The Scrapper (pt. 2)

Jack was a rough kid. He wasn’t near as tough as Pat, nor as notorious when it came to fighting, but he was definitely known for trying to prove how tough he was, especially to Patrick. Jack wasn’t the brightest star in anything. He was good at fixing cars but that was about it. He wasn’t Pat’s best friend but he was a good drinkin’ buddy and he was the only guy in town that could hold his liquor like Pat could. Jack was a loner and Patrick always felt sorry for him, until that car ride.

Patrick didn’t’ always drink so heavily. It was celebration time. It was 1964, the Beatles were blaring on the radio, and Pat and Jack had just graduated from High School the day before. They were up all night partying and were on their way home from the good times and cute girls. Amazingly, the graduation partying ended without a single fist fight. Most boys knew each other and were getting ready to go off to Vietnam, or off to college. There was no territory to mark or prove, no new blood to break in.

Patrick hadn’t made up his mind yet which he would choose, the War or college. His secret dream was to attend Tulsa University to become a writer. Going to Vietnam was the tough thing to do. His passion for writing was something he didn’t broadcast to his rough and tough buddies, or his teachers for that matter. When he was in the tenth grade he was suspended from school for reading the Grapes Of Wrath. He had the Steinback novel stashed in the back of his Chevy when the shop teacher saw it and turned him in. He was suspended for three days for reading the then-considered obscene novel.

To most people around Foyl, Pat was a strange kid. People just didn’t get him. They liked him, but couldn’t get him. He was high strung and creative. Friendly but hot-tempered. Fun and ornery to his friends but could be tough and mean to his enemies. He would take up for the new kid in school getting picked on (fairness was in his blood); unfortunately, when you got him in a fight, it was bad news for you and fairness was whatever got the job done.

Patrick never picked fights. Fights always picked him. If he did pick one, it was usually over a pretty girl who belonged to someone else. No, Patrick’s propensity and proficiency for fighting came from two things. For starters, he had a pretty face. He also developed early. He had hair on his chest in the 8th grade. Being good-lookin’ in Foyl Oklahoma was no easy thing, especially if you had his second problem...mouthiness. I guess when you know you won’t loose, you’ll say just about anything. He hadn’t lost a fight since the 4th grade and everyone from around town knew it. However, that never stopped the new guys at school from trying, trying to prove their toughness. Every few weeks a new kid would come to town and inevitably Patrick would have to square-off with him. People would try to warn whoever challenged Pat, but he just didn’t look that tough, so they’d give it a go anyways. If they could whip Pat, it would mean instant success with the ladies. That decision was always a bad move on their part. When you fight every day of your life, you get good at it. And like I said, Patrick was good at it.

It was no surprise that Patrick took to the only other sport offered at Foyl High School: boxing. He was so good at boxing, or so mean at boxing, that by his Junior year he had made it to the Golden Glove Boxer Oklahoma State Championship. He had beaten every kid competing in boxing in the entire state of Oklahoma and was on his way to becoming the State and Regional Champ. People from all over the state listened as the radio announcer gave a blow-by-blow account of “the scrapper from Foyl” as he fought the Reigning Regional Champ from Joplin. The fight went all 14 rounds. Sadly the bout went to his rich-kid opponent from Joplin, Missouri, by decision of one point. Everyone knew it was rigged. Even the Missourians knew it was fixed. Patrick had knocked the kid’s mouthpiece out of his mouth no less than four times in the last two rounds. The kid could barley stand up when they announced his fake victory. Patrick was still bouncing from foot to foot when it was announced. From all accounts it was a scandalous decision. People in the crowd booed. The sports casters tried to attribute the loss to Patrick’s lack of refinement. They may have been right about the lack of refinement, (Patrick’s boxing coach was the high school shop teacher), but there was one thing everyone knew after that fight was finished. Patrick especially knew it. When the last bell rang, Pat triumphantly went to his corner and thought:

“I have kicked ass today.” He spit his mouthpiece into the spit bucket. Five minutes later the announcer broke the news to an angry crowd.

It was a hard loss for Pat but it didn’t destroy his spirit. In his heart he never really lost. Regardless of the judge’s decision, Patrick went home to Foyl a local hero. People talked for months about how Pat was robbed. Farmers all over town would talk about it while taking a break hauling hay.

"There should be somthin' done about this crud. Pat Ward beat that kid fair and square" Old Ike down the road would say.

"I know it. I know it." Old man Jeb would reply. "Give it to the rich Kid ever time" (tobacco spit)

Across town at the hair salon ladies would chatter on talking over the giant noisy hair-helmet dryers.

"Did you hear about that Pat Ward on the Radio?" Claire who ran the local hair Salon said to a regular.

"Mmm hmm." The lady under the dryer-helmut nodded and flip the page of her Life magazine.

"I heard the Mayor of Joplin was a Judge" said Claire.

"Mmm hmm" The regular said again and flipped another page.

"Well that Patrick is to handsome to be fightin' anyways"

"Claire!" The regular stopped reading and looked scandalized. "He is half your age!"

"I'm just sayin!..." Clair said defensively and let slide a little smirk.

Foyl (pronounced Foil) was a little farming town in rural Oklahoma, and it had started to grow since Patrick had started high school. It had a fiercly competitive basketball team, and to the town of Foyl, the Foyl High Varsity Basketball team might as well have been the Chicago Bulls. Basketball games in Foyl could get violent. Parents were sent home. Some were banned from the games for life. It was serious business around there, those basketball games. Patrick played varsity for the Foyl Panthers, and their arch-enemies were in Clarmore, Oklahoma. People from Foyl were poor and few, but they were proud. It was no surprise that everyone in Foyl had their radios turned on and up when the local Foyl boy had made it to the state championship in boxing. It wasn’t Varsity Basketball but hey, it was something. At least it wasn’t somebody from Claremore. Foyl was nothing like Claremore. They were proud of that too.

Claremore was about 25 miles away, where the "upidy" kids went to school. The high school was also big and wealthy enough to have a football team, and the people of Claremore never failed to bring it up when they could. They were mostly proud of their Star runningback/linebacker, who everybody just called “Tiger.” Tiger had the same reputation as Patrick for fighting, minus the good looks. He was about 6’2 and 210 pounds of farm boy fighting machine. If you fought Tiger, you lost. He was also notorious for beating you senseless. If you were lucky he would beat you until you gave up. Back then you gave up all dignity and surrendered the fight when you hollered, “I GIVE!” Most times when he was really mad he would just beat you until you didn’t move anymore. He darn near killed a couple of guys when they tried to steal his car his senior year. The fight practically landed him in jail. It would have if he had been one year older. The two guys he thumped nearly to death went to jail because they were grown men in their twenties. There was only one person Tiger ever backed down from in a fight. Patrick’s best friend Bo Bean. Bo Bean had graduated the year before and was out of town. No one ever fought Bo because he was so huge. Bo was a 6’5 300 pound full-blood Cherokee Indian. It would be like fighting a grizzly, which is why everyone that played football with him, including Tiger, just called him… well, “Bear.” Sadly, it wasn’t “Bear” in the car with Patrick. It was dumb, drunk Jack. And Jack had just pitched a bottle at Tiger’s prized possession, his car.

Most days, Patrick usually felt sorry for Jack and took up for him.

Today wasn’t one of those days. This time there was no sympathy coming from Patrick’s heart. There was something bad about this scenario, and Patrick knew it.

(to be continued...)