Bully

by Gonzalez, J. F.

  Time was a blur as the four boys took multiple runs. Danny relaxed a little bit and soon he was back up to his usual skill level. With Bobby and Jerry standing with Raul while he did his run, he felt safe. Despite that, Raul was opening up and becoming friendly; shouting out encouragements to the other guys, trading jokes with Bobby, smoking cigarettes with Jerry. The more normal Raul became to Danny, the more he let his guard down. Before he knew it, he was feeling totally at ease around him.

  Raul was getting better as a skateboarder, too. Danny gave him a few tips while they stood on the sidelines, watching Bobby and Jerry on their runs. Raul watched them carefully, his features set in deep concentration as if he were studying their technique for a test. When it was his turn, he would grab a spare board, favoring either Danny’s or Jerry’s, and head off into the pipe. By this time, they were all encouraging Raul, and Danny was the first to let out a war whoop of victory when Raul hit the vertical mark on the pipe. “Alright! Way to go! You did it!”

  Bobby and Jerry hooted and clapped. Raul ignored them with that sense of grim determination and kept skating, hitting vertical on the opposite wall. His form was getting better; Danny could tell he was catching on very quickly and beginning to master his ability. When Raul finished, he skated back to the sidelines and Danny hurried over to congratulate him. “Fuck, dude, you did it! You hit the vertical point!”

  Raul grinned; his features were still menacing, but Danny could tell Raul was happy that he’d come this far. “That was a fucking rush, man. That was awesome!”

  Danny didn’t know how much time they spent with Raul beneath that underpass skating the giant pipe. It could have been forty minutes or it could have been forty hours. Time seemed to slow down that afternoon. Hanging out and skateboarding with Raul Valesquez was something Danny thought he and Bobby would never do. Raul was a totally different kid. There was still that menacing look to him, still that undercurrent of danger, but it seemed that part of him was turned off. Danny supposed that side of him could be turned on with a simple flick of the switch, so he resolved to not do that. If he stayed on Raul’s good side today and said nice things to him and treated him cool, maybe Raul would be cool with them. It seemed they were on his good side for now; Danny wanted to keep it that way.

  At some point while Bobby was on his run, Jerry glanced out at the drainage ditch. “Check it out,” he said, pointing out at the sunlight. “It’s getting late. I got shit I gotta do tonight. You guys ‘bout ready to split?”

  Danny nodded and Raul grunted, watching Bobby on his run in that concentrated stare of his. “You guys want to take another run after Bobby and then we go?” Jerry asked.

  “I’ll pass,” Danny said. “Raul can go one last time if he wants to, though.”

  “I’m done, too,” Raul said, watching Bobby as he hit the ten o’clock spot on the pipe.

  When Bobby was finished, he skated over to them. “Fuck, I can’t get any higher than ten o’clock!”

  “You’re too fucking light, man,” Jerry said, taking off his helmet. “You need to put some meat on your bones. You need more body mass to build up your speed.”

  “You don’t weigh that much more than me,” Bobby protested.

  Danny took his helmet off. “We’re gonna split.”

  “Okay.” Bobby took his helmet off and grinned at Raul. “Hey, I got a Logan Earth Ski deck at the house along with some extra Trackers. You want them?”

  “Sure.”

  “You’ll just need to get some wheels,” Bobby said. They headed to the staircase and started up. Danny brought up the rear, trying to ignore the claustrophobic feeling as they ascended. “You can get Road Riders for, like, five bucks a pop at Sporting Ideas.”

  “I think I can scrounge up some skateboard wheels,” Raul said.

  With Jerry leading the way, they headed back the way they came.

  Once at the top of the ditch, Danny set his skateboard down and rode slowly, keeping pace with the other boys. Bobby rode along, chattering a mile a minute. “Once we get you set up with a decent skate, we can build a ramp or something. I’ve got some building materials I was going to use to make one—two-by-fours, plywood, all kinds of shit. We can build it in my driveway!”

  “That’ll be cool,” Danny said.

  Bobby did a couple of 360’s, his hair flying. “When do you want to come back here?” he asked Jerry.

