FRONT-PORCH GOSPEL: This life story begins in 1973 (kind of) part 70

I walked up to the front of the Y and showed Corrina where the TV room was; then I showered and spruced up with English Leather so I would be presentable. Sauter and Kilgore were back there showering, too, and you would’ve thought they were Doocy and Pee Wee the way they carried on.

“Man, Sugar Ray,” Kilgore, the big red-headed one, said excitedly, “you done gone and got a beauty queen from over in Roanoke?”

Sauter jumped in, “Kilgore, maybe she has a sister; maybe one of us can be Sugar Ray’s brother-in-law.”

“I don’t know, her eyesight must not be all that good, Sauter, jus’ sayin’,” then they laughed and fist- pumped, and, as far as I know, that was before fist-pumping was a thing.

One thing I learned from Doocy was how to ignore people, and I was able to put that skill to good use. But just like my trying to ignore Doocy, that only worsened matters.

My two big friends had to make an excuse for their failures in the gym that day, so they introduced that topic, “Aw, Sugar Ray, you know we let ya’ll beat us ‘cause we’re your friends and couldn’t bear to see you get whupped in front of your new dark-haired girlfriend.

That was Sauter, who was in my class of ’74, and Kilgore, a year older, concurred with him as if the two of them were joined at the hip, and said, “Yes sir, I was ‘bout to send one of those shots up into the bleachers until it hit me that the girl was there and that I couldn’t do that to our friend.”

I regretted not having time to entertain my two friends but, as noted, I had a dark-haired beauty waiting for me in the TV room. I got showered and dressed ahead of those two and got to the door about to leave when I decided to be a gentleman and went back and gave both a fist-pump and a smile, and said, “Sorry boys, looks like today ya’ll lose all the way ‘round,” then headed out the door with sounds of oooohs and aaaahs behind me.

Corrina was where I left her, and I sat down by her and watched TV for a minute, then thought of something.

“Corrina,” I said, “did I ever tell you ‘bout that scuffle I got into here when I was about nine years old?”

“No,” she said, curiously.

“It started right here in this chair where I’m sittin’. I was here one summer day minding my own business when some fella I’d never seen before walked in out of the blue, walked up to me and asked me if I thought I could whup him. I shrugged and gave him a funny look, then got up and went to play ping pong to get away from him.

“A minute later, the bully came into the ping pong room over there, and he asked again, ‘Hey, fella,’ he said, ‘do you thank you could whup me?’

“Corrina, I looked hard at him and immediately saw that he was at least two years older, a head taller, bigger, and obviously meaner. So, I answered the only way a nine-year-old brain could answer.”

“I hope you said no and told him to leave you alone. You did, right?”

“Close. What I actually said was, ‘Prob’ly could.’”

Corrina looked up at the ceiling, shook her head, and said, “Pup, tell me you didn’t do that.”

“I wish I could,” I said, “but nine-year-old brains don’t have wires that connect all the time to the tongue the way the normal brain does. And the bad thing is, that bully took ‘Prob’ly could’ to mean ‘Sure I could’ and grabbed me by the shirt and half-dragged and half-pushed me out behind the gym. When we got there, there was none of the normal courtesy of drawin’ lines in the sand. As soon as he let go of my shirt, he hauled off and hit me in the eye, right across my right eye there,” I said, pointing to my eye and playfully twitching it as if it still was injured.

“Ohhhh,” she said, and for the first time, I saw her get riled up enough that I think if the boy had walked in at that moment, she would have punched him right in the eye herself without bothering to draw her line in the sand.

I didn’t slow down.

“I can’t remember how long that part of the fight went along. I jus’ remember tryin’ to shield my other eye so I could at least see well enough to find my way home. I wasn’t even sayin’ this was a fight, Corrina, it was jus’ him hittin’ me and me holdin’ my hands up to keep from dyin.’

“But then he made a mistake. That big boy rared back and kicked me in the shin.”

Corrina shook her head and puffed up her lip like she was mad.

“That was his mistake. I’m not sure why he thought that was e’en necessary. But when he did that, he made me mad. I mean, if you feel down on your shin, there’s not enough meat there hardly to cover your shinbone,” – When I told this part to Cheyenne, I couldn’t help but think about the western town called Shinbone, where the senator and his wife went to bury the gunslinger Doniphan in “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance,” as we mentioned earlier in the story. I wondered if somebody had a fight like this in that town and got kicked in the shin, thus its name “Shinbone.” But I didn’t know about that movie then, so I didn’t think of that.

“So, Corinna,” I continued, “when he made me mad, I jus’ started swingin’ and swingin’, swingin’ at anythin’ that moved.”

Corrina smiled.

“I swung,” I said, “and all I remember next is that the boy started backin’ up and gruntin’ and, in the next instant, cryin’. True story. That bully ran back to get away from my punches, tears runnin’ down his face, and begged me to stop. Well, I was more than happy to stop ‘cause I never wanted to start in the first place. I was jus’ mindin’ my own business.”

“Sure, Pup,” Corrina said, “you probably did the boy a favor by beating him up.”

“Yes I did,” I said, confidently, “and the boy’s beatin’ wasn’t over yet. What I didn’t tell you was that as soon as the boy had grabbed me by the shirt, all the fellas at the Y – includin’ several of Pistol and Squatlow’s friends, probably Sauter and Kilgore, the nuts from the gym – had followed us out. This is the best thing to happen to them in years. They were placin’ bets all the way out to the gym. Most of ‘em lost money, but that didn’t matter much. They were jus’ glad that Squatlow’s li’l brother ‘beat the tar’ out of that fella,’ as they put it.

“I remember the boy started runnin’ away, but the older boys made him come back and face the music. He stood there, blood streamin’ down his face, and they said, ‘Tell us, buddy, are you scared of li’l Pistol here,’ and he tried to get a word out but was hiccuppin’ now like he had been drinkin’ and barely could, but he did shake his head. It almost made me feel sorry for the boy, and, if I could’ve, I think I would’ve gone up to him and hugged him and told him that it’d be awright, that I just got lucky.

“You see, Corrina,” I said, “that’s the worst part of my personality, I get way too nice sometimes.”

“That’s not even close to the worst part,” she answered facetiously.

I smiled but downplayed it, “Jus’ hang ‘round a li’l longer, and you’ll find a list of ‘em longer'd your Christmas list.”

We both laughed as we got up and walked out to leave. As bad luck would have it, we passed Sauter and Kilgore in the hallway, and they giggled like two little girls in pigtails; once past them, I said to Corrina, “Don’t even ask.”

But I took her hand proudly as we approached the glass door, glancing over my shoulder to ensure my distinguished high school buddies were looking.

Coach Steven Ray Bowen served as a teacher and basketball coach at Red Oak High from 1998-2012 and recently spent two years teaching and coaching at Ferris. He and his wife Marilyn (the “amazin’ blonde”) served many years with the Church of Christ of Red Oak at Uhl/Ovilla Roads, but now spend time evangelizing in several states in addition to Coach’s work as a writer and author, including the writing of the ongoing novel/memoir here in the Press. Call or text (972) 824-5197, or email coachbowen1984@gmail.com, or see frontporchgospel.com.