CHOICES: Chapter 1
“Hey!” I bellowed. But then I thought about it. “Never mind. We’re talking about girls. Two outta three is good enough.”
CHOICES is the first book in the Chronicles of a Hero fantasy series. This is the story of Wendell P. Dipmier, who I’ve been writing about since 1990. I hope you’ll join me on this new adventure….as I tell the honest, complete story of this amazing 17 year old, exclusively on Life of Fiction.
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Chapter 1
If someone told me I’d have to die to be a hero, I’m not sure I would have taken the job.
Yeah, I’m only 17. Not even the popular kid, which makes this more awkward. I’m guessing most people will probably think this is just a tale of fiction. Some story of a bored teenager made up to get more attention in a world starving for attention. But you know what? They can think what they want. I can’t fix stupid.
“Ow, ow, ow!”
“Oh, stop.”
“It hurts,” I growled back. Truth was, everything hurt. That’s what happens when you try to be the good guy. The bad guys in my social spheres are bigger, stronger, faster, outnumber me, and prevent my escape. Teens are mean. Cruel even. The guys are bad, but girls are even worse. Any kid outside the ‘popular’ circles in school knows this. If you can’t meet the current standard for fame, talent, beauty, or connections, you’re just raw meat for the peer grinder.
A sacrifice for sport and cruel entertainment among youth who think the public school system is ‘real life’.
Thick fingers worked over my wounds, probing the depth of each cut. So far, there wasn’t a need for stitches, which was…good. No stitches meant no ER or med center. The last thing I needed was more parental attention. At least the sun had graced us with its presence. With the clouds retreating and the wind dying down, you almost forgot it was October. I closed my eyes to the warmth and… “Ow!”
“Wuss.”
“Jerk.”
“Baby.”
“Bully.”
“Whiner.”
“Thanks,” I grumbled. “For putting me back together.”
“You’re lucky. You know that.”
I always felt lucky at the Matthews’ home. It was my home away from home. Especially since mom died. When I had nowhere to go and no one to talk to, the Matthews had been there with open arms, as my family cracked and fell apart. Three houses down from mine, the door was always open, day or night.
Great people.
“I got beat up and pushed down a ravine, Evan. And here I was thinking my life was improving.” I flinched away from the evil cotton swab darting towards my face. “Ow. Okay, we’re done.”
The back porch and pool area were a blind spot to the neighbors, overlooking a steep ravine that descended into miles of pine trees. I always joked that it was perfect for teens, up to no good. Evan had the first-aid kit spread out across the patio table. He’d angled the umbrella back to use the sunlight for inspecting my wounds.
“That Travis came to get me,” Evan said. He grabbed another cotton ball and doused it ruthlessly with rubbing alcohol. I think he got a kick out of helping me, so long as I experienced pain. He liked to remind me it was a natural consequence of my choices. Choices that too often seemed to suck. “No, you’re not done. Sit down — that cut on your cheek needs closing.” Strong fingers gripped my arm. “If he hadn’t, you might not have been found…and I mean it. Sit.”
“Someone would have shown up,” I argued.
Evan frowned at me.
“Eventually,” I added.
He lowered his hands and stared.
“Maybe,” I grumbled. Evan was probably right. He’d found me unconscious, along the bank of the stream. My bullies had dragged me away from the water, but I could have frozen through the night before anyone noticed I was gone. “But I am glad Travis came to you. Thanks for hauling my butt back here.”
Again the nod. “Always.”
I could count the friends I had on one hand. Evan was my best friend. Had been since we were little. Something about me and a Doberman Pincer during Halloween. I’m told I got between the attacking mutt and Evan, but all I remembered was trying to get to the candy first. My face got torn up, needed a bunch of stitches, and our parents became close friends over the event. Evan and I followed suit.
“I heard Jeffrey had his locker broken into during the flag football game today,” he said nonchalantly. He pinched the cut on my cheek shut, and dabbed it with some glue.“Someone apparently tampered with his shampoo,” he said. Satisfied, he gave me a quick once-over, then cleaned up the first aid kit.
“Is that so?” I said.
“Uh huh.” Squeezing the cotton-ball remains and wrappers into a clump, he tossed it at the tiny trash basket near his feet. It missed. Rolled between my feet instead. “Guys on the team were laughing about his shiny new dome. That, and losing his eyebrows.”
It was hard not to smile. Just the thought of the biggest jerk in school getting pranked that hard was enough the make this day worth it. “Does anyone know who did it?”
Evan snorted. “Nope. But for all the times he’s terrorized other kids in the school, it was hilarious.”
“Yeah,” I said, reaching into my front pocket. I pulled out the crumpled five ounce lotion container and tossed it onto the table.
Evan snatched it up. “You didn’t,” he smirked.
I shrugged.
“Hair removal cream?”
“Who knew it would work if mixed with shampoo?”
Evan laughed, “I’m thinking Jeffrey.”
I laughed with him. “Mom used that brand, and it was small enough to conceal in my front pocket, so…”
Evan shot me a sly grin. “So if you got caught, they’d never check your front pockets.”
“If Jeffrey and his dogs are anything, it’s homophobic.”
Evan laughed again, leaning back into his chair. The hollow metal frame creaked in protest under the weight. He gave me a solemn look as he folded tree trunk arms. “I take it from Travis’s swollen face and mud soaked clothes you were a diversion?”
