Going Home

Rory was as unhappy as he’d ever been, walking to school that day. His father had been in high dudgeon that morning, much worse than usual, and in his loudest voice, he’d found fault with everything Rory did and was. Every possible thing about Rory was wrong and bad and disgusting and a disgrace on the family.

Rory hadn’t even been allowed to eat breakfast.

As usual, he’d had to stand with his hands at his side, stiff as a board, shoulders back, while his father ranted and railed for a full ten minutes.

His dad never laid a hand on him. His mother had told the man if that ever happened, if he ever got physical with either Rory or her, she’d call the sheriff and the newspaper. It had been one of the few times in her life she’d stood up to him. But, it had worked; he never did get physical with either of them. But the psychological damage he caused them both was just as bad. Day after day, Rory had to listen to himself being demeaned. That day it had even been worse.

He was in a foul mood going to school. He wasn’t angry. Over the years he’d gotten to believe that his father must be correct: he was an awful child. There was nothing good about him. He didn’t understand just why he was so bad. But he must be because otherwise, why would he get treated like he did at home? There had to be something seriously wrong with him, didn’t there?

He did have one reason he understood. In the past year, he’d realized he was gay. God help him if his father ever found out. He was pretty sure that his dad would kill him. God hadn’t helped him so far, and why should he think it would be any different then? No, his father would kill him and bury him and that would be that.

But his dad had been yelling at him, despising him for much longer than a year, and Rory hadn’t had any interest in boys before that. Rory was pretty sure his dad didn’t know he was gay. And if not, what exactly was the reason for his dad’s animosity? As far as Rory knew, he was pretty much like other boys in most other ways.

He trudged on, thinking about that, thinking about Aaron, a boy he’d been looking at for a while now, a boy who last week had looked back.

Then they’d met down by the creek, and Aaron had smiled at him, then put his hand down Rory’s pants. Soon they’d both had their pants down around their ankles, both been hard, and they’d touched each other, and that had felt awfully good. That was all they’d done, but Aaron had said next time, they’d do other things. Rory was still excited thinking about that.

Although, if his father found out . . .

It didn’t bear thinking about.

He could see the schoolground ahead. And he could see kids moving together almost as a group. Something had caught their interest. He hurried forward, wondering what was going on.

He was shocked when he got to where the kids were all crowded around, having formed a large semicircle.

Three kids were in the middle. Two of them were high-school juniors. Rory knew that because the middle and high schools in town were merged into one. The town wasn’t large enough for two separate schools for sixth through twelfth grades. And he knew the two older kids were juniors because everyone knew who they were. They were the Shurber twins, two of the worst bullies in the school. They were always in trouble for something or other.

Rory knew them well. They’d picked on him, beaten him up, humiliated him, taken things from him. His not standing up to them was one of the things his father screamed at him about, punished him for. Yet these boys were several years older than he was and there were two of them. How was he supposed to fight back? They’d simply have hit him harder if he had. Probably enjoyed the beating they were administering more, too.

So they’d had their fun with him several times, then moved on, saying they’d let him heal and worry before they’d do it again. So far, they hadn’t, but he was sure they would. They enjoyed beating up kids who didn’t fight back.

The third boy in the circle was younger than the Shurbers, Rufus and Rodney. He appeared to be Rory’s age, an eighth grader. And he was black.

He also looked terrified. Rory could see it in his face. He was so scared that he was crying. Rufus appeared delighted by that.

Rory didn’t know any black people who lived in this town. There were a few, but he didn’t know any. The few black kids in school stayed very much to themselves. His was a small town in southwestern Indiana. This was an area of the country where sentiments were deeply divided. The Klan still had elements there, and racial bias still flourished. The schools were desegregated, but that was more de facto than fact as so few black kids lived in town.

Perhaps because this was an agricultural area—though coal mining accounted for more jobs than any other single occupation—there were several Mexican families living in the region; there were Mexican kids at school. They hung together, too, like the few black kids; there was very little mixing of the races.

Now maybe there was a new black family here. Because the kid the Shurbers were tormenting was certainly black, and Rory had never seen him before.

“Look, boy, when a white kid tells you to do something, you do it. You don’t talk, you don’t run away, you just do it. That’s how things are here. So when I tell you to give me your hat, you take it off and hand it to me. You didn’t do that. You need to be taught that lesson. You need to be taught your place.”

