It’s funny how you remember little things about your first fight. I don’t remember how it started, or if it was during lunch. Maybe it was after school. I don’t even remember why Todd wanted to pound me. I do remember I was scared – my heartbeat was throbbing in my head so loud, it drowned out almost everything that was being said. There was no crowd of kids chanting “Fight! Fight! Fight! Fight!” like you usually see in school; I wasn’t that important. It was just Todd, Ogre, and a handful of lackeys – a nice even number, knowing you’re gonna get your face caved in. There was this orange traffic cone sitting next to the bench – I always thought it was out of place there. Like that girl playing hopscotch on the blacktop surrounding the park; she must have been close enough to overhear, but she ignored us completely.

Todd was your basic bully, not exactly brainy, but meaner than you’d expect – even counting how horrible his mom was to his dad, he was just mean by nature. Bigger than me by a couple inches, his red hair, ultra-pale blue eyes, and near lack of eyebrows made him look all the more ruthless. Ogre was two years older, and two years bigger – nearly four inches in every direction but smarts. Even though he was the scarier by a big margin, he must have had some complex, ’cause he was putty in Todd’s hands. Whatever the reason, Ogre put his pubescent muscle to work backing Todd from day one.

Todd’s arm was an accident. I wanna say that right now. I didn’t break his arm with martial arts or sheer strength – neither of those are things a geeky 7th grader has. Something—probably fear of death—made me rush him as he swung at me, and we toppled backwards, his arm between the slats of the bench as I fell over him. God, it seems so simple now – I’m sure at the time it must have been disorienting and chaotic. I don’t think he made any noise come to think of it, he just kinda went limp. Everything else got quiet real fast, too. That girl kept hopping as though no-one’s arm had just made a stomach-churning noise.

I was tryin’ to figure out which way was up, when a blinding pain seized my attention as Ogre’s foot came stomping down on my knee. Even though he was late to his master’s aide, that didn’t stop him from hauling me off the ground and off my feet. Then just as suddenly, he let go, slipping to the ground with the same eerie silence that Todd had maintained when I heard his arm snap.

I must have hit him with the small rock in my hand, I just don’t remember it. Then again, I don’t remember picking it up or spraining my wrist either. He was lying face down in the grass, breathing softly, blissfully unaware of the small cut on his head and the headache he’d wake up to.

Todd, as I look back at it, was never anything more than a collection of images. His hand on my throat, pinning me to my locker for looking at him wrong. His fist in my stomach, after talking to ‘his’ girl (who never had anything to do with him). The pieces of food that flew through the air at lunchtime, aimed at anyone he derided.

That day… that day he was made up of different pictures. His eyes wide with shock and the slack jaw. The wooden bench propping him up as he sat slumped next to the traffic cone. The lackeys drifting back to wherever they came from before they met him. A twisted limb and a tattered sleeve. A girl playing hopscotch.