I continued working out and running, and gained some muscle mass. By the end of the tenth grade, I was 5’10" and weighed 155 pounds, almost thirty pounds heavier than I was way back when. I was big enough that nobody thought about pushing me around, especially after word about the fight with the lacrosse players got out. That almost ended right there, but Jerry Jones decided to keep pushing it. The day after he was back in school after the suspension, he came calling and demanded I meet him after school behind the gym. I said I would be there.
Instead, I rode the bus home. Jerry was a certified moron. Ray Shorn, a buddy from Hampton Elementary days, looked shocked. “You’re supposed to be fighting Jerry Jones behind the school!”
“Jerry Jones is an idiot,” I replied.
“He’s going to say you’re chicken.”
“Jerry is going to say whatever he wants to say, regardless of what happens. What Jerry says about me isn’t worth the breath it takes to say. Why don’t you go back and ask Tessa if I’m a chicken?”
Ray glanced over his shoulder at where Tessa sat with some friends, and then looked back at me. “I don’t know, man. I think he’s going to be all over you tomorrow.”
I blew this off. Ray was right, however, in that Jerry found me at the lockers the next morning and tried to brace me right there in the hallway. He was yelling loud enough to cause a commotion, and was grabbed by a teacher, and got a week’s detention. That night I got my father alone and told him what was happening. Mom would have freaked out, but Dad was more or less human, now that he was no longer hitting me with the oak paddle.
I ended by saying, “I don’t want to start anything, but I don’t see Jerry letting this drop. For one thing, he ain’t smart enough to let it drop!” Jerry was a big guy, with at least three inches and forty pounds on me, and it was all muscle, especially between the ears.
Dad gave an exasperated shrug. “Well, the good Lord says to turn the other cheek, but I don’t recall him mentioning doing it more than once. I will tell you something I learned long ago, when I was your age, and later again in the Navy, and that’s if you have to put somebody down, put him down hard and fast and permanent. Let me know what happens.” I nodded and we broke apart.
A week later, after his detention was up, Jerry was back in my face, and actually tried to grab me and push me into the lockers. Like I said, Jerry was a moron anywhere other than the lacrosse field. I noticed a teacher standing behind him, and as soon as Jerry grabbed me, the teacher yanked him away. He got marched down to the office and got another five day suspension.
The day after his suspension was up, Jerry started mouthing off that he was going to beat the shit out of me right there in the school, and no pussy teachers were going to stop him. Everybody heard about it, of course, and several people mentioned it to me. I just nodded and thanked them, and kept my eyes open. It happened in the lunchroom. I was already seated at one of the benches, when Ray elbowed me and pointed towards the door. Jerry was striding purposefully towards me. “Shit, I need this like I need a hole in my head!” I muttered, and stood up to face him.
It was over quickly. Like Dad told me to do, I put him down hard and fast and very, very painfully. He grabbed for me, so I took his wrist and twisted it up and around, breaking it in several places, and then as he screamed in pain, flipped him up and over, and dropped him on his shoulder, wrenching his arm up and backwards and dislocating it brutally, shredding the joint. Jerry was going to the hospital, and he was not going to the NCAA. He lay there screaming and crying, and I stepped away. I wasn’t all that hungry anymore, although I did pocket an apple for later. Jerry ended up in the hospital, and I ended up in the Principal’s office, waiting for Dad to come over. By now, there was more than enough evidence, with two suspensions, a string of detentions, and countless witnesses to the attack, that got me out of any punishment. Jerry was expelled.
Mom was less than amused. I heard her and Dad arguing about it that night, and hid out in my room.
Tessa made good on her promise to pass the word about me to some of the girls, and the results were interesting, if a little schizophrenic. A number of girls looked towards me as somebody who would protect them, so I was a ‘safe’ boyfriend. Other girls heard that I wasn’t interested in ‘nice’ girls, but ‘not nice’ girls, which was a wholly different demographic. I made it a point to thank Tessa, which she laughingly accepted. A couple of girls even tried to use me in the protective role, to make their boyfriends jealous, but it wasn’t like I was some dumb teenager; I saw through those tricks immediately and told the boyfriends they were welcome to the trouble.
The net effect was that I had several different girlfriends that year, although opportunities to be alone with them were extremely limited. I didn’t have a car or a license (I was only 15) and you really can’t get too frisky in the back seat when Mom or Dad is driving you anywhere. Whatever mischief we could get into occurred at parties where we could sneak away, or bike rides around Loch Raven Reservoir, or maybe after school at her house, if she didn’t have family around.
The first was Jenny Smith, she of the St. Paul’s Canoeing Hall of Fame, who proved that canoes weren’t the only thing she went down on. She wouldn’t go all the way, and was very nervous when I pulled her pants off and returned the favor, but once she understood I would play by her rules, was very enthusiastic when I ate her out. I think I was the first guy to ever do this to her. I would have to admit that while it’s not my favorite activity in the bedroom I had certainly done it before, back on my first time around, and it’s definitely a favorite of the ladies. If my counterparts weren’t going to take advantage of the opportunity, I was more than happy to make up for them.
Jenny and I didn’t become an item, but were more like occasional friends with benefits. On the other hand, girls talk, even more than guys do, and probably more honestly. When Shelley, Tammy, and Jenny began telling the girls about my oral expertise, I became even more popular than when Tessa told them I was a hero. Heroes are good; heroes who eat pussy are even better! I am not going to say the phones were ringing off the hook and girls were battering down my door, but if I didn’t want to be lonely, I didn’t have to be.
Once the weather got warmer, and especially in the summer, when school was out, there was nothing quite like taking a bike ride with a girl up to Loch Raven. A picnic lunch, a ground cloth, and a blanket… keep it simple. You couldn’t go swimming or boating in the reservoir, but there were any number of places to take your bikes up into the trees and out of sight, and then settle in for some al fresco and au naturel dining. For the girls it was an exciting and liberating experience. Ride our bikes up to the reservoir, slip into the trees, spread out the ground cloth and cover it with a blanket, and then have lunch. After lunch, time for a little nap and seduction. The breeze on their naked skin was at once both nerve-wracking and exciting, and almost always very stimulating.
I got my working papers and got a job as a stockboy at Hutzlers during the Christmas rush. My first job — and my first layoff! I was let go after the first of the year. Oh, well. Later that year, when summer rolled around, I got a job up at Pot Springs Pizza. It was minimum wage, but all the pizza you could eat! I had worked there before, the first time, and it was a pretty good job. I worked my way up to a night manager, and learned how to make pizza, a very useful skill. I made sure that this time around I memorized the recipes.
I also started memorizing Mom’s recipes, and writing them down. Both my folks were very good cooks, and over the years, I became one as well. This became immensely handy when I got married, because Marilyn was one of the worst cooks on the planet. If you visited our house on a night we were both home, I was the one cooking. She could burn water.