The Butterfly Knife

Every morning, Craig, a flaming gay 8 year old complete with shoulder fur and occasional skirt was the object of ridicule. The girls loved him, the boys made threats among themselves of the things they would do to him. Dirty gay straight boys. One of them was named Armand, a black kid who was as small as me, but who felt he should use his voice as loud as no one ever should. A rule of life, I learned, is that the louder you speak, the less you have to say.

Armand decided, for whatever reason, though I can imagine that it was because I was in his weight class and effeminate in his own right, that one day after school he would have it out with me. He accused me of being racist for not wanting to talk to him, for ignoring him, for keeping my even strides back to my house across the dirty field. Then the overt threats came. When they were ignored, I felt a sudden blow to the right side of my face. I stopped and turned to look at him.

"What?" "What exactly do you want from me?" I asked with an authority in my voice that was comfortable but somehow felt like it wasn't mine. "Give me what you've got!" I think he was making this up as he went along. I quickly produced a butterfly flip knife and flung the handles around and back so the blade made a forboding motion to lock. "I don't think so. I'm white, but I'm not the right white kid." He got all legal all of a sudden, "MY DADDY'S A POLICEMAN!" "Oh yeah?" I asked. "Then what exactly are you doing right now? "Self-defense" You attack me with that knife I have the right to self defense. "What about my self fence? You struck me without warning." "You're a racist cracker." We went back to this.

As I folded up the knife to put away, he snatched it. A good move, I have to confess. The tables were somewhat turned. I wasn't afraid. I moved in on him. He strugged to get the handles to lock and make the knife a weapon. I moved closer. He edged away. "NOW I've got EVIDENCE!" He did have a sort of point, though truly he shouldn't be assaulting other children then claiming his father was police and thus exempt from the laws that applied to the rest of us kids. I couldn't have been more than 10. What a brat, this kid.

I've had at least two amazing black lovers, and once you have a romantic sexual relationship with a willing, very giving woman from another race you're just not racist. I mean, we're all racist, we cross the street when it's full of black kids and the other side is little old chinawomen. That's just our programming. I can claim, though, that I've been very close, very much inside of the lives of black women, and even though they had to defend me from their friends who didn't appreciate her "peckerwood" and herself from the snide comments here and there down the street, we were lovers. One of whom is dead now, the other I'd rather not see again as long as she lives. In neither final scene of our affairs were there any racial calls before the curtain.

Now Armand had the knife. He was going to give it to his father for evidence. I figured I was just minding my own business when attacked and moved to defend myself. Granted, I was clumsy to have lost the butterfly knife, but I did what I thought was right. My stepfather at the time would lecture about the human condition, survival of the fittest, and wanting to kill your father and fuck your mother. What the hell did he know anyway? He just wanted my mother.

He took the knife running across the field, and later I'd get my revenge, no... let me rephrase. God would redeem that pain by providing me with two of the most gorgeous and hottest black lovers that even a black man could imagine. Good luck Armand. I hope your own father is there to protect you. Revenge is not my business, but you assaulted and robbed me. Did you have any hot sisters?