Without Mercy

A Short Story

I’ll tell you what it was, it was when that kid Mike decided to start on me. That's when I’d had enough. He was one of those avoider types. You’ve seen them. The chewing gum under the desk, spit on your shoe types that have hate coming out their pores. This was a real mean one. A real piece of work. Late to class everyday. My skin crawled each time he walked in the room, I didn’t even have to look at him. He had this clicker, a tiny red laser pointer he’d shine in your eyes and it made me mad, his black eyes peering over his shoulder. Scum. That classroom made me sick. That red dot travelling around. The smell of acrylic paint and decaying paper. The scratching of pens set my teeth on edge. It was the kind of place that made you feel thin, even in a coat you’d shiver, like there was a sickness sat inside you. Just waiting for you to rest so it could wallop you and then you’d sink into that dark cold pit until it swallowed you up. This time though I couldn’t take it. I trained my eyes on my paper but each time I looked up his stupid red light was in my eyes and beyond it I could just see his silhouette. Before I knew it I was stood up. Everyone's eyes were on me. He didn’t even stop pointing the dumb light in my face and I said “Hey Mike. Get that light outta my eyes right now.” The crimson glow left my eyes and for a second all I saw was white spots. Then it was just their eyes for that second in time, just me and their eyes. He stood. 

“What are you going to do?” 

I looked to my teacher. I gave her a chance. I really did. But she failed. I did what he didn’t expect. I snatched the light from him, just took it out of his cold clammy hands. I bet you expect me to tell you that I shone it in his eye, well I didn't. The truth is I froze. Seeing that I’d turned to stone, Mike's ugly bulldog face crinkled into a smile. That smile was without mercy. His fist connected with my skull and the next minute I was in the headmaster's office. I wasn’t crying but he was. There we were. Sat on those weird scratchy wheely chairs they have in offices and Mike was the one crying. Bawling his eyes out he was, like a puffed up pink pig. Do you know the worst part? I couldn’t. For the life of me, sat there with that purple bruise the shape of Mike's fist on my forehead I couldn’t squeeze out a single tear. There he was blubbering away and that's how he went unpunished. He cried his way out of it.