Pat wasn’t supposed to be on his phone while he was driving the children on the bus, or even when he wasn’t, but when he saw the school was calling (as he checked his fantasy football scores) he knew it would be okay to answer.

“Hello?” he said, though it sounded more like “yellow” with the way he pronounced it. “Yes. Uh-huh. Yeah, I picked him up.” Pat looked up into the mirror above his head and directly at Johnny, “Connie, I can see him right here. He’s sitting two rows back. All right. I’ll be dropping them off in just a few and you can see him for yourself if you’d like. Okay, bye.”

Johnny had been reading a horror novel that was very much for adults, so he was very much afraid one might take it from him if they realized it. So when he suddenly heard Pat’s voice, his paranoia got the best of him and he stuffed the rather large library book into his backpack and kicked himself internally for risking it on the bus and then for not marking his page. Then Pat glared directly at him in the mirror.

“I can see him right here” he said, and Johnny’s heart went up in his throat. This is it, he thought, he saw me reading the book I shouldn’t be reading and he’s going to take it up and mom is going to kill me when we have to pay overdue fines at the library for the rest of our lives.

Pat was still glancing up at Johnny for a few minutes even after he got off the phone and Johnny tried his best to avoid his eyes and look innocent. What book? He imagined himself saying with an expression only the actor he was in his mind could pull off. Me? You saw me reading a book? I’m sorry, Mr. Pat. I’ve never even heard of this, what did you call it? Buke? Book?

It was no use though. He was a terrible actor and an even worse liar. Even when he was telling the truth sometimes people would think he was lying. Johnny let his forehead fall forward against the brown plastic material covering the back of the seat in front of him. It smelled like farts and diesel gas, though Johnny wasn’t able to distinguish the latter component.

He was sweating slightly when the bus pulled into the unloading space at the school. Johnny had tried imagining all the worst outcomes hoping that “nothing ever happens like you expect” would cover these types of situations too; if he pictured Mr. Pat ripping his book up in front of him, he could then cross it off his list of things that would then never happen. Though now that he was expecting it not to happen, would that then mean this then could happen? The knot in his throat doubled in size.

But when it was Johnny’s rows’ turn to get off the bus, Pat didn’t say a word to him. He simply stared at his phone, with a slightly angry face, and waited as the kids shuffled off the bus.

Johnny walked away from the bus and didn’t look back, expecting Mr. Pat’s hand to clamp down on his shoulder at any second. He picked up his pace some and steered to the side of the crowd corralling into the lunchroom. Ms. Walker, the school’s librarian, had given Johnny special permission to wait for the first bell in the library. She also would let him read whatever he wanted; given he was one of a dwindling handful of students in the entire elementary school that read outside of when it was required.

Two steps away from the door and the straps on Johnny’s backpack suddenly tighten against his shoulders as something pulls him backwards. Pat, he thinks, but then he hears the all too familiar chorus of laughter and snorting from Garrett and Nick.

“Where are you heading in such a hurry, fuckface?” Garrett asks Johnny, holding him still by the top loop of his backpack. Johnny thinks of slipping out of the straps and running from them, but knows they are all faster than him and this would also make the punishment worse.

“I’m just heading to the library.” Johnny said solemnly, looking down at the ground.

“Of course you are, dweeb.” Garrett says, and then he pushes Johnny into Nick. The breath seeping through Nick’s yellowed teeth is fowl and radiates heat on Johnny’s face. Nick laughs and two more whiffs of soured breakfast sting Johnny’s nostrils; he thinks one more dose might honestly make him vomit. Fortunately, Nick is unaware of this and pushes Johnny back to Garrett right then.

“Stop it,” Johnny cries, as he’s roughly shoved back and forth between the bullies. His pleading excites them and they begin to speed the shoving faster and faster.

“Guys, please, quit it.” Johnny knows he’s about to cry but he thinks he can hold out another minute or so if they cease their cruel game.

“What’s the problem, Johnny?” Garrett asks “you don’t like playing with us?”

Garrett punches him in the side when it’s his turn to catch Johnny, the air wheezes out of his body, and when he inhales again, it’s Nick’s breath that fills his lungs. Vomit or tears are eminent, he’s just not sure which will happen first.

When Nick catches him the next, he pulls him back to push him forward again, but Garrett stops him.

“Wait. Hold the asshole for a second, Nick. I think he’s going to cry.” Garrett steps over to Johnny and reaches out towards his hips. Johnny, unsure of what Garrett is going to do to him, tries to squirm his way out of Nick’s death grip, but finds he can’t move in the least. Nick is a foot taller than Johnny and even trying to become dead weight would only end in Nick leaning back and having Johnny’s legs aimlessly kicking off of the ground.

“Well, let’s see what you have to offer for us to leave you alone today, Johnny.” Garrett says, reaching into Johnny’s pockets.

“I don’t have anything!” Johnny yells, his brain flashing back to earlier that morning when he took twenty dollars from his mother’s purse to put on his lunch account. It wasn’t stealing as other kids he knew would do from their parents, his mom always told him to take what he needed because she knew he would never take a cent more than exactly that.

“What a bullshit artist!” Garrett exclaimed withdrawing the twenty-dollar bill. “You don’t have anything? Then what the fuck is this?”

Garrett put the bill up to Johnny’s face, covering his eyes with it.

“It’s my lunch money, Garrett. Now give it back! Please! I won’t be able to eat even today without it!”

“Good,” Garrett said, crumbling the bill into his pocket, “I hope you starve to death, you little shit.” And then, as if his own hateful words fueled him more, he quickly drew his arm back and punched Johnny in the right eye.

At that second, Nick let go and Johnny doubled over and crumbled to the asphalt, skinning his hands slightly as he attempted to catch himself and then bring his hand up to his face.

“C’mon guys, let’s leave. Thanks for the money, Johnny. And don’t forget what happens if you tell anyone about this. We’ll make it so much worse for you next time.”

They were walking away now and Johnny looked up just to make sure. Part of him thought about passing out, thinking that’s what would happen in the movies, but he also wasn’t sure if that’s how it worked. Do you tell yourself to pass out? Or does it just happen? What about people that die from old age? They seemed to just sort of command it? If he thought about dying too hard would he die?

Johnny decided passing out would be what his mother called “dramatic” and it was probably best if he just went on with his day, as if nothing happened. Also, he had probably enough money in his toy safe at home he could use tomorrow to cover the stolen lunch money, so it was nothing to worry about. He believed what Garrett said about telling on him, so he definitely wouldn’t make that mistake.

James Mallerman had once told on Garrett for dunking his head in a toilet bowl. Garrett was given a week’s suspension for it. The smaller kids who were bullied by Garrett and his gang thanked James for his bravery and spent the week calmly eating their lunches and playing on the playground without a care in the world. Everyone at the school, even the teachers, felt like it was easier to breathe again. The following Monday, when Garrett returned, him and Nick defecated in the toilet before they gave James his second swirly (and his final warning about being “a rat”). That time, James listened.

Johnny stood up and brushed at the dust on his clothing. His palms stung from his fall but they weren’t bleeding as much as they were just raw. His stomach felt a bit queasy but Johnny honestly wasn’t sure if it was Garrett’s punch or Leo’s breath making it feel that way. His eye was definitely the worst of it, swollen, but he was still able to open it enough to see normally. Just going to go read a little in the library and pretend this didn’t happen, he thought, but then the first bell sounded and Johnny felt like there was very little chance the day would get any better.  

Next Chapter: Chapter 3