Bully Ch. 01

A minute later, she was standing in an empty locker room.

Don't you dare cry; don't even flinch; don't show them they got to you.

Easier said than done.

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Jimmy's cell phone played the beginning of Tom MacDonald's "Whiteboy." He ignored it and kept throwing punches.

Powerful body shots. Uppercuts. One, two. He spun on the ball of his foot and pivoted his body behind it. One, two. His shirt was soaked, and his face glistened with sweat. Still, he kept going. One, two, one, two.

"You gonna have no arms left." Frank, the fiftyish gym manager and former WBA professional boxer, took a swig of water from a bottle and then spat into a bucket.

One, two, one, two.

Frank didn't fancy training to techno vibes like those found in modern gyms. Jimmy's only background music was the hiss of Arman, Frank's assistant, jumping rope, and the gunshot sound of his own punches on the punching bag.

One, two, one, two.

"Slow down, Jimmy, what're you trying to prove?"

"Nothing." One, two, one, two.

"I heard you had a fight with Sierra Reed," Frank said.

"Where did you hear that?"

"Someone saw you."

"Someone saw me fight?" Jimmy stopped boxing. He gasped for air and gulped some water from the bottle Frank offered him. "We weren't fighting. She could've killed me with a single punch if she wanted to."

Frank waited for further explanation but chose not to dig further when Jimmy offered none. "You know, Sierra used to train here."

"I know."

"She was pretty good, actually," Frank said. "Won a couple of titles."

"Why'd she quit?"

"Fuck, I'm sweating more than a hooker in church." Frank took off his body protector. He was drenched in sweat underneath. The Golden Gloves Club's air conditioner died a year ago, and Frank never got around to fixing it. "Sierra said she'd rather be a mechanic than have school dropouts punch her brains to mush. But I reckon that's not the real reason."

Jimmy started punching again. One, two, one, two.

"There was this brawler, Parker or something, a real donkey-raping shit-eater. Big guy. Anyway, he was always giving Sierra a hard time because she's... You know how some folks get down here." Frank waved his hand dismissively. "They ain't happy till they make someone else miserable just for being a little different."

Jimmy felt his heart clench. He knew someone like that personally; he saw him every day when he shaved.

"Anyway, Sierra and Parker had a bout. Went south real quick, and the guy ended up in a hospital. Severe head trauma. Took him forever to recover, and he never really got back on his feet. After that, Sierra just didn't want anything to do with boxing no more."

Jimmy's cell phone rang again, but he kept punching. He embraced the pain, which usually sent him into an adrenaline rush. Today, though, he felt like the more he pounded, the deeper he sank.

What the fuck is wrong with me?

Sierra had asked him what humiliating her little brother got him, and he honestly didn't have an answer. What about the Muslim girl in class today? What did that poor girl ever do to him?

She called him a defeatist, which he didn't think was far from the truth, but he instinctively shot back, hitting below the belt. He wanted to humiliate her, stomp on her, make her feel as important as a speck of dust. Then he sicced Taylor on her and watched the show.

One, two, one, two.

His cell phone rang again.

"You want me to get that for you, Jimmy?"

"No."

One, two, one, two.

"Playing hard to get with the ladies." Frank smiled from ear to ear. "You sly dog, you."

"It's my mom," Jimmy grunted.

One, two, one, two.

"Aren't you gonna see what she wants?"

"I know what she wants." Footwork, chin down, arms up, always protect your face. Put everything you've got into the punch. One, two, one, two.

"Son, I know your mother ain't exactly--"

"The court gave her visitation rights last week. She's taking Ashley out for ice cream or some shit like that; wants me to come with."

One, two, one, two. He'd never felt so mentally tired.

"So?"

"Fuck her." Jimmy punched as hard as he could, jamming every remaining ounce of energy into his arm.

"Kid, that's harsh."

"She had eighteen years to get her shit together. Now she remembers she's a mom? Fuck her." He took a deep breath, then undid the Velcro on his workout gloves with his mouth.

"If you want to stay, we've got a bout later."

"Gotta get to work."

The boxing gym used to be a steakhouse restaurant. When Frank bought the place, he left the original bathroom more or less intact, only breaking through one wall to add a couple lockers and three showers. The place looked the part.

Jimmy squeezed himself under the sink faucet and allowed the cold water to wash away some of the anger. Not that there was much choice. Frank never heated the water tank during the summer. Lifting his head, Jimmy got a real scare from the feral creature staring back at him from the mirror.

