Clifton was a bully but he was not without a crude and shrewd intelligence. It did not take long for him to figure out who it was who got him into trouble over the yo-yo incident. Confronted, Darlene did not deny her involvement.
Clifton: I will make you sorry!
Darlene: Let's get it on!
Clifton: All in good time, Baby.
Darlene's blood was about to boil, but she let it pass.
Clifton told his older brother, Louis, about this terrible, awful, mean, wicked girl who kept threatening him. Louis said, "I can straighten her right out." Clifton grinned. "Thanks, Brother."
The Pratt's front doorbell rang shortly after five in the evening. Mrs. Pratt answered the door to find a large angry woman and a twelve-year old boy standing on the porch.
L. A. Woman: Is this where Darlene lives?
Samantha: Yes. How may I help you?
L.A. W.: How? Just look at what that wicked vixen did to my Louie!
And there stood Louie, right eye purple and swollen, left cheek raw with claw (?) marks.
Samantha (turning toward the interior of the house): DARLENE! Come here at once.
Darlene shows up at the door, stands beside her mother, grasping her skirt and looking up, her baby blues all innocence. Louie's mother looks at this slip of a girl, turns to her son and says, "Is this the girl that beat you up?"
"Yeh, Ma. That's her."
Ma turned with a roundhouse swing and walloped her son across the cheek. "You let that little thing beat you up? I'll show you what it means to get beat up! Now get to the house. 'Scuse, me, Ma'am. We'll be getting along now."
©2017 David W. Lacy
8 comments:
Is there a Pineville in West Virginia? Because the last paragraph is exactly how my West Virginia family would behave.
Jim, I don't know about West Virginia but there do seem to be actual places called Pineville. This one, though, is strictly within the State of My Imagination. The inspiration for the story, however, was an incident my wife was involved in when she was a nine-year old girl.
"Oh what a tangled web we weave . . ."
Vee, do we imagine that somehow Darlene, and possibly Darren, too, should get a comeuppance?
This reminds me of a similar incident from my childhood - I beat the crap out of a older bigger boy who had dropped my 5 year old brother off a high stoop, little brother sustained a mild concussion so did the older bigger boy after I chased him down, tackled him and smashed his head into some decorative rocks - took 3 kids to pull me off him - his mother shows up on our doorstep, dragging her son along, confrontation did not go well for ole bully-boy.
grace, bullies best stay away from spunky, irate little girls. JoAnn's story is very similar to yours.
I would never have told my mother. The reaction would not be predictable.
Chuck, but then how to account for the shiner and the scratches? Ah, dissembling, eh?
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