One Rubber Band

By Joel Magalnick

Jason Drucker is an otherwise normal 14-year-old stuck in an ugly situation. What should have been some harmless teasing with some of his neighborhood buddies has turned into a full-scale war at their junior high school. Jason has been pushed into leading his side, and now he’s got to figure out how to calm things down again.
This is the story of One Rubber Band, a new work of fiction by Joel Magalnick. It is the funny but poignant story of a young boy faced with making real-life decisions for the first time, and how he reacts to those decisions. It’s an eventful four weeks as Jason experiences conflict, the need to salvage old friendships, the excitement of forming new ones, and even his first kiss. The story is fun, a bit tragic, compelling and magical.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Joel Magalnick
• Release date: Jul 7, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301574537

Joel Magalnick

Joel Magalnick grew up in a version of suburbia not so different from the version you'll read in his story. Thankfully he escaped and now writes on a more regular basis as a journalist for a small newspaper in Seattle, Washington. He lives there with his wife and two children. If you'd like to see some of his other fiction, check out his serial novel, 140 characters at a time, at his Twitter feed at @badassbook. Start from the bottom.

Book preview

One Rubber Band

A Novel

By Joel Magalnick

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2013 Joel Magalnick

All Rights Reserved

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Smashwords Edition License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be resold or given away to others. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you're reading thsi book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

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Table of Contents

Chapter 1: Friday

Chapter 2: The Previous Monday

Chapter 3: Tuesday

Chapter 4: Thursday

Chapter 5: Friday

Chapter 6: Monday

Chapter 7: Tuesday

Chapter 8: Wednesday

Chapter 9: Thursday

Chapter 10: Friday

Chapter 11: The Weekend

Chapter 12: Monday

Chapter 13: Tuesday

Chapter 14: Wednesday

Chapter 15: Thursday

Chapter 16: Friday

Chapter 17: Monday

Chapter 18: Tuesday

Chapter 19: Wednesday

Chapter 20: Thursday

Chapter 21: Friday

Chapter 22: Monday

Chapter 23: Thursday

Chapter 24: A Few Weeks Later

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Chapter 1 – Friday

Frank noticed the rubber band and started to egg Matt on.

Go ahead, shoot it at him. Let him have it. Aim at his ear. Go on. Do it!

Matt shrugged him off. Shut up, you nimrod!

I'd been otherwise thinking about the fun my good friend Adam and I would have over the weekend, maybe reading some comics and wishing the winter vacation that had ended a week ago would go on forever. But now, here I was again, sitting next to Matt on the school bus, watching him shift the piece of elastic back and forth on his index fingers and thumbs, creating trapezoids, rhombuses, squares. He paid no attention to the shapes, however. He had his eye square on Barry Jacobs, that kid a few rows in front of us. My legs began to rattle up and down with the rhythm of the bus. Matt had started to make me nervous. Barry, of course, had no idea what was going on. Frank, sitting in the seat across from us, had his fists clenched and pounded them on his knees. The evil grin on his face made me want to slug him.

With so much noise around us from everyone else on the bus laughing and yelling, the tension in our row had gotten even thicker. I had to hug myself to get rid of the awful feeling that something very, very bad was about to happen.

Shoot it! Frank hissed again.

He picked the wrong time to whisper, because the bus had chosen just then to stop at a light and, I'm sure, everyone around heard him. I craned my head around in time to find all eyes staring at Matt. My heart sank. Everybody watched to see what he would do.

Matt had a crowd, and he probably felt some kind of pressure to do something about it. My legs shook harder, but without the benefit of the bus to help them along. I could tell from the smirk on his face that he really wanted to go through with this. He drew a thumb forward and pulled it back with his index finger. He must have had some real pressure on that rubber band, because it stretched almost to the back of his head.

He was risking a suspension and he knew it, but maybe he didn't care. From my viewpoint right next to him, his aim looked a bit low, like it would hit the back of Barry's seat. Also, he seemed to hesitate in releasing the rubber band from his bony little fingers.

Matt sat there, the entire population of that bus from Frank on back sat quietly, waiting for him to do something. Nobody moved, except for me; the shiver that drove down my spine shook me from the top on down. Suddenly, the bus jerked forward and Matt's fingers bumped up. He let go. Time slowed down and everything went silent, the one exception being the Snap! as the elastic left Matt's fingers. It flew across the bus, past one seat, then another, then another, until it hit its target, right behind Barry's ear. My mouth dropped wide open as the rubber band fell onto his shoulder then slipped onto the floor. He lifted his arm, touched the side of his head, then pulled his arm back down.

I let out a breath of relief. He'd hardly noticed it. Crisis averted. But then, a good two seconds later, I knew I'd been wrong.

The loudest, most piercing scream I'd ever heard in my life came out of his mouth. The cry lasted for a while, minutes even, but the awful noise kept going in my head for much longer. Once I remembered to start breathing again, I slunk down in my seat, embarrassed, guilty, knowing I'd be busted for something I hadn't even done from someone who didn't care that I just happened to be in this seat with guys I hung out with but hardly liked, and wishing I could just disappear.

Instead, my whole body crashed against the front of the seat like a sack of rice as the bus slammed to a stop.

What the hell's going on back there? came a big booming voice.

Once my bones had fallen back into their rightful places, I looked up and saw Rod, our big, black monster of a bus driver, standing at the front of his bus, facing us. With the engine shut off, the only noise came from cars speeding by us. Nobody even giggled.

I said, what the hell's going on back there? he repeated.

As Rod started to walk backward, I tried to keep my face from giving anything away. He didn't even look at Barry as he walked past.

The footsteps of Rod's big boots got louder as they approached us, then as they passed. I heard Matt let out a breath, which gave me another reminder I should be doing my own inhaling. My eyes followed Rod to see where he would go. When someone tried to hold in a laugh in front of us, he turned around.