Burning blue eyes, wet hair like that of a wild animal, and a mouth twisted in a sneer.

What the fuck is wrong with you?

Later, he didn't even know how it had happened. One second he was staring at his image in the mirror. A second later, the mirror was smashed and his hand was bleeding. For some reason, the pain felt lovely.

"What the hell...?" Frank stood in the doorway.

"Dunno. It was like that when I came in."

"Sure. You need to get that bandaged."

"I've got to go to work."

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"I'm never going back to that school."

"Parvin."

"Never, Mom."

Their living room was a puzzle, pieced together from fragments of different places and different times. A testament to their nomadic life. Turkey, Vancouver, Seattle, New Jersey. Nothing Iranian. They fled their homeland with little more than the clothes they wore. A single original Persian rug Parvin's mother had once hunted down in San Francisco rested proudly beside the entrance. It was the first thing one noticed when entering the room.

"Why can't I go back and finish the year in New Jersey?"

"And live where?"

Parvin curled her lithe figure up on the living room sofa. It was an extravagant piece her father had been given by another Iranian exile. It had gold engravings and decorative tassels that were straight out of Scheherazade and the One Thousand and One Nights.

Her mother frowned as Parvin placed her bare foot on the inside of the arm, so she placed her other foot next to it. "I'm not going back to that school."

"It'll get better."

"No, it won't." Parvin picked up a brush from the table. She began attacking her locks using short, angry strokes. She grabbed strands of hair and flattened them almost violently. "I don't have a single friend here. At least I had Yassi in New Jersey."

"It's only your first day."

"Ha."

"Hey." Her mother's tone was caressing with a hint of pleading. "I ordered a pizza with extra pineapple. Everything feels better with a pizza."

"I'm the only Muslim girl in this town. I think I'm the first Muslim they've seen outside their TVs."

"Your uncles live near the interstate. Your cousin Farhad went to the same school a few years ago."

"None of my cousins wear hijabs or look like aliens."

Her mother brought two glasses of tea on an old, unpolished silver tray. She sat down, took the brush from Parvin's hands, and began brushing her daughter's hair with soft, deep strokes.

"I swear, Mom, we're the only Persians who've come to America and still act like there are Revolutionary Guard and Morality Police checkpoints on the streets. "

"Parvin."

"Isn't it enough that I was born the way I am?"

Her mother tensed. The fact that her daughter was a futanari, born with male and female genitalia, had always been a difficult subject.

"I look so different from everyone else, with or without clothes. It's horrible, Mama. I don't think any of them see me as a person."

"Did someone say something?"

Parvin took a cup of tea, sipped it, and avoided her mother's gaze. You could see the years on her mother's forehead. Darya Ghorbani was a spoiled girl from a rich family who'd married the wrong man. She'd fled her home in the night, like a beggar, and settled in a foreign land. Like taking a china doll and putting her to work in a coal mine.

"Did someone say something, Parvin?"

She hated lying, and she hated hurting her mother. She decided to go half-truth. "It's nothing, really. A boy called me Osama."

"Osama? Why on earth would anyone call you Osama?"

"Like Osama bin Laden. It's a pejorative."

"A what?" Her mother still didn't have a complete command of the English language, even after eleven years in the States.

"Like calling a black man the N-word, only for a Muslim."

"I see. And who might this boy be?"

Parvin slowly placed the glass containing the honey-colored tea on the table. "Jimmy something, I think, I can't remember exactly," she lied. "Doesn't matter much either."

"Matters to me. I'm going to see the principal first thing in the morning."

"No, you won't, Mom. You'll only make things worse."

The doorbell rang.

"I'll not stand idly by while a young criminal bullies my daughter."

Parvin jumped up from the sofa. "Don't make me regret telling you."

"Bullies shouldn't be allowed to bully, Parvin. If the young man were here now, I'd give him a piece of my mind. Osama? Wait till your father hears. Hey! Don't answer the door like that."

"Because the world as we know it'll end if the pizza guy sees me in my pajamas?"

"Parvin, stop!"

Parvin opened the door, and the world as she knew it didn't end, but its tectonic plates began to shift.

He stood in the doorway, frozen like a pillar of salt struck by God or maybe his own regret. Jimmy held the pizza box between them like a shield. Big blue eyes wide, drilling holes. A new white bandage was wrapped around his right palm.

"Hi," Parvin said.

Jimmy's jaw clenched.

