The first time I met Chadwick Nieson Rude, we didn't quite fall into the rapport that we have now.
I was a small town bred girl stepping onto big city grounds for the first time and was nervous as hell. Poor little me, unusually dressed up in a lacy yellow sun-dress smothered in 70's style flower prints and white lined tights. I was dressed for the part, but a delicate young lady I was not. I had put up the biggest fight a third grade tom-boy of a girl could give with her mother, but lost.
The mood had already been set for the day, so after a brief but negative interaction with Rude Boy, as the school kids called him, I popped-off at the mouth. He then brought it upon himself to introduce his fist to my face. I was a mouthy little one, but had managed to never end up throwing blows, until now. They handled things a little differently out here in the city.
I was walking across the school yard, looking confused and fidgeting with my dress when Chad walked up to me. Politely, I said "excuse me" and tried to walk around him, but he side stepped in front of me again. I tried moving around him a couple of times, but when my movement was returned with him blocking me every time, I became frustrated.
"Move the fuck out of my way!" I barked. My father swore like a sailor when he drank, and he drank like a sailor drowning. Drowning in his own private vast ocean of whiskey. I picked up on some of his habits early.
The swearing, I mean. I wasn't a third grade alcoholic.
My verbal demands were met with a push, so I pushed back even harder and then that's when he swung at my face sending me off balance. Within seconds of me landing butt first in the gravel, I bounced back up and squared off face-to-face with Rude Boy, little hands puckered into fists.
As Rude Boy's expression changed from a smirk to mocking laughter, my balled up white-knuckled fists swung into action.
Right fist.
Left fist.
My anger fueled fists collided with his jaw and that was all it took to send him to the ground. Crying, I pounced on him like a threatened wild animal and unleashed my fury.
Was it extreme force, or was it catching him off guard that sent his stalky fourth grade frame into a backward cement dive? To this day I still don't know and Chad never put it into question.
As all good schoolyard fights go, I was pulled into the office by the yard duty officer who only happened to see the later half of the incident. That would be the part where I viciously attacked Chad. I was granted suspension on my first day of third grade without a question as to why. The office labeled me a troublemaker, both threatened and promised to keep an eye on me upon my return and Chad walked away with only a sore jaw and a bruised ego.
The second encounter with Chad was the very next time I set foot on school grounds. I had just finished getting the index-finger-in-the-face type of lecture by my mother, as I shifted uncomfortably on the plastic blue station-wagon seat.
I remember that it was a hot day and I was experiencing a whole new, very uncomfortable sensation from the seat that I had never felt before. Through all of her yelling, I had remained emotionless and somehow that bothered her. Was it that I had become numb to all of her yelling or could it have been that I was preoccupied with the strange sticking and peeling phenomenon that was happening between the faux-leather seat and the skin on the back of my legs? Perhaps, a bit of both.
"You're a horrible child," she barked and then came the WHOLE name.
It wasn't until Jr. High that I had teachers at role call and students refer to me as Bailey. I was embarrassed by my full name and this was due, in large part, to a comment made by some boy that I had a sweaty palm kind of crush on.
I believe his words were, "who's the girl with the unfortunate name?" Ouch, that hurt and I'm reminded of that every time I see or hear my name at length.
"... Bailson Zucker Sky Shabbari, I'm SO disappointed in you." Bailson is my grandmothers maiden name, Zucker is my mothers maiden name and Sky was the middle name of my fathers godmother. Confusing, I know. Lucky me, they promised everyone in our family with the oddest names that they'd honor them by naming their children after them. I'm not even going to get into my sisters name.
You know, one can really zone out in moments like these, when the parents are laying into you like a house pet that just diddled on the rug. Rub my face in my problems.
She continued her lament as I stuck and peeled myself off of the passenger side seat for the last time of the morning, with thoughts of less aggravating chairs on the horizon.
At that point her words traveled completely off-path into her usual detour of a verbal dirt-road ramble, saying "...where did I go wrong? I try so hard with you and your sister, but it's not easy seeing as how your father left me all alone..."
My father, as if I had the choice in who she wanted to marry. Leaving just her all alone, as if my sister and I were not affected by his abandonment.
I leaned my whole body into closing the door and in my distorted regression, it's remembered to be as big as a house door, creaking in it's agony as I struggled it to a close. I waved as she quickly pulled out from the curb, leaving me in a cloud of old station wagon exhaust and tire dust.
No longer than a minute afterward, I was pulled into an empty walkway offside some unused portable buildings. Chad was staring me dead in the face and asked me what I had to say for myself. The only thing I could think of was my mother's words to my father as he was heading for the front door for the last time.
"Kiss my ass!" I said, just like that, without hesitation.
Chad put his hands on either side of my face and pressed his lips to mine. It was my first kiss and I didn't know whether to be flattered or furious. He first punches me in the face and then kisses me after being told to press his lips to my backside.
My sister, Darrison, who's knowledge exceeded mine by three years, explained with a straight and serious face, "When you tell a boy to kiss your ass, you need to point at what part of the body that is." She twisted her hip and pointed to her butt cheek, finishing her thought she said, "...'cause, sometimes they just don't know."
In retrospect, this his how schoolyard love etiquette goes. The more you like someone, the more you taunt, tease, pull their hair and knock them down. So, in lieu of this theory, it must have been love at first sight for Chad to send my tiny third grade body skidding across the cement like I were on a slip-N-slide. For me, it was his persistence that eventually wore me down to friendship. Well, that and the candy out of his lunchbox.
