“Little pissant. Mother’s a whore!” The bully had emerald eyes that cut like a stone. Chris hated those eyes. He saw them in his nightmares.
It was cold on the playground. New York was experiencing a late winter in April. Chris was dressed in handme-down winter clothes. His glasses were too big for his face, and as a result, the other students often teased him. The seventh grade had been one trial after another, and he couldn’t wait for the year to end. He was always the butt of the bully’s jokes, and over time, the boy had awakened an anger in Chris that he had never felt before. It was rage!
“You know your mother is a whore, don’t you?” The bully mocked him, cornering Chris against the playground fence.
Chris swallowed his trepidation. “My mother is not a whore. Stop saying that.” His voice was soft and fearful.
“Oh, you gonna cry? Is that it?” The bully mashed Chris’s face against the fence. “You ain’t gonna do a thing. Are you?” He wrapped his knuckles against Chris’s skull.
By now there was an audience, and humiliation erupted in Chris’s heart as he attempted to defend himself by swatting the bully’s arm away.
“How dare you touch me, you filthy little pig!” The bully squeezed Chris’s skull while he struggled to break free.
“You think it’s all right for your dirty little hands to touch me?” The bully pushed Chris against the fence. The audience laughed. He punched Chris in the ribs, and the blow ripped the air from his lungs.
Chris cringed, cowering against the fence. The bully smacked his skull.
“Just leave him alone, George,” one of the girls watching said.
“Sucker put his hands on me. You all saw it.” Chris sucked back his tears.
“Not gonna fight back are you, little pissant?” George smirked.
Chris could barely breathe.
“That’s what I thought.” George stepped away. “You ever put your filthy little hands on me again, and I promise I’ll bury you where you stand,” he said. “I don’t need your whore disease coming on to me.”
The scene was over as George retreated with his friends to the playground. The humiliation was not.