CHAPTER 8: When I Was Ten

After what happened at the pool, I developed a reputation as the kind of kid that nobody wanted to start a fight with. I was glad nobody picked on me anymore, but it was a double-edged sword. Granted, most of the kids who were bullies kept their distance, but at the same time, several of the teachers became worried that I'd become one of those kids, and that really upset me. Also, when Bebe started school, I knew I had to look out for her as much as possible. So now, instead of picking on me, they went directly to her. The stress I endured from trying to protect my sister—and trying to stay out of trouble at the same time—finally came to a head. This time, I was the one who would get hurt...

One Thursday afternoon in early October, I was taking a shortcut through the schoolyard on my way to soccer practice, when I heard a voice shout, "Hey, give that back, you jerk!"

That was Bebe! I looked to see what was going on, and there, by the fence, was a sixth-grader who looked like Eminem's flat-broke distant cousin. He was holding Bebe's lunchbox high above his head. "Come and get it, sweetheart," he smirked.

I ran up to the kid. "Hey, leave her alone!" I yelled, shoving him to the ground.

"What'll you do if I don't?" he retorted, imitating my accent. By now, my accent was just starting to fade. But I still wasn't going to stand for it.

"You don't want to mess with me," I warned, slowly clenching my fist.

"Ooh, I'm soooo scared," he said sarcastically. "What are you going to do, put me in time-out?"

Taking another step forward, I got right in his face and pointed my thumb in Bebe's direction. "You've got exactly three seconds to give my sister back her lunchbox before I knock your bloody teeth down your throat," I snarled.

"You and how many of your friends?"

"Just me. Two hits: me hitting you, you hitting the ground. Any time you're ready."

I was definitely ready. The adrenaline was really pumping. All it took was for one of us to say the wrong thing. Sure enough, this kid called Mum a really filthy name, which I'm not going to repeat. It was bad enough that he called her that, but anyone who dared utter it would be struck by lightning.

As soon as that name came out of him, all my blood rushed to my fist, and I slugged him in the jaw. He stumbled backward, dropping the lunchbox, and fell against the tetherball pole. Just as I bent over to pick it up, he tackled me. The fight was on.

We wrestled on the ground, punching, kicking, hair-pulling, and cursing up a storm. I blacked his eye, and he busted my lip open. I judo-flipped him off me, and he kicked me in the chest. It was a pretty serious fight.

"Yeah, Jason, go for it!" Bebe shouted. That really made the kid mad, so after he kicked me, he stormed over to Bebe, grabbed her by the collar, and was about to hit her when she kicked him in the shins. After he released her, I grabbed him and threw him against the dustbins.

"You don't feel like such a tough guy now, do you?" I shouted, walking over to him. That's when I saw him reach behind one of the spilled garbage bags. When he stood up, I saw that he was holding a two-by-four. He swung and missed three times, but the fourth time, he hit my left knee. I can still hear the sound of that board smashing against my knee, as well as Bebe's horrified scream when it hit me in the face.

WHAM! The impact sent me staggering four feet across the asphalt and stopping beside the bike rack. My ears were ringing so much that I didn't hear the kid drop the board and run off, or Bebe screaming for help. I did, however, feel a wet trickle down the right side of my face. I put my hand on the spot, and gasped when I saw how much blood there was. It covered all of my fingers and was running steadily to the center of my palm.

The rest of that day is a blur. I don't remember Bebe or one of my teachers checking on me, or Mum being called. All I remember is looking out the corner of my eye and seeing a little tiny nail sticking out of the end of the board. I tried to stand up, but I was so dizzy from getting hit that just getting on my hands and knees was a chore. My teacher tried to grab me in an attempt to steady me so she could look at my face, and that's when I blacked out.

The next thing I felt was a cool dampness on my face. I opened my eyes, and found myself staring at white light. What's this? I thought. I'm not dead, am I? Is this what heaven looks like?

"Oh, my God," I moaned, and not just because I was so disoriented. My face, as well as my bottom lip, were so sore. My face hurt a lot worse, because of how hard I'd been hit.

"It's all right," a gentle voice with a heavy Brooklyn accent was saying. "We're taking good care of you."

When my head cleared, I saw a silver-haired nurse patting my face with a wet washcloth. I also found myself lying on a table with a paper sheet on it, a plastic bracelet around my right wrist, and no shirt on. I turned my head from side to side—which wasn't easy, due to the bandage on my face—to look at my surroundings: a spotlessly white room with bottles and bags on the shelves, and a pole beside me. Hanging from the pole was a bag of clear fluid attached to a thin, clear line, which was connected to my left arm by a needle.

