“Asshole,” the voice grunts, “think I forgot about that stunt you and your coach pulled in the weight room?”

“No,” I squeak out as a hand shoves my head, smushing my right ear against the fins of a locker’s air vents. The hand presses harder, squeezing my skull and flattening my cheek, so my plea gets distorted. “Preesh jush let go.”

“And think we’re just going to forget about the piss on our uniforms?”

“Nuh-uh.”

“Or you dropping that squirrel back in Scott’s locker?”

Man, we—correction, I!—am screwed!

“You like wedgies?” the voice hisses as a hand reaches into my pants, grabs the back of my underwear and jerks the waistband up behind me. Feels like a rope’s lynching my nuts and ass crack.

Hanes tighty whities cut through my thighs as my feet leave the ground.

“Goddammitmotherfuckerassholeshitbucket!” I squeal.

“You like that?” The voice laughs huskily, and I’m gasping as the pain between my legs turns into something that makes me want to black out.

“Leave him alone,” a girl’s voice pleads.

“Go fuck yourself, raghead.”

“Hey, assface!” Another girl’s voice—not pleading, demanding—joins in. “Let him go before I kick my boot up your fat ass.”

The wedgie slumps, dropping me back to the ground. Relief—sweet relief—floods my groin. I can finally turn my head to confirm that yes, indeed, assface is Tom Jankowski, the big blob I beat in Coach’s leg lifts competition. Then I see a caramel-skinned Indian girl hugging her books to her chest, doing her best to come to my defense. Even scared shitless, even with my nuts throbbing from near castration by wedgie, I still can’t help noticing the girl’s long dark lashes and her large eyes. They’re fearful, now, and her forehead furrows with fright and that makes me love her all the more. Her name is Indira. She’s a junior, but compared to Tom, she looks like I do—a dwarf caught in the land of giants.

“What’s that, dyke?” Tom asks a goth girl stepping protectively in front of Indira and wearing steel-toed Doc Martens boots. Though she’s not much bigger than me or Indira, goth girl looks like she might actually enjoy tearing Tom’s throat out with her teeth.

“Tina,” Indira cautions, still hugging her books with one arm while using the other hand to restrain her friend. Don’t hold her back, I think. Let her kick Tom’s ass.

“Listen to the raghead, dyke,” Tom says.

“Why, you—” Tina starts, but Indira cuts her off.

“Tina, stop it,” Indira whispers. Other students close in around us, sniffing blood and humiliation. Tom moves toward Tina and Indira, forgetting about me. He is rhinoceros-big. I thought guys weren’t ever allowed to hit girls but something in Tom’s face tells me he feels different.

“Real tough guy,” Tina says loud and clear, not backing down an inch. She holds up her pinky finger. “That about the size of your little weenie?” she taunts. “That why you need to act so tough?”

Students around us start laughing.

Tom’s forehead and cheeks go from white to pink while the streak of zits on his neck flames. He moves within punching distance as his hands turn to fists. If only I were the size of—

“TRY IT!” Tina wails loud enough to stop all other noise and movement. “Try it and I’ll kick you so hard in the nuts you’ll be coughing ’em out!” She shifts into a karate stance, her heavy boots planted and ready to kick a hole through drywall. Tom stops. His cheeks grow a volcanic shade of pink, eyes darting from Tina to Indira to me and then at the crowd of students. He’s a giant, but Tina has everyone convinced she’s tough and crazy. Indira just looks ill.

“What’s going on here?” Mr. Warren, the senior chemistry teacher, demands. His jowls flap like a hound dog’s as he waddles toward us. Mr. Adams, the geometry teacher, rushes up from the opposite side.

“Nothing,” Tom grumbles, not taking his eyes off Tina. He’s bigger than both teachers. Tina stays in her karate stance, ready to Bruce Lee the entire hallway. Mr. Warren puts his hand on her shoulder and she flinches it off.

“Young lady, that’s about enough!” Mr. Warren snaps.

“Tell him that!” Tina screeches.

Damn! I think, admiring her more with every passing second.

“Sorry, Mr. Warren,” Tom says through clenched teeth. “These three girls must’ve run out of tampons.” He makes sure to catch my eye as well as Tina’s and Indira’s.

“Just get to class,” Mr. Warren tells him. “And you”—he points at Tina—“are coming to the office with me right now. I won’t stand for this type of behavior.”

“Something bothering you?” Bruce asks me while we’re rolling out the three large wrestling mats we use for the floor exercise event.

“Yeah.” I grunt because the big wrestling mats are heavy as hell and it takes half our team to get them unrolled and taped together. “I almost got murdered today, thanks to you.”

“Me?”

“Jankowski wasn’t such a big fan of our little piss stunt. Or the return of the squirrel.”

“We were recycling the squirrel,” Bruce corrects, snickering.

“It’s not funny, dude.” I sniff. We’ve got the first mat unrolled and are walking back to start on the next one. “Jankowski tried pushing my head through a wall,” I say, not mentioning the wedgie part, “and then I had to get saved by two girls.”