  Jerry shrugged. “I don’t know. I’ve got to work the next few days. Maybe Tuesday afternoon?”

  “That’s cool.” Bobby turned to Raul and Danny, skating around them in a wide circle. “You guys want to come back Tuesday afternoon? I can probably get you a skate by then, Raul.”

  Raul nodded, keeping pace with them. He was looking around at the houses that sat behind the brick fences that lined the perimeter of the drainage ditch. This drainage ditch cut through a large swath of housing developments. On a weekday afternoon it was like being in the middle of nowhere.

  “Dude, you’re a natural at this,” Bobby said to Raul, skating in weaving motions around them, covering most of the path. “A few more trips here and you’ll be—"

  Raul moved so quickly that at first Danny wondered what was going on. One minute Raul was walking along calmly, looking around at the houses; the next he was bolting toward Bobby, who had skated toward the yawning pit of the drainage ditch—he was still a safe distance away, but it wasn’t safe enough. All it took was the momentum of Raul’s launch, a quick grab at Bobby’s shirt, and then he was pushing Bobby across the last few feet of the path and over the edge of the drainage ditch. Raul stopped the minute he let go of Bobby and time slowed to a crawl when Danny heard Bobby scream.

  Danny was paralyzed. Part of him couldn’t believe what was happening, even though Bobby’s descending scream was loud and piercing and then it suddenly ended with a hearty crunch.

  Then all was silent.

  Jerry’s voice broke the din of Danny’s paralysis. “What the fuck did you just do!” The older boy stood near the chain link fence, his normally calm features now a mask of worry and fear. He was looking at Raul Valesquez as if the younger boy was some hideous freak of nature. “What the fuck did you do that for? Are you out of your—"

  Raul was still on his momentum of destruction. He picked up Bobby’s skateboard and ran toward Jerry, wielding it like a club. Jerry yelled and stumbled backward in surprise as Raul brought the deck of the skateboard in a wild swing that hit Jerry’s abdomen. Jerry yelled in surprise as Raul swung the skateboard at him again. “What the fuck is wrong with you?” Jerry tried to wield off the blow with his arms, holding them up defensively, but Raul already had the element of surprise. He swung the skateboard at Jerry’s mid-section, striking a solid blow to Jerry’s stomach. A grunt of pain escaped Jerry’s lips and he doubled over, his face pale. Raul brought the skateboard over his head like a club and swung it down on Jerry’s head. It hit his skull with a hearty smack and Jerry crumpled to the ground.

  That broke Danny’s paralysis and he made a mad dash down the path, skateboard in hand. He could almost feel Raul turn his attention on him when the younger boy’s command stopped him as suddenly as he’d taken off. “You run and I kill him now!”

  Danny stopped and whirled around. His heart leaped in his throat as the sight of Raul standing beside Jerry, who was conscious, his features pain-stricken. He was bleeding profusely from a scalp wound that trickled blood down his temples, staining his neck and the top of his T-shirt.

  Raul held the skateboard over his head, prepared to bring it crashing down on Jerry’s unprotected head. Raul’s gaze was pure evil, his eyes deep pits of malice. “The minute you run, I smash his skull. I’ll fucking do it, Hernandez. You know I will!”

  Danny was rooted to the spot. His body felt like shaved ice. His crotch grew suddenly warm as he pissed himself.

  “You want me to kill him?”

  “No.” Danny’s voice was a shaky whisper. He wanted to cry, but he couldn’t.

  “Why not
?”

  “Because...” That was the best answer he could give. Danny was so fear-stricken, he could hardly talk or think straight.

  “That’s not a good enough answer,” Raul spat. “Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t smash his fucking head in now!”

  “Because the minute you do, Danny will run for help and he’ll be too fast for you to catch,” Jerry said, panting. He was looking up at Danny, still lying on the ground. Jerry was bleeding badly, but at least he was alive. “He’ll call the cops and they’ll bust your ass.”

  “Bullshit!” Raul raised the skateboard higher over his head.

  “They will, and I’m not worth going to jail for.” Despite the fact Jerry was in obvious pain, there was a sense of calmness and maturity in his voice that was cutting through to Raul’s psyche. “You really want to go to jail for killing me and Bobby? Is that what you want? Shit man, you’re only eleven. Why the fuck would you want to waste your life on two dick-weeds like me and Bobby?”