She was amazed at how different he looked. At school, she'd had to gather all her courage just to talk to him. He was the same tough kid, the type she knew to avoid like the plague, but there was something else.

Vulnerability?

She suddenly realized she was standing there in bare feet, wearing a green tank top and gray leggings. That her hair ran like a black river over one shoulder.

"Hello there, young man." Parvin's mother was still used to thinking in Farsi and translating everything in her head to English. She learned the Queen's language from old British cassettes, and the result often sounded a little 19th century. "I specifically ordered Diet Coke."

Jimmy took a few seconds to reply, and when he did it was barely audible. "I'm really sorry."

"Never you mind." Her mother took the pizza from his hand. "Next time."

"I'm really sorry," he said softly. "I didn't mean to... I don't know... I'm really sorry."

Parvin didn't know if he was apologizing to her or to someone else. Frankly, it seemed Jimmy didn't know either.

Jimmy turned and ran.

"Hey, you forgot the tip." Darya waved, but he was already out the gate and on his Honda. "A little shy, our pizza guy. He forgot the tip, Parvin."

"Yeah."

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A week later...

The air was on strike, Italian-style. It came to work, but that was it. The schoolroom air conditioner was on its deathbed, wheezing.

Although Mrs. Fink had suffered from two bouts of heavy breathing since the beginning of class, she was in good spirits as usual.

"Well, Taylor, maybe start with the carbons?"

Taylor stood near the board; he towered over Mrs. Fink by a head, and yet he seemed smaller. His hand ruffled his brown curls. He smoothed them all back down. He closed one eye, scanning the chemical equation. He lifted the chalk like a violinist before the grand recital, then rubbed his jaw.

"I still hear people talking." Mrs. Fink turned to her class. "I think I'll play Class Tetris, folks. The next person I catch not paying attention will get moved to the front row. When the front row is full, the whole row will move to the principal's office. Class Tetris. Fun, fun, fun."

Parvin raised her head like a frightened rabbit scanning the savannah. She waited for Mrs. Fink to turn her back and continued texting under her desk.

Yassi wrote, "What class are you in now?"

"Chemistry."

"Any cute boys?"

Parvin glanced at Jimmy out of the corner of her eye. He was indifferent as usual, his blue eyes staring at the window, dreaming of the free world. Why did he even bother coming to school? She sent Yassi a sad face emoji. "No, cute guys. Just horrible jerks." Then she added. "When's your last class?"

Yassi wrote, "Three hours ago. I'm on the interstate. Half an hour away."

A tidal wave of happiness washed over Parvin, covering her like a blanket.

"When are you coming home?" Yassi asked.

"After chemistry, I have math. Three boring hours, then freedom."

"Your parents are already gone, right? No one home?"

Parvin replied, "The keys are in their regular place."

"Inside Eeyore?"

Parvin sent her a thumbs-up emoji.

"Holy crap, your dad is more anal than Sheldon Cooper. Don't tell me the alarm code is the same one you had in Jersey."

Parvin sent her another thumbs-up and continued, "Can't wait to see you. Got everything planned for a magical weekend."

Yassi sent her a glowing heart.

Happiness was little electrical tickles zipping all the way to her toes.

Near the green board, Tayler wasn't having as much fun. He cranked his neck and fidgeted a little more in front of the equation. "Okay," he said. "We'll take the carbon and move it here." He flipped the last carbon atom from left to right and stretched its belly. "Now we take the two oxygen atoms." He drew two O's under the inverted c. The result looked like a penis and two nuts.

Mrs. Fink scanned the picture for a while, oblivious to the sporadic giggles that spread behind her back. Then she added some curly pubic hair and a slit. "What I'm failing to understand is why it's so small. Is there something you're trying to tell us, Taylor?"

Mrs. Fink's humor wasn't so hot, but the joke was greeted by a roar of laughter. Taylor was an equal-opportunity bully, and many people held a grudge. He pretended to go along with it, but even Parvin saw through the bullshit. Taylor was as graceful a loser as a ballet-dancing elephant.

"Someone else, perhaps?" Mrs. Fink erased Taylor's attempt at second-grade humor and pointed him back to his seat. "This is last year's stuff, guys; you should know that. Arnold, maybe you can save the honor of the class?" She smiled at her best student, who was struggling to balance the equation in his notebook.

Parvin tried to disappear into her chair. Despite being so tall, she was pretty proficient at blending into the background.

