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Show 8 nose, but he strutted like a half-grown rooster and I was terrified of him. There he was on the corner by the Baptist church, eager spectators around him, Romans at the games, and I was too dumb to take another route home. Maybe I thought this was required of me. When he grabbed me by the shirt front I burst into tears and explained rationally, between sobs, that I hadn't had the slightest idea that Noreen was his girl, that anyhow my mother had made me do it, and that I would never do it again. Rudy sneered and smacked me. His lower lip curled over more, viciously, and he pulled his fist back and out to the side as far as he could, ready to smack me again. I grabbed him around the head and threw him to the ground. Lemme up, he said viciously. Will you stop hitting me? Lemme up! Will you stop? Lemme up! So I let him up and he hit me again. This time I took him down and sat on his chest, and he lay there on his back and hit me in the face, so I let him up. He came at me again so I threw him down again, so roughly this time that his mouth bounced open like a trap door and his breath flew out. He said he couldn't breathe, he said he was dying so I got off him and pleaded with him not to die, and he got up and said he hoped I'd had enough and would leave Noreen alone. Of course. Nothing I wanted to do more than leave Noreen alone. And so, dusty and panting, his knuckles bleeding from my teeth, Rudy marched off the victor, surrounded by his admirers. I was left with Maggie Martinez. She was in my class and we Anglo kids often tormented her, jeering at her, telling her she smelled, telling her she was dumb and ugly. Others started it but I went along. But now she smiled at me. "Crybaby," she said, sweetened by her sweet revenge. |