When the hand grabbed for Elias’s shirt, he knew it was going to be a bad day.

Lately every day seemed to be a bad day, from the start of school in August to now in wintry December.  Christmas break was a mere week away, and the festivities had commenced at school–flannel day on Monday, pajama day on Tuesday, dress-like-an-elf day on Wednesday, etcetera.  The pep rally was on Friday.

Elias hated pep rallies, because pep rallies meant he had to sit on the bleachers in the gymnasium for two hours, and there was seldom a spot for him amongst the crowd of fifth graders, so he would invariably end up sitting beside Tom.

The popular girls would lead the school in the chant, and the popular boys would be gathered around in football attire and partake in the tug-of-war, which was eighth grade versus seventh grade, sixth grade versus fifth grade, fourth grade versus the third grade, and so forth, save for kindergarten.

Elias never participated in any of the activities at the pep rally.  Tom didn’t either, even though he had the stockiness of an eighth grader and could probably win a tug-of-war if it was himself versus twelve, third-grade boys.

It was Tuesday, and Elias stood at the urinal in the B-Wing boys’ bathroom, going to pull the waist of his jeans up over his penis when the hand grabbed the back of his shirt collar.

With the might of an ox, the hand–Tom’s, no doubt–picked up Elias, who was at least a couple feet shorter than Tom–and brought him into the stall, where he held Elias’ head in the toilet and flushed the water.

It was this that kicked off another week of cruelties from Tom–always targeting Elias.  Always.

Why couldn’t Tom go after the Griswold twins?  Or Felix Dunner, whose mother everyone knew was on welfare and whose father was incarcerated at the Windham County Jail.

Elias sat and pondered this during Mr. Mahabir’s math class.  Tom sat two seats behind Elias.  Sometimes Elias felt a spitball fly into the back of his head, and he didn’t need to turn around to know that Tom was probably sitting there all smug, smirk covering his freckled face.  For having such a bulkiness that even some eighth graders could not yet acquire, Tom’s legs were skinny as straws, like two sticks holding up a boulder.  He had strands of caramel hair and eyes that were a different color from each other: his left eye was green and his right eye was brown.  This only appended to Tom’s freakiness.  Elias had once known a dog with two different eye colors, but never a human.

At dinner that night Elias placed his peas on the slope of his mound of mashed potatoes, like little soldiers conquering a mountain, as his parents once again praised Elias’ little sister–oh, that’s my girl and oh, what a prodigy we are raising.  What was it tonight–another four on her spelling test?–or was it that she won the Chess club this time?

Elias’ mother turned to him: You have a gravy mustache, honey, here’s a napkin.

The pep rally came with much anticipation and elation on Friday afternoon as the middle schoolers piled into the gym like sardines in a too-small and too-sweaty can.  As usual, Elias was last to step foot onto the gleaming vinyl floor.  He scanned for a spot on the bleachers to sit–he could blend in with the fourth graders.  The third graders, too, maybe.  But every spot was taken, the kids all elbow-to-elbow.  Except for one spot on the very tippity-top of the bleachers, in which a gap broke between Mrs. Duplatt and Tom.

He won’t try anything while Mrs. Duplatt is nearby.  Will he?

Elias trudged up the set of stairs and took his seat, placing his backpack in between him and Tom.  Mrs. Duplatt was preoccupied talking with Mrs. Hemsworth, who sat a seat below her.

Elias planted his elbows on his bony, scabby knees and placed his chin on his knuckles.  The whole gym seemed to erupt into one sea of roars as the festivities commenced.  Elias spotted his little sister among the group of blonde-haired girls who were performing a dance–no doubt a photo of it would be in the Brattleboro Record tomorrow morning and then their parents would say, Our girl is in the paper!.

Somewhat surprisingly Tom ceased to say or do anything at all.  He just sat there with his two-colored eyes facing the action on the gymnasium floor.

For a moment Elias’ heartbeat steadied, but then, with such haste, Tom’s pudgy hand reached for the strap of Elias’ backpack, and the next thing he knew his backpack landed with a thud onto the gym floor.

No!  

Pencils and papers and notebooks spilled out across the gymnasium.

Almost without thinking, Elias sprung to his feet and scampered down the stairs but on the way down his feet twisted in on each other and suddenly he was lying on his face in the middle of the aisle.

Redness gushed from his nostrils and trickled down the stairs.  One of his eyelids forced itself shut.  The laughs and the gasps swamped his ears.