High school is hell, but a high school bully, self-named Danger, contributed more than his share to my hell on earth. Not just in school. Everywhere. Even my after school jobs. I longed for revenge.
After school jobs were easy to get in the 60’s. Job hunting meant getting three jobs in one day and picking the best. The winner was a drug store. A sixteen year old’s dream: being able to gaze and be near the prophylactics, kept behind the counter, and absorb their maturity. Unfortunately my job was mostly delivery boy, using their battered “professional delivery bicycle.” The bike’s metal sign caught wind blasts that almost blew me down a few times. A toy, handlebar bell, alerted Chicago traffic to my invisibility. Ever ride the bicycle in a foot of snow, as cars spinning on the ice, head toward you?
Rain was great, though. I’d shower under clogged roof gutters and my tips doubled.
So I’m in the center of a busy intersection, terrified as cars from all directions are doing the yellow light, pedal to the metal stomp. Rain slick pavement. Sound of a car radio blaring rock, an Ooooooga horn and I know Danger is near. “Hey fairy!” he screams.
“Get him!” cries Danger’s second in command.
I’m deluged with sticky soft drinks and milk shakes. Girls giggling and the smell of the car’s exhaust. The wind punches the bike’s sign, my feet slide on the slick pavement, and I hit the ground as hubcaps blur by.
I returned to the pharmacy, still shaking and white from the precipice of death. “You’re dripping again,” barked the pharmacist. I fought to keep my thoughts to myself, but he wasn’t making it easy. “You represent the pharmacy. How does that make us look?”
Bursting, my face went from white to red : “As cheap as that broken down, dangerous bike I have to ride. I hear businesses make make deliveries with cars these days. By the way, I don’t think your breath adds anything to our image.” Oh what the hell; I was on a roll. “And none of your jokes are funny – no matter how many times you tell them or what stupid voices you use.”
After being fired, I moved up a dime an hour to eighty five cents working as a theater usher. With Danger. We communicated with insults and dirty looks.
In place of a starched white dress shirt, we wore a cardboard dickey. And one size fits all pants. We pulled them up and stapled them to our cardboard dickey. A smelly, oversized sport coat hid all that and kept the ensemble from looking totally ludicrous.
Maybe it was Danger’s attitude that made him look cool even through he was similarly dressed in old cardboard and shapeless, colorful cloth. I hated him.
We were told to throw out three twelve year olds, who were screaming and throwing more food than was allowed. Danger loved assignments like that. He shined his flashlight in their face and in his best Elvis/Brando tone, growled, “Get out.”
Two of the kids got up. The third just sat there. “My dad’s a rich lawyer and he said you can’t make me.” The kid took it up another notch. “You Auntie Cement!”
The audience’s gasp sucked the screen back a foot. No one ever challenged Danger. Food stopped flying. Danger’s friends, who he snuck in for free, were watching. His reputation was on the line. Danger was uneasy. I jumped in with an idea. “Get out or Danger will bash your teeth down your throat.”
Danger looked at me, trying to figure what the hell I was up to. The twelve year old nervously held his ground. “If he does, my dad will sue him and throw him in jail.”
The twelve year old had thrown down the gauntlet. Danger’s eyes betrayed his helplessness. “Twelve year olds don’t scare Danger,” I loudly announced.
The game of chicken was on. I turned to Danger. “You don’t want to get blood on your sport coat when you smash his teeth out. I’ll hold your coat.” Danger had no other option. Staring down the kid, he took off his coat.
Suddenly there he was: baggy pants stapled to a cardboard dickey, looking like a clown. Everyone’s imagination added the floppy shoes and red nose. The audience burst into laughter.
Danger quickly turned to me with an “I’m going to kill you” look. The quick turn tore the staples from his dickey and his pants felt down.
He was never able to revenge that.
My favorite HS bully produced his knife in the bathroom and demanded all my money, which was 50 cents.
Mohair sweaters were popular then, and he would pick the hair off them whenever anyone would wear one to school.
Our graduating class had 520 students. The school, in an effort to reduce self- esteem, published the class ratings, 1-520. A kid in our homeroom was around 515. So the bully announces to everyone, “Hey Manny, all you got to do is kill 519 kids and you’ll be number one!”