Rufus was talking, and the way he was, Rory thought he was talking to the crowd as much as to the boy. He seemed to enjoy having an audience.

Rufus and Rodney. Twins. Their father was named Rufus, too. He was a janitor at the school when he was sober enough to work; his principal notoriety came from being the town drunk. The three of them lived in a shack by the river. The twins’ mom had left long ago. Anyway, she was no longer there; she’d simply disappeared as far as anyone in the town knew. It had been rumored that Rufus the elder had killed and buried her. All anyone really knew was that she was gone.

Rodney was behind the black boy, holding his arms, pulling them back behind him. Rufus was in front. After telling the boy this was a lesson he needed to learn, he said, “First lesson,” and stepped forward and hit the boy hard in the stomach. The boy let out a half scream, half an oof and would have folded over except for Rodney holding him up.

“Now, we’ll see if that lesson stuck. Give me your shirt, Boy.”

Rodney didn’t let go of the boy’s arms, so the boy couldn’t take off his shirt even if he’d wanted to. Rufus shook his head, said to the crowd, “Some of these people have to learn the hard way,” and hit him again.

While the kid was fighting to breathe and not being very successful getting a breath, Rufus crowed to him, “I only asked for your shirt. I could have asked for your pants. How’d you like that? How’d you like all these kids seeing you without pants?

“Hey, you know what? I keep hearing about how you guys all have gigantic dicks. I wanna see that! I’ll bet all these kids wanna get a look at it, too.”

Rory was watching, and for maybe the first time, what he was seeing wasn’t simply frightening him. For the first time he could recall, he was getting mad. Really, truly angry. How could these guys do this? And how could the crowd let them? He remembered how he’d felt when these guys were bullying him. How he’d felt totally worthless. How he’d hated not being able to stop them, how he had to just let them do whatever they wanted. Now he saw a scared, helpless kid being treated like he was nothing at all but a play toy for two of the town’s worst bullies.

Rory thought about how he himself felt. Rory was thirteen, and so was this boy, probably. Rory hated the idea of anyone seeing him naked, seeing how undeveloped he was. This other kid must feel the same way. This had to be awful, maybe worse than being hit. The kid was being shown to the crowd as weak and undeserving of any personal privacy. His humanness would be stripped along with his pants.

Rodney got a big smile on his face. “Do it, Ru. Do it. I wanna see, too. See his dick.”

The boy now was almost hanging by his arms, as if his legs wouldn’t hold him up. Rory remembered how it had felt being hit in the stomach by Rufus. He remembered feeling he couldn’t breathe. And he’d only been hit once. He’d been able to bend over when being hit which seemed to allow him to catch his breath. This kid was forced to be upright. Maybe he really couldn’t breathe. Maybe he was on the verge of passing out. Rory could see both fear and, now, hopelessness on his face.

The kid was sagging as much as Rodney was allowing him to. Rufus said, “Pull him up straight. I’ll pull his pants down. We all wanna see his wanger.” Rodney had to move his hands from the boy’s arms to under his pits to pull him up straight. The boy didn’t seem to resist. Rufus made quick work of yanking his pants down, and then pulled his underwear down, too.

And that was when everything changed.

Rufus took a look at the boy’s genitals and, with a big grin on his face, stepped back to let the crowd see. He opened his mouth to comment when suddenly Rory was on him. The attack was entirely unexpected, and Rory was as irate as he could ever remember feeling. Mad enough he had courage he never realized was in him; courage from not even thinking what might happen to him when he attacked an older, larger boy. He ran at Rufus, arriving just as the larger boy was stepping backward. Because Rory was shorter and lighter and had never hit anyone in his life, he couldn’t do much damage with his fist against Rufus’ body. But he could hurt the older boy. Rufus never had a chance. Rory kicked him squarely between his legs. Hard.

Rufus’ eyes got huge, and he let out a scream and sank to his knees. Perfect. Rory swung as hard as he could and planted a fist directly on Rufus’ nose. A frightful crack ensued, and Rufus toppled over, one hand still in his crotch the other now over his face.

