Cool Steve Deals With An Insult

Welcome to From Insults To Respect.

Today, I present a brief story that asks the question, How would someone people respect handle the challenging situation of being insulted? The story is an abbreviated section from my novel, Fights In The Streets, Tears In The Sand. The story’s setting, 1965, Brooklyn’s lower middle class section of Brighton Beach. Jeff Star, one of the two major character’s of the novel and its narrator has begun his second day at Lincoln High, and he is intrigued and jealous as he begins to hear about a classmate some students refer to as “Cool Steve.”

The Story

My second day as a student at Lincoln High, at lunch I spot an open seat at a table. A couple of guys that I recognize from my gym class are sitting there. One of the guys is reading a story in Sports Illustrated with a great shot of Mickey Mantle. The Mick’s neck and forearms are bulging as he’s clobbering a monster home run. There’s another guy sitting next to Cliff, two very nice to look at girls are there as well. I’ll give this a try.

     “Anybody got this seat?” I ask while preparing myself for rejection.

    The guy reading the sports magazine checks me out for a couple of seconds, then replies, “Sit down. I’m Cliff Schweitzer.” The two girls give me a friendly smile and resume a conversation they’re having about what they did over the summer. The other guy at the table completely ignores me.

     “Hey, who do you have for Social Studies?” Cliff asks,

     After checking my schedule card, I answer, “Mr. Lofton.”

     “Is he any good?”

     “I don’t know. I have him for the first time a couple of periods from now.”

    “I got stuck with Mr. Putzmeister,”Cliff says mournfully.

     “Putzmeister,” I reply with a smile.

     “Yeah. I got to get out of there. He’s major league boring.”

     “You only had him for one period,” I reply. “Maybe he’ll get better. You’re interested in history?”

      “Well, to me, a branch of history is ‘The world of sports,’ and I love sports. In fact, I’m writing a column for the school newspaper. It’s called the ‘Sports Scene.’ The first issue comes out on Friday. Check it out. Let me know what you think.”

     While we’re talking, we hear a kid from a nearby table, yelling, “I bet you wouldn’t do that ta Cool Steve!”

     I turn to Cliff. “That’s the second time I heard this name, Cool Steve. You wouldn’t happen ta know him?”

    “Yeah, from Cunningham,” he answers, referring to one of the junior highs that feed into Lincoln. “I guess most of the kids who know him, know him from there.”

     “There seems to be some kind of respect thing connected to him.”

     “Respect? Steve? Well, yeah.”

     “You respect him?”

     “Sure.”

     “How come?”

      “Well, I guess for me it’s got something to do with the fact that he’s a pretty decent athlete. In stickball he’s got explosive power and a rocket arm, and in football he’s got lightning speed and incredible hands. He’s… he’s history in the making! But, um… I got a feeling people would respect Steve even if he wasn’t so great in sports.” Then Cliff’s voice trails off and he looks like he’s searching for a more complete answer but ends up shrugging his shoulder and resumes reading his article.

     Hmmm. I bet this guy Cool Steve is a real jerk. Everybody thinking he’s such a cool dude. I hate people like that.

     As I begin to eat my lunch, I wait for a break in the two attractive girls’ conversation so I could introduce myself. After several minutes pass, without a single conversational pause, one of the two girls at my table begins to check me out. And then she introduces herself.

     “I’m Jane.”

     “We actually call her Mysterious Jane,” says Cliff.

     “Mysterious Jane?” I ask.

     “Well, we call Mysterious Jane, Mysterious Jane, because she’s strange,” he explains.

She might be strange, I think to myself, but she’s mighty fine–long, straight, glossy black hair that slightly covers her prominent cheekbones, voluptuous body. Her green, almond shaped eyes have a thin line of black mascara and perhaps within these glimmering eyes there is a hint of some sort of mysteriousness.

     “I’m Sandy,” says the other girl. She’s cute, with a peachy complexion, and long, wavy, sandy-blond hair. She glances at me and smiles.

    After a quick sandwich, we all go sit on the steps of Lincoln’s main entrance. It’s warm and the sun is shining. Suddenly something catches Sandy’s attention, and she cries, “Who’s that gorgeous guy?”

