One day he walked right up to me and my friends and said—to me—“Hey Faggot—tomorrow if I see you on the street—I’m gonna kick your ass.”
And then he swaggered away.
My friends were quick to back me up.
You better move, Dave Minor said.
Canada, Barry Gay said. They got plenty a hockey up there.
Yeah, John Dourville added, or you could live in the basement in my house—no one ever goes down there.
We should call the cops, Mark Zambini said. Kung Fu is against the law.
Andy Zambini cut a huge, smelly fart.
These were my advisers.
We spent the rest of the day throwing rocks and discussing why—with a kid actually named Gay on the block—Bobby Burns felt the need to call ME a faggot.
Barry said it was because beating up a guy named Gay was REALLY gay. Dave said it was because Barry was smaller than Bobby and therefore beating him up proved nothing. Mark Zambini said maybe your brother calls you faggot so much, Bobby just thought faggot was your actual name. John Dourville said his father had gotten his nose broken once and that his dad said it hurt like hell and it bled a lot and your eyes watered and then it hurt for like another five or six weeks or so and then after a while it was okay. Andy Zambini hocked a huge loogie onto the sidewalk. And I mean huge: several ants immediately became suspended in it. We stared at them for a while as they tried to wiggle out of the goo. By a while I mean about an hour and a half. We poked at them with sticks.
I went home, said nothing to my dad or my brother—who said pass the salt faggot at supper and got whacked across the head with a gravy ladle by my mom—then I went to bed, staring at the low ceiling of the basement and wishing I could just disappear.
I woke up the next morning and briefly considered pretending to be sick but after a couple of minutes I decided to get up and get it over with. If Bobby Burns was gonna kick my ass I might as well get my ass kicked as quickly as possible and carry on with the rest of my summer. I spent a couple of minutes staring at my nose in the bathroom mirror—imagining what it would look like moved over another inch to the side of my face. Then I went outside to meet the guys.
So I guess you didn’t move, huh? Dave Minor said.
Or run away, John Dourville added.
Barry Gay piped in with this headline: my sister said a kid in her grade said that he knows a kid who used to go to school with a kid who knew Bobby Burns’s first cousin and the cousin said Bobby killed one of their drunk uncles with a Vulcan Death Grip.
No one said anything for a second. The Vulcan Death Grip was a move that Spock used to kill people on Star Trek, which of course I never watched because I hated science fiction because it seemed like bullshit. Until now.
Needless to say, later that morning we were playing street hockey when everyone just froze, right in the middle of a scoring play. They all were suddenly looking over my shoulder and beyond me with fright in their eyes. I turned to see what they had seen: way down at the end of the block—Bobby Burns. Approaching.
I looked down at my feet for a second—gathering my thoughts—until I realized—my thoughts sounded a helluva lot like breaking bones.
Looking up, I could see that Bobby Burns was only about twenty yards away, cracking his knuckles, each crick of a finger echoing off the asphalt like a bullet’s ricochet:
Crack.
Thwang.
Crack.
Zwing.
I could feel the blood leaving my body—apparently not wishing to get spilled.
As Bobby came closer, I could sense everyone else starting to move away from me—I think I even heard a couple of uh-ohs and maybe even some whispered prayers. One of the guys even moved the street hockey net out of the way. As if they didn’t want it covered with my blood and intestines and stuff.
Within seconds Bobby Burns was right there in front of me. The hair. The open denim jacket. No shirt. His beady eyes looking up—glaring. He smiled his menacing, evil grin. Then—two things happened:
1. I didn’t shit my pants.
2. Not shitting my pants made my lower lip—which had begun to tremble—stop trembling.
Then Bobby Burns yanked my street hockey stick right out of my hand and threw it behind him. It clattered across the road. Then—Bobby Burns called me a faggot and slapped me in the face. Hard. Really really hard.
Then, his left hand slowly began to move upwards—in what looked to me much like what I knew the G.I. Joe With The Kung Fu Grip’s hand always looked like—ready to kill or hold a plastic grenade. Or maybe this was what Spock’s hand looked like just before he tried to kill Captain Kirk.
Two more things happened, almost simultaneously:
1. I didn’t shit my pants again.
2. I kicked Bobby Burns in the balls—so fucking hard that my foot almost split him into two separate halves.
No sound came out of his mouth as he doubled over in pain and stumbled sideways onto the tiny front lawn of Zambini’s house. I thought that any second Bobby would spring up and stab me or shoot me or even worse—chop off my head with some crazy Kung Fu karate chop, fly through the air and scissor-kick my torso, slicing open my rib cage to reveal my beating heart to the entire WHAM! I jumped on him and started beating the living crap out of him. Punching and kicking and elbows and knees and punching and everything became one big blur and the next thing I knew my own dad and Mr. Zambini were pulling me off and telling Bobby Burns to get the hell up and go home.
Which he did—very very slowly.
Okay okay, he stuttered, awright.
