I’m not saying that.
On the sidewalk Luther and Betty started back toward the east side of Holt with their grocery cart. It was hotter now, the sun risen higher in the blue sky. They kept to the shade under the trees and once or twice in every block they stopped to rest, and then shoved on, homeward.
6
THEY WERE COLLECTED IN A CIRCLE ON THE PLAYGROUND when he came out at noon recess. Even from a distance he could see they were from his own grade, with a few of the younger ones from the lower grades there too, gathered inside the chain-link fence beyond the end of the school building. Now and then one of them hollered something brief and excited, and he went down to see what it was about.
Two little boys from the first grade were facing each other across five feet of red gravel, and the older boys were trying to make them fight, saying things, goading them. One boy they taunted more than the other, the one whose lank brown hair appeared as if it had been cut by someone barbering with his eyes shut. He knew who it was—his classmate Joy Rae’s little brother—and inside the ring he looked ragged and scared. His outsized shirt was buttoned to his chin and had holes at the elbows, and his jeans had a purple tint as though someone had washed them together with something red. He seemed ready to cry.
One of the boys next to DJ was yelling at him: Go ahead. Why won’t you fight?
He’s a chickenshit, a boy across the ring hollered. That’s why. He flapped his arms and crowed and hopped up and down. The kids next to him hooted.
The other boy in the ring was somewhat bigger, a blond boy in jeans and red shirt.
Go on. Hit him, Lonnie.
They don’t want to fight, DJ said. Let them go.
Stay out of this. The boy next to him stepped out and shoved the blond boy forward, and he swung and hit Joy Rae’s brother on the side of the face and then stepped back to see what he’d done and her brother put his hand up to his cheek.
Don’t, Joy Rae’s brother said. He spoke very softly.
Hit him again. You better hit him.
He doesn’t want to fight, DJ said. He’s had enough.
No he hasn’t. Shut up.
The boy shoved the blond boy again, and he hit her brother and grabbed him around the neck and they went down in the gravel. The blond boy rolled over on top of him, their faces close to each other, and hit him in the face and throat, and her brother tried to cover his face with his hands. His eyes looked frightened and his nose was bleeding. He began to wail.
Then the circle was broken by a girl rushing into the ring, Joy Rae, in a blue dress too short for her. You’re hurting him, she cried. Stop it. She ran over and pulled the blond boy off her brother, but the first big boy, the loudmouthed one, shoved her and she tripped over the little boys and fell on her hands and knees in the gravel. One knee was cut but she jumped up and pulled at the blond boy crying: Let go, you little son of a bitch.
The big loudmouthed boy grabbed her and this time hurled her backward into the ring of onlookers, and two boys grabbed her by the arms.
She twisted and kicked at them. Let go of me, she screamed.
DJ stepped into the ring and pulled the blond boy off and stood her brother on his feet. He was crying hard now and his face was smeared with blood. The ringleader grabbed DJ by the arm. What do you think you’re doing, asshole?
He’s had enough.
I’m not done with him yet.
Then a boy cried: Oh shit. Here comes Mrs. Harris.
The sixth-grade teacher came striding into the circle. What’s this? she said. What’s going on here?
The boys and girls began to walk off fast with their heads down.
Every one of you come back here, she called. Come back here.