Snakes, Snails, and Puppy Dog Tails

         Our small forms hovered motionless over the dark hole, staring deeply into the abyss. Stephanie’s hair was reckless and her clothes caked with the mud of the playground. I stood next to her, an obvious contrast in the frills and lace my mother picked out every morning and my hair in the tight French braid courtesy of my older sister. While our classmates roamed the playground fighting to squeeze on the jungle gym or swings, Stephanie and I couldn’t pull ourselves away from the deep hole that led to what was most likely a sewage drain and was covered with a large, rusted grate. The darkness and unknown depth of it both frightened and excited us.

         The ragged grass from the surrounding banks tickled our ankles. It was obvious maintenance to this area had been strictly ignored compared to the rest of the playground. A sour smell rose from the hole causing our noses to crinkle in disgust. Stephanie was the first to say it, unable to pull her eyes from the murky liquid flowing below. “I wish we could put someone down there.”

         Young though I was, my mind was excited by the possibilities of who I would condemn to that putrid Hell. “It would have to get a lot worse first,” I said twirling the end of one braid through my fingers, already plotting what “worse” would mean.

Stephanie and I took finding objects of torture as a personal challenge for recess for a week. We scrounged the grounds for any objects we believed could cause harm and injury, and we always returned to the hole with full pockets. We would push whatever we could through the grate’s small openings with stubby, pink fingers.

         “These rocks are really sharp,” Stephanie said as she tossed them in. “I’m sure they’d cut whomever we put down there.” We listened for the small splashes seconds after the rocks hit the black depth.

         “This wire,” I held up the bright red piece I had found, “will electrocute them.”

         She poured the contents of an abandoned sports drink in. “Poison,” she explained casually, a smirk growing on her lips.

         Kneeling over the hole, our conversation fell to whom we most wanted to see suffer in our tunnel of torture. I knew immediately what classmates I despised most. Bradley, the sandy-haired boy with glasses and bad teeth, had pinned me to the ground one recess and tried to kiss me. The next day, in retaliation, I waited till he went to the bathroom and the teacher was down the hall, and I colored the inside of his desk with every marker I had. He returned and reached in to get his book out, only to have his arms turn Technicolor. Although I found great glee in watching him cry over his ruined clothes, I knew it would be even better to see him squirm in pain in our pit. Revenge was a talent I developed early.

         I also suggested Adam, the boy I had been absolutely crazy over. Bright-eyed and freckled, he would rather chase the other boys than play house with me. Spurned by him, he made my list of victims. If only he had chased after me instead, I would have spared him.

      For Stephanie, it was Marty, a boy who had called her ugly the previous week, although he looked rather rat-like. She had cried the whole day after his comment, so he made a worthy addition to those we deemed deserving of this doom. He would be even uglier after a tumble down the hole.

         It was thrilling to both of us to stand solemnly over this dark cave and imagine the contorted forms of these boys and what their cries for help would sound like. The thoughts filled us with a grim satisfaction, but I knew just there would always be more who would deserve this end other than just the foolish boys from class. “Any boy who ever hurts us,” I said, with fists clenched and trembling. “Any boy who ever hurts us we will put in here and just leave them…”

         “…to die,” Stephanie finished for me as she pushed stray hairs out of her ruddy face.

         Our eyes were blazing as our gaze met, and we silently nodded.

         I should have been too young for such sadistic thoughts, but even years later I would wish for a bottomless pit for all of the abusers, betrayers, and the men I would encounter that could count cruelty as something they were especially good at. Years I would spend trying and failing to erase faces and names from pain-filled memories, but scars, like diamonds, are forever.

         There was the one who left me bruised and crying over freshly slapped, stinging cheeks. There was the one who renamed me, first name “Stupid” last name “Bitch”. There was the one who claimed I was worthless, pathetic, and downright awful at anything I attempted to do. There was the one who criticized every bite I ate as the ribs poked through my skin. Lastly, there were multiple ones that I tried to stand up to…that is, until they put the gun to their own head or the knife to their wrists and coyly said, “Go ahead. Leave. See what happens.” I, being the coward I had always been, would stay and sadly try to convince myself that one day I would have the courage to walk away. One day I would have the courage to lock them in that bottomless pit and walk away, leaving them there, altogether dead to me.