He had drool running down his chin and a bunch of cuts on his Roger Daltrey chest and grass stains all over his jacket and jeans but—he was moving away.
My father had come running from our house and only saw the last part of what had happened—but he knew enough to say—out of the side of his mouth—“Good job. But don’t say anything to your mother about this.” And off he went. Mr. Zambini told us to get the hell off his goddam lawn. Then he went back inside. It was all over so fast.
As we watched Bobby Burns make his way down the block—bent and bumbling—Dave Minor summed up what each one of us was thinking:
What the hell did you do that for?
I dunno, I said. What just happened?
Holy shit, Mark Zambini said.
He’s gonna kill you tomorrow, Barry Gay said.
He’s gonna kill all of us, John Dourville added.
Andy Zambini didn’t fart.
Or hock a loogie.
Or even belch.
He just shook his head and followed his father inside the house.
Wow.
That night I went to bed thinking my life—as I knew it—was probably over. My dad gave me a knowing look at the dinner table and instead of feeling proud—I was worried sick. The next morning I awoke, once again filled with a let’s get it over with quick mentality. I met up with John and Dave and Barry and the Zambini Brothers. Everyone had long faces. We played street hockey, but every time someone thought they saw a figure off in the distance—we’d stop and look up—frozen with fear and a bottomless pit of dread.
Then someone would say It’s okay—it’s not him.
That must have happened ten or fifteen times that morning. But Bobby Burns never showed up. As a matter of fact—he didn’t show up anywhere for a couple of days.
Maybe you killed him, Barry said.
Maybe he’s buying a gun, Dave said.
Then—on the third day—down the block he came. As soon as we saw him, we all got Deaf Mute Fear. You know the kind? The fear so strong it starts out somewhere inside the marrow of your bones and emanates like a magnetic force out through your blood cells and into your veins and rumbles up and wraps around your arms and legs and neck and chest and leaves you unable to speak or hear anything except the pounding of your own pulse reverberating in your eardrums?
Ba-bump.
Ba-bump.
Bobby Burns was walking toward us.
Ba-bump.
Ba-bump.
I wanted to run but my feet refused to move.
Ba-bump.
Ba-bump.
From a distance, he looked angry—defiant. Uh oh.
Ba-bump.
Ba-ba-bump.
My heart was beating faster.
Ba-ba-bump. Ba-ba-bump.
Maybe that was Barry’s heart.
Ba-ba-bump.
Nope—it’s mine. Don’t shit your pants don’t shit your pants whatever you do DO NOT SHIT IN YOUR OWN PANTS.
Ba-ba-bump.
He’s twenty feet away. Don’t piss your pants either.
Ba-ba-bump.
As he drew closer I actually shut my eyes, figuring at least I wouldn’t have to watch my own dismantling.
Ba-ba-bump.
I could smell him now.
Ba-ba-bump.
I sneaked a peek—to see if Barry and John and Dave and The Zambinis were still there and—much to my surprise—we were all looking at each other. Then we looked up to see Bobby Burns—walking just past us, waving a weak hello and saying “hey guys” and—get this—continuing on his way.
It took us more than a few seconds to mutter two or three heys back at him.
And then he was gone.
Wow.
We must have stared down at the empty end of the block for at least thirty seconds.
Later in the day he came back in the opposite direction and gave us a little head nod with a tight little smile.
We nodded back.
And that was it.
No beating, no knife, no gun—not even any Kung Fu.
Everyone made that jaw-drop, round-mouthed, wide-eyed holy shit can you believe it face. Then we laughed. Then Andy Zambini sneezed and as he sneezed he also cut a giant fart. We laughed. Loud and long.
Bobby Burns never ever threatened any of us again.
As a matter of fact, anytime he walked by he would wave that weak hello and say “hey guys” or just give us the head nod with a tight little smile. Turns out he had never been in jail never killed anyone and Kung Fu was just a TV show he watched like the rest of us. The Vulcan Death Grip? Bullshit. It was all hype. My boot to the balls was just what the doctor had ordered. It had shut up the biggest bully on the block and filled me with a new confidence. I couldn’t wait for the next asshole who decided he was going to push me around—man, would he get his. The boot to the balls with absolutely no warning was gonna become the signature move I would use to establish my reputation with all bullies everywhere.
One day later? The opportunity quickly arose. I tried the same exact move on another guy who was bullying and belittling me and calling me a faggot and thought he was going to get away with it and you know what happened? He blocked my foot before it reached his balls and then beat the living daylights out of me. That guy was my brother Johnny.
That’s right—I roomed with a bully. My brother wasn’t an official bully—just a bully brother. He could handle himself well and was the kind of guy who would wander the streets putting bullies in their place—but when it came to me—well, brothers will be brothers, especially when they share a room small enough to be a walk-in closet for Mini Me.
