The sound of my feet dragging along the sidewalk, while bothersome to others, had become something of a comfort to me. Just as the steady "tch…tch…tch" was soothing, so too were the newly dead corpses of once vibrantly green leaves.
The sidewalk under the great oaks was littered with them, but the street to my left was practically clear, thanks to the work of the street sweeper. In the darkness of night, with the light from the street lamps reflecting off of the rain-soaked road, I was reminded of a painting I had once seen.
That particular painting portrayed a colorful autumn night and a man and woman walking together with their dog. The similarity was not complete, though. After all, there was no beautiful girl walking with me tonight, and Misty, my pit bull, was at home.
As the wind picked up and the chill in the air deepened, I lifted the hood on my black, zipped up rain jacket. The memory of that painting, and watching her eyes light up at seeing it, was one that I doubted I would ever forget.
Of course, she didn't know that I even had this memory of her. It felt to me as though I had taken something that didn't really belong to me, but the memory was important regardless of that, or maybe because of it. I hadn't gone up to her that night, as I wanted to do. I was too afraid.
Seeing her in my mind's eye was but a short respite in the torrent of thoughts and emotions that came down on me more relentlessly even than the heaviest autumn rainfall in North Texas.
My uncle Rob, who had been overseas for the last seven months somewhere in the Middle East, had been declared MIA. When Mom had called earlier that afternoon to deliver the terrible news, I could hear the sorrow in her voice.
She was barely able to get the message across through choked back sobs and quick, short breaths. At the time I had been standing at the edge of the lake behind the new high school.
It didn't seem to me that it was as big as a lake should be, really, but that didn't make it any less damaging to my cell phone. The shock of the news had caused me to drop it right into the water.
I knew that I should go straight home but I just couldn't imagine seeing Mom in such a sad state. I was already in a dark enough place as it was without that.
And besides, I knew she would just break down as soon as I walked in the door. So, instead of facing her, I had been walking, for what seemed like a very long time, around Angel Grove. It was early autumn, the first of October, and still the beginning of freshman year.
The days were warm enough, and the nights nice and cool. That night, with the constant drizzle soaking me to the bone, it was especially unseasonably cold. The biting wind made it worse by numbing my face and causing my nose to run. Still, though, it was preferable to seeing Mom cry.
Not only would she be sad but she'd likely be furious, too. I hadn't bothered to go into the water after my cell phone.
I hadn't asked someone else to use theirs, either. I had simply begun walking. It was all I could do not to run and keep running. I wanted to leave this town full of bad memories and at fifteen years old I considered just taking off for good on my own, but I couldn't do that to her.
She needed me. We were all each other had in the world, save for Uncle Rob, and now he was gone. Just like my father – gone. It made me angry. I was pissed that he had decided to reenlist when he had a family, albeit not really a normal one, that loved him and needed him back in Texas.
I knew that Rob was nothing like my biological father, he was a much better man, but that didn't make his absence any easier. If anything it made it much worse. He was also the only thing like a father that I had ever known.
Rob had told me that he and my father had been close when they were kids. Rob was the younger of the two brothers by 18 months and the brothers hadn't actually grown apart until I was born.
After my birth, it was said that my father had changed. They said that it was because my parents were so young when they had me. They said that 20 years old was too young.
In reality, I knew it was because he was nothing more than a selfish asshole. Uncle Rob, in many ways, felt the rejection by his older brother just as much as I did, maybe more.
The snap of a twig behind me gave me a start and I came to a stop as I realized that my mouth was hanging slightly open. I snapped it shut defiantly.
"Hey, Mouth Breather." The voice, colder even than the chill night in which we stood, was all too familiar. I despised the boy to whom that voice belonged nearly as much as I hated the name "Mouth Breather."
That nickname had been earned a few years ago after the owner of that voice had noticed my bad habit of leaving my mouth open while in thought. And I happened to be lost in thought quite often. The term was basically synonymous with "idiot" and more than anything I hated being called an idiot.
I turned around unhurriedly. It was never good to show your enemies that you were afraid. Rob had taught me that. The boy's red hair framed his sinister looking face in a way that made my skin tingle.
The expression he wore could freeze boiling water. This kid had been taunting me for years, but I had learned to put up with it. Now, though, I was in no mood to be bothered by him or anyone else.
"What do you want, Fish?" I knew that Bradan hated that insult of a nickname just as much as I hated the name "Mouth Breather."
The sneer that came to my face on the tail end of my words seemed to make Bradan's face contort slightly, a dangerous look passing through his eyes. It was gone as quickly as it came.
"I heard what happened, with your uncle. That's a real shame." That lack of concern in Bradan's voice made it clear that he didn't care at all about what had happened to my uncle. "You know, he probably got shot by those terrorists over there. That's what happens to weaklings. Weaklings like you and your uncle make me sick."
I wasn't sure how I had maintained my composure as he spoke, but I knew for certain that I was going to make him sorry he had ever met me.
I took a step toward Fish, committing to a bloody end. Another step and my fists were clenched. The third step stopped me in my tracks.
The shadows behind Fish were shifting right before my eyes. At first, I didn't understand what was happening but it quickly hit me with an unrelenting force that it wasn't the shadows moving, it was people.
Three boys, two of which I didn't know, stepped out from a small stand of maple trees. Fish leaned back against the maple nearest him, chuckling softly. "You know what we do to weaklings, Mouth Breather, and the way I see it: You're the weakest of them all."
I flashed back to that afternoon in sixth grade when Fish had been bullying Lisa. The vision of leaving Fish knocked out on the ground less one tooth and some blood was vibrant.
"I don't think you're going to make it out of here on two feet, Mouth Breather." Fish was the kid that everyone else steered clear of.
He wasn't unusually large, a couple inches taller than me, but most were afraid of him anyway. He had an air about him that reeked of emotional instability.
I wasn't afraid of him. I knew that Fish was just another kid with a sad story. Everyone had a sad story.
I wasn't afraid of Fish.
But this wasn't just Fish.
This was a four-on-one fight and I had no weapon to defend myself with. The adrenaline had been pumping through my body since the snap of that twig, now it felt as if my body was in overdrive.
I wouldn't be able to hold off all four of these boys and I knew that if I tried I would likely end up in the hospital. Or worse. There was only one thing left to do: run.