Defiance

Their fists rained down on him like maelstrom hail. The feet came next, hardened by rubber soles and just as painful. They whooped and hollered as they beat the boy on the green grass, letting out savage cries of ecstasy and fulfillment. Georgie covered himself as best he could, curling into a ball as tight as his frail body would let him. He covered his ears and shut his eyes, trying to shut out the savages. A toe caught him in the teeth, and he felt a few of them crack. Another one landed square on his nose, almost breaking that too. Through the muffled sounds, he could hear the breaking of his own body the best. Of course, he hated every second of it. He internally winced at every note in his body created in the symphony of his destruction by their hands. Bastards. But, to him, those coming from his own were better than those coming from them.

              He could feel hot tears rolling down his cheek, tears born from the most burning and most profound hatred. No whimper or cry followed. His vocal cords were paralyzed. He felt his battered face turn a deep red, as red as the stripes on a Christmas candy cane. His heartbeat began to drum faster and faster like it too was feeling rage. Eventually, he could feel the fists slowly stop landing. The savages' war hollers turned into something more sinister. From all of them (six of them, when his thoughts straightened), he heard a chorus of laughter. Deep, sociopathic, insane giggles reverberated all around him like the sounds, too, were trying to hurt him. The rage inside him was an excellent shield, but the tears were a horrible indicator of his pain. It was his pain that they were laughing at, and he let them see it.

              The Mongrels; that's what they called themselves. Indeed an original name, not one taken off an Internet chat room. They were fashioned from some of the 'toughest' at Mellevine-Arbour High School. However, they were just some bored rich kids who thought they could get away with anything. It seemed to be that way, too; their leader, a natural son of a bitch named Alex, caught two charges of sexual harassment and battery. The only sentence he got was anger management sessions twice a week for two months. It seemed to work, but he was back to usual tricks after those two months went by. Another one, second in command named Blaine, was caught with a DUI. A judge forced him to go to court-mandated AA for a while. Just like his best friend, he was back to himself after it was all over. After that, the two of them convinced four other guys to join them for a little 'after-school club.' They were the closest thing to a gang in Melleville-Arbour. In school, they were picture perfect; straight A's, after-school clubs, football and soccer, the whole shebang. At night, they were prowling about doing whatever they pleased. Every bottle that they threw had a mark on somebody's head. Everyone's girlfriend had a few words or hands placed on them by them. They went so far as to make their horrible impression of a bark their greeting. They lived up to that name.

              Georgie hated them. Every single one of them. He hated how proud they made themselves all because they thought themselves untouchable. He despised how they felt that they knew everything and that by going the way of the hooligan, they're proving themselves capable, decisive. They had no idea what it was like to struggle, live in a constant state of worry, and genuinely fight for what they needed. He remembered their faces on his way to work when he passed them on his bicycle one day. Half cocked in a devilish smile, eyes full of life and youth yet so dead like the devil. Though it made him seethe with resentment, it also made him fearful. The fear that he felt was not what they could do to him; though his body was frail and his constitution weak, he was never afraid of other people. What he feared was who they would become. If they were like this now, who knows what they would become later. If they could hide their evil as well as they could now, all of them could become anything they wanted. It made him shudder to think about it.

              It was that fear that made him decide to act. One evening, he found them at the ballpark on Fifth and Euclid on one of his days off. They sat in a cloud of smoke, laughing and joking. Probably recounting old stories of chicks they scored with or wimps they beat down. Overcome with a sense of responsibility, Georgie hopped off his bike. His heart beat in anticipation as he marched down the way to them.

              "Alex!" he shouted curtly and loudly.

              The snake looked up in shock. Georgie had caught him just in the middle of him, taking a drag on his cigarette. It made him cough a little bit. When he realized who was calling, he snickered.

              "What, runt?" he asked.

              "Come here. I want to talk to you."

              All six of them got up, but with a gesture of his hand, Alex sat them down. He swaggered down. As he approached, he blew smoke in Georgie's face.

              "Spit it out, boy. What do you want?"

              Georgie's face turned a slight red. In anger, in embarrassment.

              "I've had enough of what you've been doing. You're going to stop now."

              A puff of breath, incredulous, left Alex's lungs. He began to laugh, and his lackeys joined with him.

              "What? Stop what?" he said, feigning ignorance.

              "This!" Georgie responded. "This and all you're doing right now."

              The look of amusement left Alex's face. Replacing it was stone-cold anger.

              "You got no right to tell me what to do, boy."

              Alex stepped closer to Georgie, using his ten inches of extra height to intimidate him.

              "You're all by yourself. You can't do anything to me. Are you going to tell your mom about me? Huh?"

              Without thinking, Georgie kicked hard in between Alex's legs. The blow sent him to his knees, where Georgie punched hard across the jaw. The impact made Alex fall over and wince in pain. His gang stood up and, with insane fury, charged at Georgie. The beating was only a couple of minutes, but it felt a lot longer. As they sulked a foot or two away from him, Georgie struggled to get up. He ran his battered fingers across his face and teeth. He clutched his stomach, where they smashed him. Alex, speedily recovering thanks to blood lust, landed one last kick to his stomach. Georgie snapped back into the fetal position. Alex bent down close. Though he was on the verge of passing out, Georgie could smell the alcohol and marijuana on his breath.

              "See what happens when you mess with me, boy?" Alex said, venom and hatred sliding in his voice. "See what happens when you don't stay where you're supposed to be?"

              Georgie could feel that he was getting close to blacking out. It wouldn't be long before they would leave him in a heap. Eventually, someone will find him, or he'll just lay there all night. It didn't matter to him. But he wasn't keen on just letting him get the last blow. Summoning the last of his strength, he garnered as much spit and blood as he could in his mouth. With a final push, he spat in Alex's face. He could see the blood and spit drip down back upon him, Alex's face contorted in rage before he went down into the darkness.