Just Messin' Around

Today's muse: I’m more than a little disturbed by the increasing incidents of bullying.

Be forewarned: This is a dark piece and not for everyone.


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Just Messin' Around


I killed Gerry Dodds.

Not with my own hands, o’ course, but I killed him. Gerry Dodds was this snot-nosed little shit who did nothin’ but whine and cry. Jesus, he pissed me off! He pissed everyone off.

Me and CeeCee, we was down by the ball diamond, hunched behind the bleachers, smokin’ a couple, when Dodds walks by. He’s got this humungous backpack and he keeps his head down cuz he knows if he makes eye contact, one of us is gonna slam him. So he keeps walkin’ by, like we’re not even there. It’s not like he don’t see us cuz CeeCee’s a pretty big guy and he kinda stands out, ya know?

“Hey!” CeeCee yells.

Gerry jumps about three fuckin’ feet in the air and I swear he shit himself. He looks over at us, then runs for it. I look at CeeCee. He looks at me. And we both shrug. Why the hell not, right? So we run after Dodds. It doesn’t take long before we catch up to him and shove him against the fence.

“Why the hell did you run?” CeeCee asks him.

Dodds is cryin’ and he’s got snot runnin’ all down his face. I roll my eyes and smack him. “Don’t be such a pussy,” I say.

I yank his backpack from him and dump it on the ground. There’s a bunch of books on math and shit and a few bills. I grab the bills and shove them in my pocket.

“Bring some more tomorrow.” I plant a solid right into his stomach and he doubles over and yacks on the sidewalk. CeeCee laughs like I just told the best god-dammed joke, and we walk away.

The whole school year went by pretty much like that. We smacked Dodds around a bit and he gave us money. No big deal really. I mean, we wasn’t gonna hurt him or nothin’, just mess around with him, ya know? Stupid fuck went and hanged himself anyway. I guess Dodds didn’t get that we was just messin’ around.