Then I figured it out. I was in the hospital. I looked at the nurse to ask her a question, but she was too busy putting the washcloth in the basin of water she'd been using. Then I felt her place a thermometer in my mouth and pick up my wrist to check my pulse. A minute later, I heard the thermometer beep, and she removed it. That's when panic started to settle in.

"Mum? Mum?" I whispered, getting more and more frantic. I don't know why, but my first instinct was to jump off the table and run for it. When I tried to sit up, I'd forgotten about my knee, and in an instant, I felt a sharp pain shoot across the middle of my shin to my kneecap. It felt like a whole nest of yellowjackets stinging me. That was all it took for my voice to come back, loud and clear.

"AAAH, BLOODY HELL!" I screamed through clenched teeth, clutching my knee. I knew I'd cursed in front of an adult, and that wasn't allowed, but I didn't care. The pain was excruciating.

The nurse grabbed my shoulders. "It's okay, sweetie," she said. "You're safe now. Everything's going to be all right." I guess she knew how much pain I was in, because she never bothered telling me to watch my language.

I started to calm down, but I was still a little confused about how I'd gotten there or what was going on. "What's this needle in my arm?" I asked.

"This is an IV. It's to keep your injury from getting infected."

"What?"

"The nail that was in that board was probably dirty, and this IV is preventing you from getting sick," the nurse explained.

It all started coming back to me. The fight. The kid grabbing the board and hitting me with it. Bebe's screams for help. I was pretty shaken up by all this. "Where's my mum?" I asked.

"I'll get her for you," the nurse said, patting my shoulder. "Right now, the doctor would like to see you."

The nurse emptied the basin of water she'd been using into the sink, hung the damp cloth up to dry, and left the room. A few minutes later, Dr. Combs came in. He basically looks like a slightly older version of Erik Palladino, only with gold-rimmed glasses.

"Hi, Jason," he said. "How are you feeling?"

"I've been better," I confessed.

Dr. Combs nodded, then checked my blood pressure. Next, he put his stethoscope on. "Just relax and breathe normally for me," he said. When he put the stethoscope on my chest, just as I'd expected, it was ice-cold. I think it's a requirement for all doctors to have a freezer full of those ends. When I reacted to the cold, he blew on it, then tried again.

After he was finished, he hung the stethoscope across the back of his neck. "Well, you're one lucky young man," he said. "If that nail had been an inch higher when it hit you, you would've lost your eye."

Upon hearing that, the color just drained from my face. The idea of spending the rest of my life with only one eye really scared me half to death. "Thanks," I managed to say. That's when the door opened, and Mum came in just as the doctor was leaving.

"Hi, baby," she said. Tears started to fill my eyes as she approached me. I felt like I was three years old again.

"Mum," I sobbed. She helped me sit up, and I wept in her arms for a minute. Not only was I upset about getting hurt, but it was also how horribly the other kids had been treating me because I had an accent. Why couldn't anyone see past that?

"Shh, it's all right," she said gently. "Jason? Jason, look at me, please." I couldn't move much, because of the IV, so Mum helped me lie back down.

"It was just a few stitches, love," she said, stroking my left cheek. "And it didn't cut your eye or break your cheekbone. You were very lucky." She took a tissue out of her purse and handed it to me.

By then, the nurse was returning with a cart. "Excuse me, Mrs. Everett, but I need to draw some blood," she said.

What? More blood? Didn't I lose enough already? Without saying a word, Mum turned my face toward hers. The nurse had me make a fist with my right hand so she could put the needle in. When it did, I didn't even flinch. Go figure!

"That's my brave lad," Mum whispered.

After the nurse finished, she took the IV out and left the room. Mum helped me put my shirt and jacket on and handed me my shoes. I'd just put them on and finished tying them when the nurse returned with a wheelchair. "How about a special ride to your car?" she asked. I shrugged, and she and Mum helped me into the chair.

When we got out to the parking lot, instead of waiting for Mum to bring the car down, the nurse, being the genius that she is, started to follow her up the ramp. I thought for sure I was going to fall out of the chair, so I held onto the armrests for dear life.

By the time we got up the ramp, Mum was waiting with the car. She opened the back passenger door, then she and the nurse helped me out of the chair and laid me down on the backseat. I fell asleep on the way home, wondering what was going to happen next.