I wrote lots of short stories when I was a kid, and all of them are what you’d expect—written by someone who loves to write and has potential but has a lot to learn about the craft.
One that comes to mind: “The New Kid.”
I think at one time it even had a working title “Kids Shouldn’t Play With Dangerous Things.”
I seem to remember a bully who messes with a new kid and then wishes he’d never been born.
In my twenties, I re-wrote it, hoping to make it publishable. It might be on a jump drive or old email address somewhere. I’m not optimistic I’ll stumble across it again: any stories I wrote that I never transferred from computer disks now live only in my memory.
Here’s what I remember of the newer story: a nerdy kid transfers to a school. He wears glasses, wears ill-fitting, out-of-style clothing and likes to slick back his dark hair back, a la 1950s.
A bully, seeking fresh, helpless, defenseless meat, moves in, only for this nerdy greaser to show boredom instead of fear and challenge him to a fight.
The bully goes for the quick knockout with a round house punch, the new kid effortlessly intercepts the punch and then uppercuts the bully.
A short time later, suffering a bloody nose, broken jaw, a few missing teeth and realizing that this has turned into a fight to the death that he’s losing, the bully grabs the new kid’s hair.
A large piece of skin rips off, revealing the new kid is really a robot.
I keep thinking if I re-work this a second time, maybe I can turn it into something worth reading.
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Richard Zowie, Writer 