Free Foolish Fire by Guy Willard Page B

face snapped forward and our eyes locked.
    “Tell me, faggot,” I said with my voice lowered, trembling in spite of myself, “is it true that you like to take it up the ass?”
    His face froze. Then, with a calmness which surprised me, he muttered, “Why don’t you leave me alone?” and tried to push his way past my encaging arm.
    I grabbed him by the elbow and pulled him back into a niche formed between the washroom partition and the urinals. His eyes grew big with fright, belying his recent show of bravado, and I felt a quick spark of relief shoot through me.
    “Listen,” I hissed between my teeth. “You’d better not sass back if you know what’s good for you.”
    “Why? What are you gonna do about it?”
    I was at a loss for an answer and my confidence suddenly ebbed. I wondered again about my ability to take him on in a fight, one-on-one. He had an almost smug look on his face, as if he were laughing at something I couldn’t see behind my back. (I actually turned around to see if someone was behind me.) I’d never seen him this confident before.
    “How come you’re so cocky today?”
    “I’m not cocky.” His expression changed suddenly, as if in demonstration of this, into a softer one tinged with obsequiousness.
    “You are cocky. You’re a cocky little faggot, that’s what you are.”
    He glared silently.
    “Well? Say something. You’re scared, aren’t you?”
    I shook him roughly, but he didn’t reply.
    “Listen,” I said, my voice pitched low. “You’d better be in the music room after school today if you know what’s good for you.”
    “Why?”
    “Just be there if you don’t want me to beat the crap out of you.”
    I let go of him and watched him scurry off. Then, drawn by a confused yearning, I stepped into the hall to watch him walk away. I noted the way his buttocks pressed tightly against the fabric of his pants. To my shame, I found myself picturing how he’d look naked.
     
    *
     
    I was first clarinetist in the school band, which automatically made me Mr. Seth’s student assistant. I’d been “volunteered” to keep the music sheets in order, neatly filed by song title and instrument in the music library. I’d also been given the keys to the music room so I could let students in after school to practice for the year-end band festival.
    As I made my way to the music room, I spotted a waiting figure by the door. It pleased me to see Mark so compliant after his cheekiness earlier. But when I got closer, I saw it was a girl named Sharon, a fellow band member. Scrawny and stoop shouldered, she was hugging her clarinet case tightly to her chest.
    “Hi,” she smiled shyly, trying to hide the silver braces on her teeth as much as possible. She had greasy-looking hair parted on one side, and her enlarged eyes peered owlishly from behind the magnifying lenses of her tortoise-shell glasses. I knew—to my embarrassment—that she had a crush on me. Our hands had brushed once as I’d reached to turn the music sheet, (she was second-chair clarinet) and she looked so wrought up I thought she’d faint. On another occasion she had sat at the same table with me in the lunchroom, but had been unable to speak a single word, blushing through the whole meal.
    I felt flattered by any attention I received from attractive girls, but the fawning looks cast my way by girls like Sharon only shamed me.
    “Hi,” I said. “Did you wait long?”
    “No.”
    I unlocked the door and we entered the deserted building. She went straight for her usual seat and immediately sat down, opening her case and starting to put her instrument together. Seeing this, I felt obliged to practice with her. Since I hadn’t brought my own clarinet with me today, I went into the instrument room to borrow one of the school’s.
    This instrument room was a separate room within the building with its own locked door to protect its contents from theft. Here, from among the racks of moldy-smelling instrument cases, broken