Not today. Mrs. Fink smiled at her, not unkindly. "Parvin, maybe you want to give it a try?"

Parvin quickly shook her head.

"I'm sure the guy you were texting with is way more interesting than chemistry. Still..."

Crap.

Mrs. Fink wore thick-rimmed glasses, but she could spot tiny molecules as long as they had something to do with her class. "Come on, Parvin. Give it a shot."

"OsamaBinFag." Taylor coughed, adding a few more fake coughs that sprayed the people in the next row.

"Taylor, do you have anything to add after your excellent performance?" Mrs. Fink said.

"I'm good, Teach. I think something went down my throat, but I'm okay now." Taylor fisted his chest a few times. "I heard there's this Middle Eastern bug that attacks people. It wears a little towel on its head."

"See me after class, Taylor."

Parvin felt her little sun lighting up from the pit of her stomach. Yassi was coming home for the weekend, and even Taylor couldn't ruin her happiness. She rose to her feet. "I, I... I think that maybe I can solve this." She walked over quickly, cursing herself as she almost tripped over a student's schoolbag, causing a titter. She blushed, but regained her balance and reached the board.

Her delicate fingers grasped the chalk like a painter working magic with a brush. There was no hesitation, no maybe. She didn't pause for a second, writing quickly and adding numbers to both sides of the equation. Then she put the chalk down and returned to her seat without saying a word.

Mrs. Fink took her time checking the equation, much longer than it took Parvin to solve it. Then she beamed and turned to her class. "Beautiful. Excellent! This is how it's done, guys."

Parvin noticed the look of pure hatred on Arnold's face, the teacher's former favorite pet.

As if I needed more enemies.

"Okay, I got the lab assignments I gave you guys last week. Those couples who spot a big red S on their work, that doesn't mean satisfactory. It means see me after class." Mrs. Fink danced through the rows and handed out the graded assignments. "Jimmy and Parvin." She gave Parvin another bright smile. "Impressive work. I think it's the first time I've ever wished I could give more than an A+."

Parvin was well aware that Jimmy was staring at her, dumbfounded. "It was a joint effort," she mumbled, not meeting the teacher's eye.

"Oh, I am sure it was." Mrs. Fink pulled out her smartphone. "Okay, everyone. Put everything but your pens in your bags. I don't want to see anything on your desks. Pop quiz. Yay."

A cacophony of dejection rose from the class. After the noise died down, Mrs. Fink triumphantly pressed her smartphone. "Stop the recording! Guess who has a new ringtone?" She pranced around a bit merrily, playing the "Owwws" and "come ons" on repeat.

People laughed because despite some minority opinions, she was a beloved teacher.

"Don't be such a bunch of crybabies. It's just that I can sleep soundly at night knowing that you know what I know you should be knowing. Know. Knowing. Yep. Where was I? Anyway, it's a short multiple-choice test, and it should be a piece of cake for anyone who did the lab assignments as I instructed. Oh, and for anyone who has math after chemistry: Mr. Gilmore asked me to tell you that he had to cancel today. Yes, I know you're all devastated. So, everyone who is in Mr. Gilmore's class, you're free to go home when you're done."

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Parvin was staring at him again. Well, not quite. The girl had a way of watching you without looking.

It turned out that she had actually gone to the chemistry lab and written both their names on the report. Not that it was going to help Jimmy now.

Jimmy stared at the exam, and the exam stared right back with a condescending smirk reserved for idiots. Hardly a new experience for him.

He tried to make sense of the first question.

He tried to make sense of the second question.

He wished more problems in life could be solved with boxing gloves in an arena.

Then he tried to guess why Parvin hadn't taken all the credit for the assignment. He failed at that as well.

Suddenly, Parvin's delicate palm landed on his desk. He raised his head like a meerkat on the savannah, looking for danger; Mrs. Fink had her back turned to them. When he lowered his eyes, his test was gone. Five minutes later it was back on his desk, all the answers circled.

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For some kids, a school hallway is nothing but dented and scratched lockers. A trail of trophy cases and trash cans. Enough unimaginative, depressing greyness to support a room full of therapists.

For others, it is a place of creativity and communication. Like a pink handmade poster: "Untamed Night Party". Asking everyone to prepare their dates for a night of... of something. Which only served to underscore to those students without a date that they were total losers.

For Parvin, it was the place where the hair on the back of her neck stood up. A teacher-free zone where violence could trickle down the food chain to put the weakest in its crosshairs.