "You're a pleasure to have in class!  A+", underlined with a bright red smiley face.  He felt his lip tremble a little bit, and dared not turn his head to scan the faces of those behind him. 

He crossed his arms and buried his mop of red hair in his arms, taking in the familiar scent of the ink on that strange slippery paper, as he felt his heart in his throat, beating a steady rhythm of panic.  It was the smell of torment.  His mind was numb and bumbling, failing him in his time of need, full of fear and adrenaline and empty of the many escape routes he had planned earlier in the day.  He had known with a dread certainty this moment would come, that Mrs. Carlton wouldn't change her practice of placing his results before him first or second, that she would single him out with a gesture or touch, and would hold him up as an example to his shamed tormentor holding court in the rear of the classroom, Jim Green, the hulking goliath whose father was a drunk, and who had been held back twice between kindergarten and third grade.

He was intimately familiar with Jim Green.  Had felt his heavy body stretched out upon his own, had felt his embrace and warm breath upon his throat as his arms constricted his breathing in a head lock.  He knew the feel of those big hands upon his body, their frenzied slamming as they sought out the soft spots to efficiently mete out pain before a teacher, principle, or parent could separate him from his purpose.  He knew the feel of those big clumsy feet as they swung up to strike his tender stones, and the coldness and abject hatred of those dead brown eyes staring into his, impenitent as he delivered his fury with a calculated efficiency born from the sins of a father.

He had been singled out, culled from the heard of fresh young faces the very first day he arrived at Jefferson Elementary, and was asked to introduce himself to the sea of strange faces staring back at him.  He suffered the giggles and scorn as he stuttered out his name with a heavy southern drawl, noted the silent disapproval of eyes rolling upwards as he explained to unsympathetic ears that he was from Arkansas, and his father had been "trans-furred causa work".  He was not only new, but markedly different.  A double whammy he knew would get him attention he so desperately didn't want.  He held his own that first year, as he adjusted to the unknown sarcasm and swear words hurled at him.  He would fight at the drop of a hat, sometimes winning, sometimes not, but slowly garnering the respect of his classmates.  He thought he had blended into his surroundings until third grade brought him Jim Green.  Though his draw and stuttering had dissipated, they didn't escape Jim's detection, nor did his consistent high marks.  The second week into the new school year had started with an ambush on the way home, while he was walking home with his best friend Ted.  He felt a presence rush up behind him, and then blinding pain which left him curled up on the ground holding his nuts.

"Where you girls heading?  You gonna go play dolls?"  He sneered and chuckled.

"Does teacher's widdle pet have a sore dingus?  Poor baby.  Nice A+ dickwad!  You think you're better than me?"

"Naw, just smarter." he stammered back.  Wrong choice of words.  Ted ran off for help, as Jim launched a new assult, kicking the wind out of him.  He tried to duck and cover from the rain of blows descending from the hulking, angry body leering over him.

His father had stressed the importance of not giving an inch, of fighting back.  He had even attempted to teach him to box in the backyard after he had come home teary eyed and bloody two times in the same week.  When he failed to enthusiastically embrace the art of fighting, his father had thrown his hands up in disgust and stomped back into the house.

"You're just gowin to keep bein picked on if you don't fawt back, son!" 

How do you fight back against a semi-retarded giant intent on your imminent destruction?

He had tried to blend in by purposely lowering his performance on papers and tests, but that just resulted in a parent teacher conference and a trip to the woodshed.  There had simply been nowhere to hide. 

He heard the bell ring, and the shuffle of books being hurriedly shoved into desks, as his classmates scurried to grab their jackets and head outdoors to the beckoning late Spring afternoon.  He looked down at his clumsy boots, and realized in horror that he had miscalculated.  He should have gone to the nurse's office, or asked to use the restroom earlier and ducked out of school before the bell rang.  If he were to hang out, he would eventually be asked to leave, and Green and his buddies would just be waiting and grinning like a pack of jackals.  He could feel his eyes starting to well up, readying themselves to spill over in shame and humiliation.  Why him?  Why always him?  There were smarter, uglier, fatter, kids who could have taken some of the heat, but were always left unscathed.  He cursed to himself, put his books away and slouched out of the classroom, trudging to meet his fate.  In his mind he fantasized the bloodbath of his sweet revenge.  Hammer blows to the face, a long sword lopping off that savagely grinning head, the feel of the heavy steel trigger in his unmerciful grip, and the slow steady pull which kept the bullets flying straight to their mark.  He would stand over Green and empty those barrels into his jerking body until the blood flowed thick, and the twitching subsided.  He relished the idea of watching his head explode in a blast of brain pulp, and skull fragments, mimicking the carnage he saw nightly in the news reports on Viet Nam.  He took a deep breath, holding onto the little bolster of confidence his dark fantasies gifted him, and headed out into the pleasant brilliance of the earthy and damp afternoon.

He walked down Bryant Avenue, his head scanning left, then right, every sense on high alert, his heartbeat rapid and strong.  The crossing guard at the intersection at Hill and Bryant nodded, and waded to the middle of the crosswalk, waving him onward.  He made the cross and was halfway down the street before he heard the footfalls and heavy breathing coming up behind him.  Without looking back, he sprinted towards a maple tree on his right, grabbed the thick lower branch, and swung himself upwards.  He was twelve feet off the ground and ready to keep scaling upward as he turned to see the hulking form of Jim Green bent at the waist and panting, straddling the sidewalk a few feet from the base of his perch.

"Don't make me come there and get you, faggot."  he wheezed.  "If I have to climb up there, I'm gonna beat the living shit out of you."

He felt something in him click.  His vision was red tinged and concentrated, his body twitching with anger, and the need to explode.  He gazed down at his heavy boots and was struck by a crazy idea.

"Fuck you, Jim!  If you want to kick my ass, your going to have to climb up here and pull me down!"

Green walked to the base of the tree, taking the bait, and jumped up to catch his hands around the lower branch.  He made his move, letting go of the branch he was clinging to, landing with all his might onto those fat, merciless hands.  He felt a sickeningly sweet crunch through the soles of his boots, and the heady scream of Jim Green.  He jumped to the ground in a flash, and before he could even register it, He had delivered a swift kick to Jim's balls, sending him sprawling to the ground.  He lost himself in a sea of red, blind and oblivious to his surroundings.  He was dancing in his mind, feeling the body submit to his fury of stomps and kicks, feeling no pain as his stubbed his toes on Jim Green's skull.  He could hear somewhere in the distance the screams and curses, so guttural, intense, and righteous.  He realized they were coming from himself, after the crossing guard had finally managed to pull him off his victim and lock him still in her embrace.  He broke down and cried after his temper was dowsed, seeing the bloody whimpering boy that had tormented him all year.  He cried silently in frustration, in joy, in exhilaration, and in grief. " Why couldn't he just leave me alone?"  He  took a sober inventory of the carnage he wrought, and hoped that this would finally be the end of being picked on.

Jim Green returned to school with a cast on his right hand,  black eyes, two missing teeth and a broken nose, from what the other kids could see.  He no longer spoke in class, or managed to stare anyone down with those  brown eyes of his.  He stared Jim down when he came back to the classroom, and knew that he had broken something inside far more substantial than dentistry. He was now on top, and kids who were once his detractors, were now getting out of his way.   He realized a year later, as he stared down with ruthless blue eyes while kicking the faggot ass of  Gordy "the Gaylord" Spermstien, that breaking the stuff inside, was immensely more satisfying than the outward stuff.   No matter what he had to do , or who he had to hurt, he would never allow himself to be picked on again.