  “You know you’re a dick-weed, don’t you?” Raul said, nudging Jerry’s body with a sneakered foot. “You know you suck dicks in hell, don’t you faggot?”

  “That’s right, I suck dicks in hell. I’m a faggot. Why do you want to throw your life away for killing a faggot?”

  “Because I hate faggots like you!”

  “What’d I ever do to you?”

  “I hate your fucking face, you dipshit, fairy motherfucker!”

  “Fine. You hate me. But you know I’ve never done shit to you, Raul. Seems to me it would be worth more to kill somebody you really hate, somebody that’s really fucked you over. You know I’ve never fucked you over. If anything, I’ve treated you with respect.”

  This seemed to make Raul think, although he still stood over Jerry, skateboard raised over his head and ready to swing. He glanced from Jerry to Danny. “I still don’t care. The minute Danny runs, I’m still killing you.”

  “Then Danny won’t run,” Jerry said, and now he was looking at Danny, those brown eyes imploring him Don’t run. Please don’t run, let me talk some sense into him! Danny stood where he was, fighting his instinct to bolt and run anyway. “Instead, you’ll just walk away.”

  “Bullshit!”

  “You’ll just walk away and let us go.”

  “And then you’ll tell the cops. Fuck that.”

  “No, we won’t tell anybody.”

  “You think I’m going to buy that bullshit?” Raul looked like he was going to swing the skateboard down at Jerry’s head again.

  “I’ll scream,” Danny said, the words blurting out of his mouth. His voice sounded panicked. “I’ll scream and somebody in one of these houses will hear me.”

  “Yeah, and if you scream, I’m still bashing this motherfucker’s head in,” Raul threatened.

  “Danny isn’t going to scream and you’re not going to kill me!” Jerry’s admonition wasn’t a threat, but Danny detected a tinge of fear and panic in it. “We’re going to be cool, okay? You’re going to put down the skateboard and — "

  Something changed in Raul’s eyes; Danny caught a glimmer of it. A sense of understanding, a shifting of gears. He nudged Jerry with his foot again, his eyes locked on Danny. “Does he know what I told you the other night, Danny?”

  Danny shook his head.

  “Maybe you should tell him, then.”

  “Raul killed that family in Torrance,” Danny blurted out. “You know, the ones that were cut up that night in their house.”

  Jerry didn’t say anything. He was still looking at Danny.

  “Tell him what I told you the other night,” Raul said.

  “He’s been watching my house,” Danny said, his voice breaking. He was shaking so bad he could hardly control it. “He ... I heard him the other night. He sneaks over to my house in the middle of the night and watches me and my family sleep. He says he’s going to do to me and my family what he did to those other people and—"

  “And the minute he cuts and runs, he knows I’ll not only bash your head in, I’ll wait until his family’s asleep and I’ll break in his house and cut them to pieces,” Raul said. “And I’ll fuck his mom and his sister and cut their fucking heads off and shit on them. And nobody will know it’s me.”

  “They will when Danny calls the police,” Jerry said, fighting to remain calm. “He’ll tell them everything, and then— "

  Raul laughed. The tone of it sent chills down Danny’s spine. “You think the fucking pigs are going to believe what Danny tells them? Don’t you know that I should be in a fucking juvenile home by now? Why haven’t they put me away? You think after all the shit I’ve been caught for and let off on, they’re going to do anything to me if Danny tells them?”

  While this made sickening sense to Danny, he still didn’t understand why, if Raul had been arrested for other crimes, he was still allowed to walk the streets. Still, he would think murder would be something even Raul would not be above escaping.

  “I’m only eleven-years-old,” Raul said, his voice calm yet menacing. “You think the pigs are going to believe a shit-head like you telling them an eleven-year-old is capable of killing people? That he could cut people up and avoid being caught? Are you out of your mind?”

  “They’ll believe me,” Danny said. He realized with a rising certainty that chilled him to the bone that Raul was right.

  “No, they won’t,” Raul said.

