Bullies

“You're going to get the wedgie initiation.” 

It was my first day of tennis practice. I was in middle school, and two weeks before, the varsity high school tennis coach scouted me at a local tennis club, and I was invited onto the team. (I’m not saying this to brag as I’ve always been horrifically bad at every other sport.)

I had played adolescence strategically and nobody bothered me. I wasn’t popular nor a nerd, but high school was foreign territory.

“Today’s the day,” the senior captain of the team warned as he grinned from the front of the team van. 

They had already gotten the other two new high school players. One kid was chased down in a parking lot after a meet. They jumped the other one on the court in the middle of a practice match while our coach had gone to retrieve the Gatorade cooler. They pinned each to the ground while someone ripped a handful of cloth from inside his shorts as the victim screamed. Most likely harmless, but from my thirteen-year old perspective, these kids were huge, and it looked like medieval torture that one endured in the basement of Abu Ghraib prison. I wanted it to be done, and pleaded with them to get it over with. 

“Maybe tomorrow,” he pondered. “We’re going to make this one extra special.”  

I decided that if they came, I was going to swing a forehand at the closest head and take out someone’s teeth. But they extended the torment. During practice, on the way to meets, while we were running drills.

After two weeks, I asked to resign. Fuck high school. Fuck these mental mind games. Fuck any kid who lords power over another because they are bigger and stronger. I desperately wanted to go back to hanging out with my middle school friends where I belonged.  The next day our coach called a team meeting. 

“No more initiations,” he ordered.

The captain gave me an evil eye as I gazed innocently to the ground. Most of them ignored me for the rest of the season, but I didn’t care. I was planning on applying to boarding school and hoped to never see them ever again.