I shrugged. “They thought Travis did it. Jumped him after school. When I saw them take the creek route home, I couldn’t just walk away.”
Evan smiled. “I know. You’re decent that way.”
“You mean stupid,” I said.
“That’s not how I see it.”
I ran my fingers carefully over the cuts on my face. Three bandages and two sealed cuts. Plus, no one had broken my nose for once. I was getting better at this. “You didn’t see it at all, Evan. Which reminds me…if you weren’t at football practice with all your non-nerd linebacker buddies, this wouldn’t have happened at all.”
Evan scowled. “You don’t know that.”
“Oh, come on. I’ve seen you fight, remember? Those idiots wouldn’t have a chance.”
“That wasn’t my point.”
“Then what was your point? Cause I keep trying to stand up for myself, just like you tell me to. I don’t turn away or hide when someone smaller is being picked on, but that only places the bully’s target on my back.”
“Violence isn’t always the answer, Wendell.”
“You’re right,” I said. “Violence is the question. The answer to bullies is ‘yes’.”
Evan’s scowl deepened. “I’d prefer to talk things through…peaceably. Get people to listen to reason. That’s how to resolve issues long term.”
I snorted. “Says the six foot two Mother Teresa on steroids. If you knocked them on their butts, I guarantee they’d listen.”
Evan sighed. “Now you’re the one not listening.”
It’s not that Evan was wrong, but we had very different lives. Where he was a beefy football player and babe magnet, I was more like a skinny-nerd fridge magnet. The kind toddlers knock to the kitchen floor when they brush up against them. Evan received cheers and adoration, whereas I received sneers and abhorrence. Just his presence in a room has stopped fights by reputation alone. I’d seen him protect me against four guys his own size. When Evan couldn’t reason his way out of something and violence was the last option, he was…inhuman. Moving between enemies with timing and precision, using just enough force to put an attacker down. No more.
He’d even turned some conflicts into opportunities to make friends. Guys, who to this day, would watch Evan’s back if needed. I still don’t understand how he did it, but I saw it with my own eyes.
Sinking back into the chair, I folded my arms defiantly, anger swelling in my chest. We’d had this talk many times before. He just didn’t get it. Not from my perspective.
How we’d remained best friends often confused me. As little kids, you just have to like each other and play, but as teens? We had little to nothing in common. We didn’t walk in the same social circles, and even our family lives were night and day in comparison. I’d asked Evan once why we were friends. He said, “I think it’s because when you’re around, I feel like a complete person.” When I’d opened my mouth to argue, more than a decade of proof forced it shut again. Fact was, I’d worked flippin’ hard to deserve a friend like him.
What Evan’d done wrong to get me as a friend wasn’t my problem.
“Sorry,” I said. Common sense beat my selfish moron version back into a mental closet, and I forced a not-quite-pathetic smile to my face. “The last thing I want is to replace my bully with another bully. Jeffrey may be a jerk, but that doesn’t mean I want to put you in that position.” I gave him my bouncing head from a side-to-side gesture. Translation: I’m being a jerk. We both know it. I’m sorry. Can we move on now?
He gave me a nod. “It’s Friday. You’re safe. Travis is home safe, and my mom and dad are going out for the evening. You…need to get home soon?”
I shook my head.
“Does…your dad need to know about today?”
“Naw. Like you said, I’m safe. It’s over, and I don’t think he’d notice, anyway.” Dad preferred work to being at home. My cuts would be mild scars before we’d end up in the same room again. We’d become estranged roommates, instead of father and son. I was a walking reminder of mom’s passing, and it hurt him. If he looked at me for too long, or had to hold a conversation for more than a few minutes, you could see it.
Something in him had broken.
It’s one reason the Matthews welcomed me, and took every opportunity to encourage me. To be patient with my dad. To remember how much my mom loved both of us. They’d seen it all. The car accident. Praying at the hospital. The funeral in the rain. Reaching out to my father in his grief. Mom had been the center of our family.
The center of my universe. Now she was gone.
If I asked for anything, my dad wouldn’t hesitate to provide it. He just couldn’t give what I needed.
A father.
What do you do when you’ve become invisible in your own house to those you love? When you have no one to turn to? To talk to? My dad loves me. Of course he does, but he was hurting. The love of his life had been taken. “He’s…working late,” I said, shaking the oncoming depression from my mind.
“So you’re free,” said Evan. “Cool. What say we order pizza?”
Ah. A subject my mind could switch to.
Pizza was food of gods, college students, and soccer moms too tired to deal with complaining kids. Our source came from a jolly 400lb Greek dough-slinger named ‘Bud’. I know the name resonates more with riding a horse and herding cows, but no-one questioned the results of the six-foot-four owner of the local pizzeria. Beard like a mighty dwarf and hands the size of anvils, Bud worked pizza magic like a sorcerer.
The corners of my mouth curled up. “I’ll do one better. How about pizza, get out your dad’s projector, and we invite some girls over to watch a movie?”
Evan cocked his head to the side and smirked. “Have anyone specific in mind?”
Did I have anyone in mind? What a stupid question. My fingers nervously strummed the surface of the table. “We should definitely invite Cindi, of course.”
“Of course.”
“…and maybe…uh…”
“Yes?” Evan’s smile grew a bit too wide.
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