Later that same year, Jackie J -- JJ, I called her -- some other kids and I were playing ‘It’ in the parking lot behind the school. “It” is played just like tag. The last person tagged was called ‘It’ and then they had to do the chasing. JJ was pretty, with big teeth and a smile that showed them off, especially when they were seen against her dark skin. She also could run very fast. I was just fat and I always hoped against hope that I could catch her sometime. During this particular game, JJ was running and I was plodding along, perhaps even wobbling, when she came flying past me making faces. I already had some momentum going so all I needed
to do was pick it up a little. Had we started running from a dead stop, I wouldn’t have had a chance. As it was, I was just a few feet behind her. Her pigtails flopped nearly straight back as she ran and I could almost reach them. That was the carrot I needed. The fat boy, me, dug down deep and chugged on for all I was worth. My time or steam or both were almost gone. She snickered. Even her pigtails seemed to laugh at me. I bore down and then I reached, stretched, grimaced, and grunted and, to my own surprise, I got a hold of one of the pigtails and the tails came off! All of the rest of her hair came off with it! I ground to a halt and found myself holding one pigtail with a pink ribbon, a mop of hair so black it was almost blue and another pigtail with a baby blue colored ribbon. And then, JJ, bless her heart, could really run. She was bald under there and her head was shiny, too from the sun’s reflection.
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