[fastfredracing]

6 th grade. We had assigned seating on the bus. I sat next to Brain Cook. He was a brainiac, but stuttered, and was a bit nerdy. Nice kid though, and he grew up right behind me. This older kid who sat behind us kept flicking Brian's ear. Even I thought it was funny for a minute, but he kept it up. Soon I could see Brains lips starting to quiver, and tears were starting to flow. Other kids on the bus were laughing. His ear was turning read, and I could tell it was starting to hurt. I said to the big guy behind us " come on , let up, you are hurting him". Well that led to the big kid saying " what are you going to do about it?" .
Now all eyes on are me. I was never a tough guy, and hated to get into fights. ( I might have been a little bit of a pussy at that age) So now the big guy is egging me on and shoving me. I don't know what happened, may have been fear, but I snapped, and smacked the hell out of that guy, blackened his eye, split his lip open, and bloodied his nose. The bully started to cry. Now everybody on the bus was laughing at him. I think everybody expected to see me get a whoopin'.
Our bus driver saw the whole thing, and actually thanked me for sticking up for Brian when I exited the bus. I got zero punishment, and to this day, I know I did the right thing. Ah , the good old days.