I feel the blood rushing to my face.
"Let’s just say, she may no longer be interested in Richard"
I remembered that he’d had a date last night too, and I wanted to change the subject.
"What about your date? How’d it go?"
"Did you see a sock on the door?
No? Then you know how it went."
Dennis suddenly turned sullen, and I wondered what had happened. Being a Jock, he normally had his pick of women.
From the noises that had emanated from his room on past occasions, I knew he got plenty of action. That was part of the reason we had instituted the ’sock on the doorknob’: I had walked in on him on more than one occasion.
Knowing that I wasn’t going to get any details, l ate my own cereal,, showered, brushed my teeth, and got out the door.
Wind and Rain pelted me in the face as soon as I stepped outside, and I rushed to my car.
Normally I prefer to walk to the campus, but in bad weather like this, I was glad I had my car. It took me a few minutes to get it warmed up, and I had to keep my wipers going and defrost running just to see the mushy road.
The rain was coming down hard, and I envied the guy from Japan that could start himself on fire. That was a feat that would come in handy at the moment.
Wet as the roads were, l arrived on campus at the same time l usually did when I walked. By the time I made it to class, I was wet, and slightly out of breath from running.
On the plus side, no one threw any balls at me, or called me any derogatory names. Everyone was too busy trying to get out of this storm.
On the bad side, despite running and the cold, I fell asleep halfway through my science class, and couldn’t get my programs to compile in my programming class; all the switches I wrote into my code kept failing. The Irony of that didn’t escape me.
Lunch was a welcome break, but I couldn’t get my mind off my failure with the switches. I was lost in thought, when something struck the back of my head. My headache had completely dissipated, thankfully.
"Look what we have here,"
Richard’s voice boomed above me, and I cringed,
"a geek who thinks too highly of himself."
"Leave me alone, Richard" I murmured, cradling my head in my hands. With my new ability out of commission, I knew I was no match for the bigger man.
"Weave me awone, Wichard," he repeated in baby talk, laughing.
"Tina told me you tried to come on to her, and she had to kick you out. She’s mine, understand? Leave her alone, or you will have me to deal with."
Richard’s tone made my head throb, but his words made my blood boil. Tina claimed I had come onto HER?
Sure, I had flipped some of her switches, but in the end, she had been the one to kiss me.
I stood up from my chair, turning to face the bigger man, and spoke before I could think better of it.
"Really, Richard? I have a question for you: how bow-legged was Tina walking when you saw her this morning?"
I could see that I struck home by the flash of red that blossomed across his cheeks.
Quicker than I could think, he shoved me back, and I fell hard back into my chair.
I knew I didn’t stand a chance against him in a fight, and with my anger rising, I started to act before I could think. I made a switch in him to make him weaker, and firmly started moving it.
Standing back on my feet, I looked up to him, wishing | were the taller one. My fists were clenched at my side, as I glared at the bigger man.
"Look at the dweeb," someone said behind Richard, and I realized he’d brought one of his cronies, "looks like he wants to fight you, Richard. You’d better be careful, he looks angry."
The mocking tone just added fuel to my fire, and I pushed more on Richard’s ’weak’ switch, and remembered that I had created another switch yesterday.
"Maybe if you were a big enough man to satisfy your girlfriend, she wouldn’t have come to me."
The words were out of my mouth before I could think better of them.
Again Richard’s hands pushed against me, but in his weakened state, he fell back and almost tripped over Dan Peters.
Dan caught his leader,
however, and helped him back to his feet. Richard tried to shove me again, bracing himself this time, but he barely had any strength left in his arms.
"Leave me alone, Richard, and never bother me again," I told the bully, menace dripping from my voice. "I’d hate for you to have any more accidents."
Richard’s arm cocked back, ready to strike me, but his eyes grew large as I flipped his other switch. In horror he looked down, to see the puddle forming at his feet.
"Come on, Richard!" Dan cheered him on, not noticing what had happened.
"Show this dweeb where he stands...
Richard?"
It was too late.
Richard had turned and fled, an unmistakable dark stain still growing as he fled the scene in panic