“O.K., be sore!” he snaps. Then he breaks into a falsetto: “Goo’bye,
Bashful!”
I let him have it before he’s hardly got his mouth closed. He hits me back
in the stomach and hooks one of his ankles around mine so we both fall
down. It goes from bad to worse. He gets me by the hair and bangs my head
on the sidewalk, so I twist and bite his hand. We’re gouging and
scratching and biting and kicking, because we’re both so mad we can hardly
see, and anyway no one ever taught us those Queensberry rules. There’s no
point in going into all the gory details. Finally two guys haul us apart.
I have hold of Nick’s shirt and it rips. Good. He’s half crying, and he
twists away from the guy that grabbed him and screams some things at me
before darting across the avenue.
I’m standing panting and sobbing, and the guy holding me says, “You oughta
be ashamed. Now go on home.”
“Aw, you and your big mouth,” I say, still mad enough to feel reckless. He
throws a fake punch, but he’s not really interested. He goes his way, and
I go mine.
I must look pretty bad because a lot of people on the street shake their
heads at me. I walk in the door at home, expecting the worst, but
fortunately Mom is out. Pop just whistles through his teeth.
“That must have been quite a horror picture!” he says.
5
[Illustration: Dave and Tom lunching in meadow above river.]