     Mysterious Jane turns with her large green eyes in the direction that Sandy is looking—down the steps and off to the right. She lets out a long sigh. “Oh, that’s Steve Marino.”

     “That’s the guy the guys call Cool Steve,” says Cliff.

      “Ain’t he built!” Sandy squeals. “You know him?”

     “Yeah, from Cunningham,” Jane replies. “All the girls were nuts about him because, well, a lot of the girls say it’s because he’s so cute. And he is cute, especially his eyes. I l-o-o-v-e his eyes.” This is followed by a moan, and she then drifts off into another dimension.

     Sandy pokes Jane, returning her back to Earth.

     Jane looks over to Sandy, lowers her voice to an eerie whisper and says, “If you want to know the truth, the real reason all the girls are crazy about Steve is because he moves with the grace and power of a large panther, but he has far more power than any panther you’ve ever seen.”

     I think to myself, that Mysterious Jane, she’s strange!

     Watching Steve down the steps, I can’t notice him moving in any special way. He’s tall with dark eyes and hair, like me. But compared to me, Steve is broader and has more of a Paul Newman nose. Mine ain’t nothing to be proud of.

     Anyway, the guy’s gotta be some kind of jerk. People thinking he’s cool, what a jerk. I notice in my innards a sense of jealousy. In junior high, I was far from the most respected kid there, getting into fights and cursing out anyone who looked at me in a way that provoked me even when later I couldn’t figure out why it had. Oh, I had problems at home, my parents were divorced, I was teased about it, and I had an awful relationship with stepdad, but I sense that being jealous of this guy, Cool Steve, who I had not even yet met, made no sense, but still I had crazy angry feelings toward him.

     I’m walking out the south side exit of Lincoln heading home. Images of how I had treated my friend Leroy disrespectfully earlier in the day flashed through my mind.  Hey, I don’t give a crap about this respect garbage!

     Suddenly I hear, “Hey, Jeff Star!”

     I turn to my left and spot Cliff calling after me and he’s with Steve Marino. “Jeff, that guy Steve you were asking about, here he is.”

     As I walk over, I’m feeling a completely unfamiliar nervousness. And then, when I open my mouth, I find myself saying in a loud tough voice, “So you’re Steve Marino. I’ve been hearing about you. The word is you’re a jerk!”

     As I glare at Steve, my heart pounds furiously. From the corner of my eye, I notice Cliff watching on, his mouth closed so tight he seems to have no lips. His words from yesterday come to mind—”Steve’s the best athlete I’ve ever personally known. Big shit!

     I’m waiting for an angry come on, or a quick jab from his right. My muscles are as tight as a hangman’s noose.

     I notice several students who were walking home from school have put on their brakes and their eyes are darting back and forth between me and Steve.

     Steve’s eyes lower, his forehead creases. Then his eyes look into mine and I see, instead of fury, sadness. “I guess,” he begins to say haltingly, “well… I was hoping… you know… starting a new school here… well, I was hoping the kids would like me.”

     Those dark, glimmering eyes of his….

     “Jeff,” says Cliff, “why did you say that?”

     My eyes dart to him and back to Steve. Cold perspiration beads up on my forehead. The students looking on are almost drooling.

     In junior high, whenever I started to put someone down, I had the favor returned with cries of “Fuck you!” and blood splattering fistfights. Such reactions would turn me into a raving lunatic as we would go at each other screaming and swinging until one of us had nothing left to offer but thoughts of revenge. Now, uncomfortably, I look into Steve’s eyes…the sadness there…eyebrows down. He looks directly into my eyes, then down, and then back up into mine.

     “Listen Steve,” I find myself saying,  “I… I don’t know why I said that… everyone I talked with said you were okay.” I take a quick glance at Cliff and the other students watching on…and hurry away.

    A few minutes later, I’m pushing the elevator button in my apartment lobby. Jeez, I guess I just made a great impression, a hell of a great impression. Steve’s eyes… man, who is this guy?

   *.         *.         *

Well, that’s my story for the day. I’m wondering how my readers think Cool Steve handled the insulting situation. Any views on how Steve or Jeff could have handled the situation better?

My Best.
Jeff

conflict resolutionDealing with insultsjealousy