2016Bluestone

Mainstream CL Bledsoe

John was the only kid with worse cursive writing than me. We had to sit in the corner and practice in our workbooks while everyone

else played. I got through it by tracing my letters. He’d just grin and make noise. We never called him slow. There’d been several like him, still in regular classes, but the teachers weeded them out when they could. One kid made it to junior high and ran down the hall yelling, “Accident!” when he soiled himself. Once, John lost a whole tooth—root and everything—in the back of class. It was the coolest thing, but I was the only one who wanted to see it. We came back from lunch, another day, and he’d eaten the whole class’s supply of glue and had to go to the nurse. When it rained, we’d play inside, and I was the only one who’d play with John, or maybe he was the only one who’d play with me. The big table was home base. We couldn’t run, but we could walk fast. I sat on the edge, and the thing flipped.

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