It is one of nature’s immutable laws that the
smallest kid in the 7th grade is always named Clarence or Randall or
Percival. This particular bespectacled and bird-like youth was
called Percival. Mr. Shanafelt hated all of the small, pale and
skinny boys who had ever been in his gym classes but Percival was
the most annoying. Mr. Shanafelt had spent the semester belittling
the bug-eyed runt, reminding the kid constantly of his puny arms and
legs, his glistening dental braces, his prominent ears, his reedy
voice and his lack of athletic prowess. He held the silent child up
to his peers as undersized and clumsy, a disgrace to his gender and
a sissy besides. The kid accepted the humiliation with the silence
of every weakling but the towering gym teacher had not been able to
make the mama’s boy cry. Not yet. Today was the last day of the
semester and it was the last chance for Mr. Shanafelt to break the
resigned composure of the shivering wimp. Percival had to cry today
because this was the last day in this life that Mr. Shanafelt would
be the social superior of the sickly scholar. These underdeveloped
and stunted specimens somehow always went on to become the lawyers,
professors and hyper-educated namby-pamby technocrats of the world.
Percival was going to get that preoccupied look wiped off his face
today.
“Ok, listen up, you rats. Today we are going to
finally climb the rope. All the way to the top.” Mr. Shanafelt
pointed to the ceiling beams. “We are going to start with, let’s
see.” He consulted his list carefully. “Let’s start with—Percival.”
The class was stunned into silence. No one had ever
climbed the rope to the top and Percival would certainly not be the
first.
“Well, runt, get moving!” Mr. Shanafelt leaned down,
the bush of black hair from his back pushing up out of his shirt, to
grin into Percival’s face.
Percival walked hesitantly onto the mat and looked
up to the top of the rope, his prominent eyes open abnormally wide.
He grasped the rope with one hand. As if in severe trepidation, he
wiped his hand across his mouth. He reached his second hand up high
to grasp the rope just as a gush of foam poured from his mouth. He
fell suddenly to the mat and started to twitch violently.
“Damn, he’s having a fit!” Mr. Shanafelt dropped to
his knees astride the boy as the lather erupted from the kid’s mouth
and streamed onto the floor. “Somebody get me a towel before this
loser swallows his tongue!” Percival’s eyes rolled far up and he
started to flail his arms, his left hand cuffing Mr. Shanafelt a
clapping blow to the ear. The teacher yowled a curse and clasped
both hands over his stinging ear. Percival moaned and choked a
little before slapping a backward right hand to Mr. Shanafelt’s eye.
“Damn it,” the man howled, covering his smarting eye with a palm,
“someone give me a hand!” Before anyone could move, Percival arched
his back with a shudder and brought his knee briskly up into Mr.
Shanafelt’s crotch. The burly teacher’s own eyes rolled up and he
tumbled off onto his back, one hand over his eye and the other
cupping his crotch. Percival suddenly became dead still, the bubbles
still pushing through his clenched teeth. Mr. Shanafelt grimaced and
grunted and gesticulated for about a minute before standing
unsteadily. “I’m going to the nurse’s office,” he croaked and
hobbled away, hunched over with his eye streaming now, both hands
guarding his groin.
Percival’s only friend, Theodore, ran to slide on
his knees across the mat to his friend’s side. “Jesus, Percy, are
you OK?”
Percival jumped to his feet and spit out the sudsy
remains of the 5 Alka–Seltzer tablets he had placed in his mouth.
“Come on, Teddy. We don’t want to be late to chemistry class.”
