The bold letters painted with white, chipping paint on the sign dividing HartBrook and West HartBrook, the town I live in, are always in my head, day in and day out. The stupid, green, rectangular piece of metal that mocks me and my family and my neighbors I’ve come to be friends with. “WEST-HARTBROOK” the sign reads, “POPULATION: 271.” Sometimes I wonder if HartBrook and its poorer twin village were even meant to be named after each other. The worst thing is that the school I go to, HartBrook Primary, is in HartBrook so I need to cross between both towns every day.

It was Monday night and I was walking home from school. I had to retake a test in health so I had to stay late. I was getting dark and Mom would probably get worried if I wasn’t home by 6:00. It was 5:13 when I left the brick prison I call school, so I knew I had a bit of time to walk and mind my own business.

When I crossed the border into West HartBrook the sun was just starting to set. The cool Autumn air chilled my body with every breath I took. There were leaves scattered across lawns and the sidewalk. The leaves on the sidewalk crunched under my feet as I stepped on them, breaking them into little tiny pieces. I checked my watch, it was 5:39. I had quite a bit of a walk yet to go and I know my way around town from all the time I spend wandering around on the weekends, so I took a cut through two or three properties and emerged back on the main street, my feet soaked in mid afternoon grass dew. I was squishing with every step and you could’ve heard me a mile away, because Jaren Ronalds sure did.

Jaren is a big tenth grader and everyone knows not to hang around him or his street. His parents are divorced and he got forced to stay with his dad, a drinker who’s had three girlfriends since he divorced Jaren’s mom, and Jaren doesn’t like any of them. His dad usually comes home late at night, drunker than the last, he doesn’t have a job and relies on his girlfriends to pay for food and the house rent.
Anyway now I’m twenty feet away from him. He was sitting on the curb doing something. I got closer to see what he was doing. He had been drinking one of his dad’s beer bottles . I knew I had to pass him to get home so I did the best I could, not to make a noise when I stepped. But with my luck these days I stepped on a stick that was buried under the leaves, which snapped in half. CRACK! He peeked up. “Oh no." I thought.

“Look what we have here,” Jaren sneered, “a nerd is trying to get past me on my own street."

“Look man,” I said carefully, not trying to tick him off, “I don’t want to fight you. Just let me get home.”

“I have a better idea,” he explained with a smirk as peered at his bottle he was drinking out of, “you’ll leave when I say you can, and you can tell your mom you got mauled by a dog on your way home.”

“Oh God,” I thought, “what’s he gonna do to me?” I didn’t know what to do, so I took off running, but he caught my jacket’s hood before I could get away. He pinned me on the chain fence surrounding his house. 

“Thought you could get away from me?” he spat, “well tough luck, ‘cause you’re gonna wish you didn’t come close to my street.” He shattered his bottle in half and held it like a knife.

"This is it,”  I thought, “he’s gonna kill me! No, no he’s not. Don’t think like that, the only way you’re gonna die is if you think like that.”

He lunged his bottle at me.

"Oh crap." I said, my eyes nearly popping out of their sockets. I wiggled out of the way just in time to miss the meat of the blow, but I still got cut by the edge of the bottle though. The bottle went into the fence and shattered. Jaren swore under his breath. He turned and jabbed me with is three middle fingers right in the gut.
“Damn, that stung.”  Is what ran through my mind as my chest throbbed. My lungs we on fire as I gasped for air, but couldn’t draw in a breath. I wobbled back to give myself some space.

"Whats the matter sissy, can’t take a hit?” He mocked.

"Can’t you just shut up?! I don’t want to fight you!” I shouted, anger and annoyance filling my voice.

He ran at me and tackled me. We both rolled around trying to get a hold of each other. I finally had an angle over him to really hurt him. I wrapped my arms around his neck and grabbed my elbows, holding on for dear life. It was the only thing I could actually do to him. He flung around, trying to shake me off, but I had a firm grip. We eventually reached back and pried my arms open and flung me off. I rolled backwards a few feet and slowly got up dizzy and holding down my lunch. He stuttered as he got up, holding his wrist like he broke it.

“You got lucky punk, but you, you're gonna regret that choice of actions...” he kept babbling and I cut him off.

"I said I didn’t want to fight!” I shouted at him. With every ounce of strength I had left in my body I wound up and kicked him right in the stomach. Jaren fell to the ground, his hands cupping over the kicked area. I looked down at him.

“I told you,” I said as he groaned in pain. "I didn't want to fight." A car came by. It was an old, rusted lime VW minivan. Painted on its hood and back window were rainbow colored "Peace" signs.

"Nice." I thought out loud, breathing heavily as I watched it turn the corner and disappear.