My brother was way bigger than me and I drove him to the brink as often as I could. Here’s one example: he would alphabetize his record collection along the floor against the wall on his side of the room and then—here’s where he would fuck up—tell me that he had just alphabetized it and for me not to even look—never mind touch—any of the records. I would then wait until he left and immediately pull all the records out of their sleeves and put them haphazardly into other sleeves—a little process I like to call Anti-Alphabetizing. He would come home later, go to pull out
Crosby, Stills, Nash And A Whiny Canadian and instead end up listening to Iron Butterfly’s In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida. Then the Iron Butterfly sleeve would produce Grand Funk Railroad. Abbey Road? Leon Russell. Leon Russell? Three Dog Night. Watching him struggle through the process—and this happened many many times—never failed to make me smile. And then he would threaten and chase and pummel me—which I never really minded. I would laugh and cackle and it would make him insane. He could kick my ass. So what. We both knew he didn’t know Kung Fu or the Vulcan Death Grip. He would go back onto his side of the tiny room and painstakingly realphabetize the records and I would secretly plan how long I would wait before anti-alphabetizing them again.
What did I learn? Patience, pulling, pushing, and the great pleasure of anticipation—waiting for him to come home, knowing the records were all messed up. I learned all four of those things by aggravating my brother. Oh—and Vaseline. Let me explain.
Sometimes my brother would come home late—when I was supposedly asleep—so he would have to put on headphones to listen to the stereo. The big, giant, puffy seventies headphones you see in old movies? Uh huh. You got it.
Once or twice I coated the inside of those babies with Vaseline or this stuff my dad kept with his tools near the water heater—it was called Lava hand soap. And believe me when I tell you—it was aptly named. Lava came in a giant screw-top vat and was invented to wash away engine oil and valve grease. I think it was actually just volcanic spew that some guys at Mount St. Helens let cool down after an eruption and then shoveled into jars and slapped a label on. It made your hands feel as if they were melting. So you can imagine what it would do to your ears. It had a warning on the front: Do Not Put On Face! The way I figured it—technically speaking—the ears are part of the head.
I don’t even think my brother ever figured it out. He’d usually be two sheets to the wind and fall asleep with the headphones on and some shitty music rejiggering his brain cells and wake up with greasy hair.
And the other odd time, ears that felt like they were on fire. I imagined him making a mental note to turn the bass down before he got under the sheets.
Oh the pure joy that brought me. What did I learn? Revenge, folks. And, of course, how to fall asleep with a smile on my face.
Here’s a funny story that sums up my kidhood relationship with my brother. I was playing football in the school yard with some older kids I barely knew. I was covering this kid who went up for a pass and as I blocked it I also accidentally hit him in the face and as we both tumbled to the ground the guy starts punching me. A lot.
As I was trying to defend myself and/or grab a hold of his hands WHOMP! he was hit with blunt force and suddenly disappeared from view.
I sat up to see my brother sitting on top of the guy and holding his head against the ground by the neck and saying: Nobody touches my little brother except me, okay asshole? Hah? Ya got it? Hands off. Then he stood up and walked away. The guy lay there, desperately sucking air. I didn’t know what to do. So—confused—I said That’s right, asshole. Only he can beat the shit outta me! Then I turned to all the other guys—who also looked confused—and said Everybody hear that? Okay, then. Puzzled, they all nodded yes. Then we played more football. There were many many You okays? and Lemme help you ups from then on.
One more bully story: my good friend and writing partner Peter Tolan (Rescue Me, The Job, Analyze This, America’s Sweethearts, Too Many Other Credits To Mention Not To Mention Some Insane Amount Of Emmy Nominations And Three Actual Emmys) was born in raised in Scituate, Massachusetts, in much the same circumstances as me including Irish (American) parents, nuns, priests the whole nine yards. We’re both about the same age.
Peter’s bully was a kid named Billy Noonan who would stand out in front of his house and refuse to let anyone pass unless they gave him money. He made threats and swore and spit and acted like a tough guy and pretty soon everyone was forking over their loose change and lunch money just so Noonan wouldn’t kick their asses. His reputation grew. He killed a guy. He skinned a cat. He invented a new kind of Kung Fu (hey, I told you—Kung Fu was EVERYWHERE back then).
In order to get to school, Peter and every other kid had to walk past Noonan’s corner—there was just no othe
r way without walking an extra couple of very very long blocks so most kids just decided to give in and pay the vig and accept their fate. Then—one winter morning—there was a huge snow and ice storm. Walking the streets was like skating on a huge outdoor rink. Noonan put on a big, brand-new gangster-type overcoat and stood outside his house—as always waiting to taunt and spit and collect. As Peter made his regular turn onto the corner—along with a bunch of other kids—Noonan yelled “Hey Tolan—where’s my money?” Peter sighed and very carefully—making sure not to slip and fall—turned and looked over at Noonan’s outstretched hand. “C’mon, faggot. Fork it over.”
Why We Suck Page 9