Chapter 2
My relationship with Abigale, which is her full name, was always an oddity from the very beginning. Because of a change in the school zoning changes in our city, Abby ended up coming to my elementary school even though her parents lived on the rich side of town.
To put it politely, Abigale came from a very wealthy family who lived in a small mansion that had a chauffeur, a maid staff, a kitchen staff and a butler that held it all together.
My house was just this side of the wrong side of the railroad tracks and we were barely in middle class range. Our three bedroom house was actually half of a duplex.
There was never any class awkwardness between me and Abby from the very start. The only thing we focused on was that we liked each other better than the other students and we hung out together in almost everything we did.
While I was waiting to take the bus to go home, I would wave to Abby as she climbed into the fancy limo that drove her home. It wasn’t till high school that I heard one of the other kids on the buss call her a stuck up rich bitch that the difference in our station in life came to my attention.
It had never occurred to me that we were different because she rode to school and home in a limo while I was stuck taking a bus with dozens of other kids. It never occurred to me that could make a difference.
I sat down next to the boy with the big mouth and elbowed him in the ribs. “Maybe you should be careful about how you talk about other people,” I told him. He was the first high school boy I ever corrected for saying that Abby was a rich bitch.
Word about Jack’s protective streak concerning Abby caught fire like a grass fire the next day. When the boy told his buddies that I had jabbed him in the ribs, they came to confront me at lunch.
The small group of six boys crowded around me out in the main court yard.
They were led by a red head boy named Jimmy, the school’s main bully.
“I heard you jabbed my friend in the ribs because he said something about this fat, snooty little bitch,” Jimmy said as his eyes raked up and down Abby’s body.
“Maybe you would try to take a jab at me,” Jimmy snarled while he swung his right hand and slugged me in the right shoulder.
Jimmy was about to say something else but he never got the chance.
My right arm arched around in a right hook and hit jimmy right on the temple.
Jimmy dropped like a rock out cold. “Does anyone else have anything to say?” I growled.
The five other boys stepped back and sort of cowered in front of me.
The large crowd of people who had gathered around us was stunned that I had just punched out the big school bully. At first there was dead silence. And then, suddenly, they all started clapping.
I was still smiling about their reaction when the principal suspended me for the rest of the week for fighting. Although I knew my mom would be mad, I knew my dad would be proud of me that I stood up to the school bully.