Devil's Child - Part 1 - Bullies

It was too hot for October. The type of hot that made you want to jump into a bathtub full of ice cubes. Too bad a cold bath was only a pipe-dream. At least for now.

Sitting in Freshman English class was like burning in hell with the devil. As Mr. Naylor taught us about passive and active voice, I tried desperately to bring cooling relief to myself. But it didn't help that rotten James Edson was winging spitballs at my head. Come on. We're freshmen. Not eighth graders. He really needed to grow up.

Of course, James was every girl's dream. More than six feet of solid muscle, James was the star of the Freshman football team. When I saw him coming down the hall, I silently screamed, "Fear the Mullet!" for he had one of the biggest mullets I've ever seen in my entire life. It was the color of pee. And his eyes. Ugh! They made me cringe! They were slitted, blue, and mean, just like a cat's. His nose was kinda big, too, and his mouth was wide and filled with teeth whiter than mine. And I hated his guts.

Not that James didn't hate me right back. I was considered to be the school freak. Nobody liked me except for three people; Beth Kennedy, Brian Parker, and Gabriel Garwood. Other than that, everyone either hated me aggressively or from far away. Even the seniors enjoyed taking their turns hurling insults at me as I walked down the corridors, a notebook, folder, and reading book in hand. I sometimes wished a tornado would come and suck up all my enemies. Especially stupid James.

No girls liked me one bit. I was not quite as tall as James, but almost up there. But I was much thinner than him. My skin was pale as death, making a weird contrast with my dark, straight hair and huge eyes of ebony. Sure, some of my relatives and friends of the family told me I was handsome, but when almost an entire school hated your guts, the idea was hard to fathom. Plus, I dressed in all black. Witchy goth clothes, James said. I'd rather look like this than like him, that's for sure. At least I didn't beat people up to prove my masculinity.

I reached back and picked a spitball off the back of my T-shirt. I flung it at the ground, disgusted.

"Is there a problem back there?" Mr. Naylor asked. "Stanleigh Kretsch, what do you think you're doing by throwing all those spitwads on the floor?"

My throat locked up as I stared intensely into his eyes. I rarely ever talked. Whenever I was forced to, my voice sounded hoarse. My throat always hurt and my mouth was always as dry as a desert. As I reluctantly opened my lips, I discovered how dry and chapped they were. "Ummmm...I didn't do that," I said in a voice so low that he had me repeat it.

"Listen to Stanny talk." James cackled. "Did the cat have your tongue for too long, Stanleigh?"

Beth, who was also in the class with me, spun on James. "Why don't you stop acting like a middle schooler and leave him alone? You threw those spitballs and you know it!"

"Did you really throw those, James?" Mr. Naylor raised his eyebrows.

The whole class chorused, "Yes."

"Pick them all up this instant or else I will send you to the office! Do you want that?" How deadly he could make his voice seem when he wanted to. I wiped the film of sweat off my forehead. I felt so ugly, I wanted to crawl into a hole and die. But seeing James crouched down on the floor, picking up after himself, gave me a sense of happiness. Too bad it would be short-lived. As soon as I got home, I knew I would get bawled out by my wretched father for something.



The smell of mystery meat attacked us as we filed into the lunch room like mechanical people. I stood in line with Beth, lunch card in hand. This year, our school decided to waste some money on a new lunch system, along with building a whole new wing for the science and music department. Instead of lunch tickets, we had cards. We made deposits; the lunch people just scanned the cards and took money from our account. My card was already falling apart, despite it's lamination. And the new wing already had some graffiti scribbled on a small section that said, Winslow High Bites. Another few dollars was spent painting over that. Our school is so in the hole now it's no longer funny.

"Could the food be any worse?" Beth stuck out her tongue in disgust. "Hamburger helper?"

"Yeah, this school can spend hundreds of dollars on new uniforms for the entire football team, but they can't spend it on the art department or on edible food. Seriously, in art, we don't even have new canvases available to us; we have to paint over old ones," I complained.

Beth smirked. "I hate this jockist community."

The smell of Tommy Girl cologne attacked me before I heard a wicked laugh. I turned around to see yet another one of my enemies, Courtney Kerrigan. She was one of James's good friends. Accompanied by James's girlfriend, Katie Bryant, she began ragging on me about getting James in trouble.

"You think you're something, huh? Getting James into trouble? No wonder why you have no friends! You glorify in trying to destroy the reputations of other people!" Courtney accused.

"Go away, Courtney," Beth snapped. "We don't need your crap today."

"Oh?" Courtney made a face of mock surprise. "And who are you to talk? Ya know, Beth, people around here have been saying that you wear way too much make-up!"

"Yeah? People say you don't wear enough make-up. Now grow up, go away, and leave us alone. Be gone!" Beth said with a flick of her wrist. I turned my back on Katie and Courtney, not wanting to deal with any of their silly insults. Besides, they were never good at insulting people or threatening, so it really didn't hurt all that much. It was just annoying.

For the rest of the day, I couldn't help but think how much I couldn't wait to graduate. Only seven semesters, one quater, and a few days left until graduation...

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