Stranger

Nora

           

I should've been pissed that he'd read my notebooks, but I was finding it hard to be too angry.  He'd told me my writing was good.  That was something, coming from a Pulitzer-Prize winning writer, which he had pointed out to me on several occasions.

Feeling cheered on, I opened up my latest notebook and began writing as soon as I got home from school.  I wrote about skateboarding, school, my mom, my new home...I ended up writing for a good hour and a half when I should have been doing homework.   But really...which was more important?  Filling in answers on a worksheet or creating something that hadn't existed before it popped into your brain?

I was getting a little stiff, so I decided to take a skateboarding break.  I grabbed my skateboard and gear and headed towards the skate park.  There were a few kids I knew there, but a large group of kids I'd never met before.  They were rowdy.  Most of the time, skateboarders just left each other alone.  There was a certain etiquette in taking turns with the equipment, but these guys didn't seem to play by those rules.

Still, I tried to ignore them and mind my own business.  I was waiting my turn at the ramp when I heard two girls nearby snickering.  A lot of girls have a sixth sense, knowing when they're being talked about.  This was one of those times.  I turned my head slightly to the left and heard one of them say, "Her skateboard is pathetic.  It's, like, made for a 6 year old."

"Her hair is like a beehive or something...damn, doesn't she know how to use a comb?"

Finally, I turned around to face them.  In my neighborhood, if you had something to say to someone, you said it to their face.  If I got word someone was talking smack about me, I went right up to them and made them repeat it.

"You got a problem?" I asked them, looking them in the eyes.

"No, but apparently you do.  1995 called.  They want your skateboard back."

"I bought this skateboard at a store with my own money," I told them.  "Besides, I don't see anything special about your board.  There's at least half a dozen just like it in this park.  At least mine's original."

"Girl, if that's original, then you need to be shut down," the other one said.  "Nobody needs to be spreading that style."

That was it.  I slammed my skateboard to the ground and gave the first girl a hard push.  She wasn't expecting me to hit with a lot of force.  Most people who don't know me usually don't.  However, I wasn't expecting her to fall completely off the ramp.  She fell probably 5 feet to the ground.  Her friend looked at me, frozen for a moment, then charged at me.  We fell down the ramp and started punching at each other.  She had long fingernails and she scratched at my face.  No one tried to stop us as we slowly pushed each other off the ramp and onto the gravel.  I could feel the back of my shirt ride up and the gravel digging into my skin.  I ignored the pain and managed to get on top of her.

Finally, a cop pulled us apart.  I was breathing hard, pissed off and filled with adrenalin.  The girl and I both stared each other down, not at all finished with each other.  Soon, another cop showed up and led both of us away from each other.  As the cop led me away, I was starting to feel the sting of my wounds.  Obviously, I was bleeding and pretty banged up.

"How old are you?  What's your name?"

"I'm thirteen," I huffed.  "My name is Nora."

"Nora, you've got a lot of nerve picking a fight with a girl almost twice your size," she said, pulling out a couple tissues.  She led me over to her squad car and opened up the back seat so I could sit down.  She popped the trunk and got out a first aid kid and put on gloves.  I pushed her hands away when it began to sting.