Rory turned to find Rodney, who’d now dropped the black boy and was facing Rory, who was a sight like nothing he’d seen before. Rory’s face was bright red, he had spittle on his face, his eyes were wild, his hair was flying all over, and he was coming at Rodney, screaming as he came.

Rodney was the backup, the assistant, the helper. He never started the fights they were in. Actually, they weren’t really fights. But he was the holder, the encourager, not the one delivering blows or slaps or kicks. He’d never been attacked before, and he wasn’t sure what he should do facing a madman.

Rory arrived and started swinging fists and screaming. Rodney was entirely defensive, but Rory’s fists were flying, and one hit Rodney in the neck. It hurt. Rodney turned, stumbled and fled.

The black boy was now on the ground, appearing stunned. He hadn’t even pulled up his pants. Rory went to him, then took off his own shirt and covered the boy’s privates. Then he turned to the crowd, his emotions still running hot.

“What the hell’s wrong with you people?” he screamed. “You just let that happen? No one stopped them? This boy needed help, and you all—” Rory’s emotions got the better of him then and he ran out of words. He had only one thought left. He yelled again at the silent crowd, “You’re all cowards! I’m ashamed of every one of you!”

He stood there, staring at them, and no one said a word. They weren’t even meeting his eyes. He may have been the smallest one there, but he seemed to have more presence than anyone he was facing.

Then the crowd started to leave one by one, the exodus quickened, and then they were all gone. No one had spoken after Rory had kicked Rufus, and they remained silent as they were leaving. Maybe, Rory thought later when remembering what had happened, they’d been ashamed of themselves, too.

He turned back to the boy. He was sitting up now, sitting holding his stomach, Rory’s shirt now covering his lap.

“You okay?” Rory asked.

“My stomach hurts,” the boy said.

“You need a doctor?”

The boy just looked up at Rory. Then, “I don’t know. I don’t think so. It just hurts.”

Rory didn’t know what to say. He realized that for the first time he could remember, his shyness was absent. And something else, too. This boy was really cute. Light-brown skin and perfect facial features. Curly hair, but neat and well-cut. Large brown, expressive eyes. But for some unknown reason, Rory didn’t find himself getting feelings in his stomach—or even below. He liked how the boy looked but wasn’t turned on by him. Strange. Most cute boys affected him on an emotional level.

Not knowing what else to say, he said, “I’m Rory. I’m in the eighth grade.”

“Me too,” said the boy. “Except the Rory part. I’m Bobby Tate. We just moved here. My dad’s a lawyer.”

“Mine runs a building company.” And then Rory said something so atypical, he never was able to figure out why he said it, unless it was the emotional outburst he’d had that morning. “I hate him.”

Bobby’s eyes seemed to reflect compassion if anything, but Rory couldn’t read it well. Bobby said, “I’m sorry. I love my dad. He’s going to be madder than a rabid dog when I tell him what happened here.”

“I won’t tell mine. I don’t tell him anything. I don’t talk in the house. He does. He yells at me. All the time.”

“That’s awful. You have to come meet my dad. He’s wonderful. Anyway, I don’t want to go to school today. Not after all those kids saw me.” He pointed at his lap, then realized he still had Rory’s shirt. He picked it up and handed it to Rory, leaving himself exposed. It didn’t seem to bother him, which Rory didn’t understand. He’d never let another kid see him like that.

Well, he let Aaron see him, but the circumstances were much different. He’d been hard and excited then. Bobby was neither. He was also very much like Rory, except for one thing Rory found startling.

“You’re not circumcised!” he said, then put his hand over his mouth and blushed. “I’m sorry! I shouldn’t have said that. I shouldn’t even have looked. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I don’t know why I went after those bullies, either. I’m scared all the time and a coward. I’m weak, too, and shy. This is all so weird.”

Bobby grinned at him while pulling his pants back on. “Shy? Weak? Scared? You just saved me from being socked some more and humiliated—well, more humiliated than I’d have been if the crowd had been able to stare at me more than they did. They only had a brief look, and then were all focused on your Jason Bourne, Jack Reacher, wild-man act. You don’t seem to be any of those things you said. None of them.”

“Well, I am, and I hate it. I hate everything about myself.”

Bobby looked at him for a moment, then said, “I’m too weak to defend myself, too. So, you and I need to fix that. I know how.”