  “The FBI will get involved,” Danny said quickly, the idea coming to him so suddenly that all he could do was run with it. “The local police might not believe an eleven-year-old could kill two kids, but the FBI will. I’ll call them, too.”

  This seemed to affect Raul more than the threat of the police. He still held the skateboard poised, ready to strike. “You motherfucker.”

  “I will!” Danny blurted. He could feel the adrenaline rush pouring through him, making him sweat. “I’ll tell the FBI and I’ll tell them everything!”

  “They’ll still have to investigate,” Raul said, parrying Danny’s thrust quickly. “It’ll take a few days before they pick me up. And I can promise you that tonight, while the cops are busy trying to convince the feds an eleven-year-old isn’t capable of doing this, I’ll be at your house jamming a knife in your little sister’s twat.”

  “I’ll tell my mother!” Danny said, saying anything to keep the threat going. “We’ll leave the neighborhood! You won’t be able to find us and—"

  “We won’t say anything,” Jerry said. He sounded stronger now, more in control. He was still on the ground, right arm still up in a defensive mode. “We won’t say anything about your involvement. Swear to God! We’ll say Bobby was showing off and he got too close to the edge of the ditch, lost his balance and fell. You panicked and ran off.”

  Raul appeared to think about this. “What about you?’ He nudged Jerry with his foot again.

  “I’ll tell them I wasn’t wearing my helmet in the pipe and I fell,” Jerry said. “They’ll buy that.”

  Raul looked from Jerry to Danny, weighing his options.

  “It’s like you said,” Jerry said, looking up at Raul. “They won’t believe you could do this, so if we say it was an accident, they’ll believe that. They’ll also believe you got scared and ran away. It’s easier to believe a kid would get scared and run away, than it is to believe he’s capable of pushing another kid off a forty-foot embankment to his death. Nothing will happen to you.”

  “Nothing will happen to me if you tell the truth,” Raul said.

  “That’s not true,” Jerry said. “The minute you bash me with that skateboard, Danny will run home, and he’s already got too big a lead on you. You won’t be able to catch him and, he’ll not only call the cops, he’ll call the FBI. He’ll tell everybody, and even if it does take them a few days to pick you up, there’s probably going to be cops and shit at his house, so you won’t be able to carry out your threats. Once they get you, he’ll tell them everything and you’ll really be fucked.”

  “Yeah, and if I
let you go I’ll still be fucked because you’ll just fucking tell anyway!”

  “And what if we did? It’s like you said, the police won’t believe us. And even if Danny called the FBI, it’ll still take them awhile to get on the case. There’ll be no urgency for the police to protect him and his family, he won’t be able to talk his mom into leaving, so you’ll still have that advantage.”

  What the fuck are you doing? Danny wanted to scream. His heart froze as he saw Raul’s face light up at the implications.

  Raul set the skateboard down. His eyes were black pits; they narrowed to evil slits as he glared at Danny. “I’m getting the fuck out of here. And if you think the cops are going to find me in the next day or two, you’re mistaken. You won’t know where I am, but I’ll be watching you. And if I hear so much that a cop comes around asking me about anything other than Bobby falling off his stupid ass skateboard and breaking his fucking neck, I’m not even going to sit outside your bedroom window and scare you all night like I did last week. I’m just going to come in and kill all your asses.” He looked down at Jerry and kicked him lightly in the hip. “And as for you, I’ll find out where you live, and you know I can, too!”

  Jerry licked his lips. His tanned, handsome features were pale and drenched in sweat and blood. “I know.”

  “If you think the cops are going to do something about this, you’re wrong. They don’t give a shit what I do. They let me do whatever I want. They don’t give a shit. Do you understand?”

  Jerry nodded. “Yeah, I understand.”

  Danny nodded too, knowing this had to be true, and feeling deathly afraid because of it. Why else was Raul allowed back out into the streets and in school? If all the stories about him were true, he should have been packed off to a juvenile detention center a long time ago.

  Raul threw Bobby’s skateboard into the drainage ditch and leaped for the chain link fence. Before he vaulted it, he cast one last threatening glance at Jerry and Danny. “Just remember that I’ll kill both of you if I even suspect you’ve told the cops what really happened.”