“Oh, shit, dude, that was you?” Fisher jumps in. “I heard two hellcats almost clawed Jankowski’s eyes out in the hallway after he wedgied a freshman right up off the ground.” Fisher slaps the rolled mat we’re pushing, then bursts out laughing.

“I heard that one girl is a psycho,” Gradley adds from Fisher’s other side. “She tried to hit one of the teachers that came out to stop it. Or tried to bite him or something. Heard he has to go get an AIDS test, now.”

“No shit?” Fisher asks, still chuckling. “Wish I had a girl like that hanging around, waiting to protect me. Did you get her number, Danny?”

I don’t say anything, just push against the mat, trying to get it rolling. I’m trying to make sure my eyes don’t tear up. I can’t stand it when they tear up. It’s like it proves I really am a baby.

“It’s not funny, Fish,” Bruce says. I can tell he’s watching me as we unroll the big mat. “We’ll get ’em,” Bruce says quietly. “Trust me. We’ll get ’em.”

“’Course we will,” Fisher says on my other side. “Count on it.”

I wait for a second until I know I won’t cry. “I don’t want to get anybody,” I mumble at the mat. “We get them, and then they get us or just get me again. It won’t stop and they’re way bigger.”

“Danny, you can’t just let them run around beating on you or some other kid and think they can get away with it,” Bruce says, huffing as he puts his shoulder into rocking the third mat to unroll. “It ain’t right.”

“Great routine.” Bruce holds out a chalky fist and we touch knuckles. My whole meet goes that way: me killing on all my routines while all I’m really imagining is killing Jankowski. High bar is the last event and I’m last up. By now, I’ve imagined 197 different variations on how to completely torture and destroy Tom Jankowski if I were the size of Tom Jankowski. Or Kurt Brodsky. Walking over to the bar, escorted by Coach Nelson, I’ve exhausted all mental scenarios involving power tools, lawn mowers, sewage treatment plants, uranium pellets, bedbugs, exotic snakes, ferrets, piranha, Tina’s boots, an Iranian women’s soccer team, and, perhaps, a wood-chipper. I’m beginning scenarios involving large circus animals, clown suits, and shark chum as I stand waiting for the judge’s signal that I can jump up and begin my best event. Absently, I glance over to my teammates, all clapping for me, and then my eyes wander out into the almost bare bleachers, maybe hoping Dad snuck in at the last minute.

“No suicide trick today, right?” Coach whispers. “It’s not quite ready.”

“No,” I say out the side of my mouth, reassuring him. “No suicide. Not yet.”

“Okay, good.”

Out in the bleachers, all seventeen attendees have been joined by two more bodies. I make sure my eyes aren’t playing tricks on me.

“Danny,” Coach prods. “Judge is ready.”

“Huh?” I ask, not paying attention because I’m seeing person eighteen, Tina, the girl who saved me today. But that’s only half of it. Person number nineteen is Kurt Brodsky, sitting off by himself like mob muscle come to finish the job Tom didn’t get to in the hallway.

“Danny.” Coach puts his hand on my shoulder. “He’s ready for you.”

Oh, yeah, he’s ready for me, I think. He’s going to kill me dead after this meet. Son of a bitch!

“Let’s go.” Coach pushes me forward. I shake my head, raise my hand to the judge without seeing him, then leap up for the bar with Coach’s help. Tom Jankowski leaves my head, replaced by Kurt Brodsky just sitting out there watching. And Tina, the goth warrior? What’s up with that? My body drills through on autopilot while my mind races. I’m sailing around the bar smoothly, letting my arms and legs think for me. I could show them, show both of them I’m somebody. Show off for Tina, say thank you. And for Kurt and his Orcs, give him a message that I’m more than a kid they can beat on whenever they want.

I throw the suicide.

I place it right after my V-hinge grip change, add an extra two loops for speed, and chuck it without really thinking about what I’m doing until I’m upside down in the air above the bar and my mind finally wakes up, screaming What the fuck are you doing?!?!?!

A sharp intake of breath from somewhere below confirms I’m in trouble. Then everything goes quiet as I come out of my second somersault above the bar and blindly stretch my hands out hoping something connects and it’s not my neck, nose, or lips. I’ll even take a shoulder.

The bar smacks the meat of my palms and my fingers snare it for dear life. My legs keep swinging down and back up. I think I hear the universe—that is to say, all nineteen people in the bleachers plus my teammates plus the other team plus the coaches and judges—release their breath at the same time, then hoot and whistle and start clapping. I finish with my safe full twist layout and hit the mat without a single misstep or deduction.

“Yeeeaaahhh!” Bruce hollers across the entire gymnasium. He’s running at me full tilt, pumping his arms.

“Jesus, kid!” Coach slaps my back. “You really are trying to give me a heart attack. I thought we said no suicide.”

“We did,” I say, smirking. “I forgot.”

It’s the best score I’ve ever made on high bar, only a couple tenths away from the high score at last year’s state meet.

“Scared me half to death, son,” the judge says to me at the end of the meet. “But I can’t wait to see that again at the end of the season.”

Amid the fist bumps and high fives and backslaps that create a chalk cloud around me, I stare out into the bleachers. Parents and girlfriend are coming down to congratulate us on our first win.

Kurt’s gone.

So’s Tina.