The Bully

Simon was his name. He could do no wrong as far as most of the teachers were concerned. He was outside centre in the School Rugby XV. He was Opening Bowler for the 1st XI cricket team and an explosive middle order batsman. He was also a right prat and did so badly in his GCSEs that he was forced to repeat the year. I will only recall three of the stories I have about him as I think you can get a idea of what he was like from these.

We were travelling with the cricket team to Anothertown for a match. I was 12th man (reserve for the un-initiated!). We were going down the motorway when he decided he would start mooning people out of the coach window. He mooned this coach of kids, who all laughed. He moaned this woman, who pretended not to notice. He mooned this old couple who took offence and made the coach pull over. They identified him (God know's how!) and he was dropped from the team and I suddenly had to play. Him getting dropped was, for some reason, my fault and he had a chat with the captain, who was his friend, and made sure that in that game, I got all the crappy assignments.

Another cricket match, this time at the start of the season. My dad had just been to a test match or a one day international and brought me back a brand new England sun hat. I loved it. I always wore a sun hat when I fielded. I wanted to be Carl Hooper (who I met several years later and he told me I wasn't the first person to tell him that story). Anyway, back to the hat. Simon decided it would be quite funny to nick this hat when I was getting changed. He went and took it into the toilets, put it in a urinal and pissed on it. Nice fella.

While getting changed after some sporting thing or other, I was in the changing rooms and was leaning down tying my shoelaces. When all of a sudden I got a whack on the side of my head. It knocked me out cold. I wake up to find a teacher stood there and Simon appologising. Apparently, he was throwing a de-oderant can to someone at the other end of the changing rooms and accidently hit me in the temple with it. From what people told me it was one hell of a whack and it must have been some poor throw to hit me while my head was about a foot off the floor.

I tried to look him up on Friends Reunited when I was writing this but he isn't on there. I'm guessing he's too stupid to use a computer or is possibly banged up at Her Majesty's pleasure.