Short Story by VictorM

It’s summer time. The warm morning sun shines on the house with an overgrown grass lawn and paint peeling around the windows. Inside, a young man rises. Posters of Hitler and the KKK adorn his room. His black outfit and dour personality complete an all too common stereotype: the suburban white boy with hate in his heart. He places his KKK ring on his middle finger and steps outside. He puts his sunglasses on and smiles an evil grin.

The house next door, with manicured grass and immaculate curtains, conveys a sense of contrast. Gina, a 16-year-old girl, rises. Her room is messy. A burner, flasks, test tubes, matches, firecrackers, and how-to books clutter her desk. Strange books like Practical Uses for Manure and Clorox. Her face shows the strain of restless sleep. She brushes her teeth, drags a brush across her hair and gets dressed. She stuffs the pocket of her jeans with money she earned from baby-sitting. She picks up a brown paper bag and heads out the door.

Once outside she comes face to face with King, the boy next door. He stands in front of Gina, shoves his KKK ring on her face and twirls his fingers. “Remember, these fingers will rule the world!” he says with his usual arrogance. Many times before Gina ran away to avoid this type of confrontation. Today, however, her eyes, cold and indifferent, glance at him for a few seconds. Without a word, she just walks past him. He does not follow her but dishes out his usual barrage of insults and threats. As he walks away, he smiles an evil grin.

Gina enters the restroom at the bus station. Closing herself in a stall, she removes the contents of her brown bag. She sits back for a minute contemplating her decision. She sighs. In a move full of determination, she places the brown wig on her head, adds a touch of blush and lipstick, just enough to make her look a bit different. Stepping outside, she boards the bus that will take her to a few towns over.

Sitting quietly towards the back of the bus, Gina’s determined exterior camouflages a mind that races ferociously for justification to what she’s about to do. Her eyes tear slightly as she recalls King’s oppressive behavior for over one year. She remembers the cries for help that fell on deft hears of school officials, police officers, and even her parents. As she searches her mind for assurances that she tried all she could, there is something that strengthens her resolve: she senses King’s stench of hate.

She tries in vain to stop thinking about that night. She can’t even recall all of it, just bits and pieces. Her parents were out of the house for the night. She remembers hearing the noise behind her… King stepping into her room… his voice uttering “I rule you”. She remembers delivering a stiff knee to his crotch… the feel of his hand grabbing her t-shirt as she tried to run away. Her memory starts fading at this point. She remembers pain, but mostly she remembers the feeling of hopelessness. Her mind is filled with blanks. Next she vaguely remembers her skin wrinkle in the shower from spending too much time scrubbing herself, wanting to wash away that revolting stench. One thing, however, she recalls vividly -- his evil grin.

Gina’s mind returns to the present as the bus reaches her destination. She wipes the tears from her eyes and descends from the bus. She wonders downtown looking for the pawnshop that she read about in a newspaper. She can’t find it at first, but is determined not to ask anyone. Finally, she finds it and walks in. She knows what she’s after. She stops in front of a globe. A pretty globe. A hallow globe. She trades it for her money.

As she walks home with her package, King comes out to meet her. She controls herself as she feels that stench again. King claims he does not hate blacks or Jews or other minorities. He simply thinks they are inferior. But Gina, that’s a different story. He hates her with passion because she’s the worse kind of all: a white girl who dances to nigger music, sympathizes with Jews, runs around with spicks. She is a traitor to the cause. He doesn’t hesitate to let her know of his relentless hate for her. Using his much bigger size and vicious mind, he has succeeded in intimidating her. But not today. Today she walks firmly, determined, confident. Somehow, he senses it. Something is different about her. Her eyes show no fear. She walks by him as he simply shakes his head and smiles his evil grin.

Always an excellent student, Gina’s grades plummeted over the last few months. With the exception of an “A” in Chemistry, all her other grades were “D” or below. She must attend summer school to make up for the failing grades. Apart from the time spent at school, Gina has pretty much secluded herself to her room. She often sneaks out in the middle of the night, riding her bike for several miles to the abandoned quarry where she conducts her experiments.

As the summer vacation nears the end, and much to her parent’s relief, Gina seems to have snapped out of her slump. She has gone on a cleaning rampage. Much of the debris that adorned her room has been removed. All the strange books are gone. Piles of garbage were dumped in the city dump. She scrubs clean every inch of her room. Her parents don’t question this change – they welcome it. They are happy to see her back to normal. Her room is now spotless.

It’s the day before regular school is to start. King answers his doorbell but sees no one around. Stepping outside he notices a box on the porch. Puzzled, he opens the box. It’s a globe. A pretty globe. A not so hallow globe. He grins as he reads the note that simply says: “Rule this!” He doesn’t notice the faint tick, tick, tick sound until it’s too late.

The incident was a shock to this quiet suburban town. The media attention was intense but short-lived. And so was the line of questioning by a police department inexperienced at dealing with bombs. She remembers the visit by Lt. Moosie. He seemed more interested in sounding like a movie character than doing his job. He apologized for the inconvenience and stated that the questioning was just a formality. In fact, they had reason to believe that due to King’s affiliations, there were explosives in the house. They ruled his death an accident.

As she takes the test back from the teacher, Gina takes a deep breath, then looks. Another “A”. The teacher stands over her, pats her shoulder and says, “It’s amazing what you can do when you put your mind to it Gina. Congratulations.” Many of her friends rejoice at her turn around. This is the Gina they all knew. She smiles and thanks them.

When she gets home, Gina reads her mom’s note to do yard work. Autumn has come early. Gina grabs a garbage bag and a rake. She starts raking the leaves from behind the bushes. She notices a strange object. She looks closer. It’s a charred finger with a KKK ring around it. “Um..” she mutters to herself. She tosses it into her plastic garbage bag and walks way, smiling an evil grin.