Who was that? Huh? Who's laughin'? he yelled.

As he scanned past our seat, we held eye contact for a moment as he started to walk forward. I hoped the fear that surely oozed out of me wouldn't give us away. Finally he passed us and another chill ran down my back.

Typical of you kids, not sayin' anything. You pull this crap again and none of you'se is gettin' to school.

Nobody said a word until he sat down and started the bus back up, Once we made it back into traffic, and the noise covered it over, Frank started to mock Barry's bawling.

Crybaby! Little weenie! Where's your mommy, little crybaby?

Matt joined right in. I wanted no part of this latest attack against him. I sighed and started to push Matt off the wide seat.

We could've been busted. You guys suck, I said.

You suck, too. Quit pushing me, he retorted, a smile spreading across his face.

Frank gave me the finger and grinned. I growled at him and looked toward Barry. Some girl I'd never liked named Jackie had moved over next to him and began to rub his back. I let out another sigh, wondering how a weenie like Barry could get girls to pay attention to him when they wouldn't even look at me.

Matt and Frank kept up their stream of insults, entertaining nobody but themselves as their mean talk melted into the rest of the noise around us. Hearing our names tossed around the back seats where the cool people sat didn't even excite me like it otherwise would have. When we finally made it to school, I pushed my way past Rod while we exited the bus, my heart pumping quickly, hoping he wouldn't single me out for a meeting with the principal.

Matt and Frank had already dragged me into their vendetta against Barry this week, and they hadn't even told me why they hated him so much. These so-called friends would get me into trouble, and by default they had already made me an accomplice. After all, I had provided the stupid weapon.

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Chapter 2 – The Previous Monday

It started today, our first day back at school after Christmas vacation—our first day of classes for 1986, but the only things that felt new were the homework assignments. I had somehow made it through all of my classes, and now we sat on the bus, heading home. Finally. My friend Matt Mullaney sat next to me, muttering about something or other, which wasn't all that unusual, truth be told.

As we rolled through Denver's snowy suburbs, bouncing with each pothole and ice slick on that highway, I had no idea what to think of Matt's mumbling. I tried to ignore him and stared out the window, watching the cars pass us by.

We finally made it to the stop before mine. Barry Jacobs' mom waited for him at the corner, right in front of his cul-de-sac.

I shook my head. Two whole weeks off and nothing had changed.

Matt's voice, which had sort of blended into the background, startled me when he actually raised it to something I could hear.

Watch this, he said.

He shifted his body over and lifted his leg up. I looked behind and saw that everyone from this stop had already stood and begun to walk forward. As soon as Barry came by, Matt kicked his leg out with as much force as he could muster. Barry, apparently oblivious, kept on walking as Matt's attack only brushed the back of Barry's leg.

Both Frank and I laughed. I didn't even try to hold it in.

Nice going, Butthead, Frank giggled. He always had a way with words.

I wondered what Matt had done that for, but I couldn't stop laughing.

As far as I could tell, Barry Jacobs had nothing really wrong with him. Sure, he didn't talk much and he didn't have an extra finger on one of his hands or anything like that. He wasn't retarded. Actually, quite the opposite. As a seventh grader, he took a few eighth grade classes. He even shared one with me. He was Jewish, but that couldn't have been it; I'm Jewish, too, and according to my parents we're supposed to all stick together. We couldn't even make fun of the clothes he wore, because as far as I could tell, there wasn't anything wrong with those either. Not that I'm the world's best dresser or anything. My parents wouldn't even think about getting me some of the stupid fashions most of the kids in my school wore. But we weren't as rich as most everyone else at Belyart.

Matt Mullaney, however, was a different story. His family lived at the end of my block. He had strict parents, but neither he nor his three older brothers and sisters ever paid attention to the stupid rules placed on them. Their Catholic academy ended after the seventh grade, so Hiram Belyart Middle School had welcomed Matt—though not with particularly open arms—to public school for the very first time this past fall.

Frank was a different story. A couple of months ago he had just shown up out of the blue. I had been shooting hoops on my driveway, and he came up to the edge of the drive and just stood there, watching. I think I said hello to him, and when he didn't say anything I just ignored him. I remembered I'd cut my time playing outside because he freaked me out, but from that day on, he showed up constantly, whether we wanted him to or not.

We said our goodbyes as the bus pulled away, and though I lived in the other direction I could hear Matt and Frank screaming victory, I guess for what they had just done, or, I suppose, not done to Barry. I pushed it out of my mind because already my stupid teachers had loaded us up with homework. And it had only been one day back at school.

After finishing up my homework and watching a little TV, I took my place at the dinner table. Mom had whipped up some lamb chops tonight. My dad hated to cook, but he sure loved to eat. He sucked down half of his dinner before he'd even tucked his napkin into his lap.

As she talked on about whatever she'd been doing that day—she was a teacher, but at some elementary school across town—my mind wandered onto Barry, and what he did to Matt and Frank that they hated him so much. I twisted my mashed potatoes around with my fork, looking at the patterns I could make. Why had they all of a sudden gotten so fixated on him? Maybe if I could ignore the teasing, but still hang around with them, I'd be fine. Maybe it was wishful thinking, but that in combination with the taste of cold cauliflower hitting my tongue made me shudder. My mom must have noticed.

Have some more vegetables, honey, she said, pushing the serving bowl toward me.

I slid down in my chair. Please don't make me eat more of that stuff!

I don't want anymore. I'm full.

Just a couple more pieces, she sighed.

Mom always pushed me to eat vegetables.

I want you to be a big, strong boy, she would tell me. But I didn't particularly want to be big or strong—not that I wanted to be weak. I guessed I had never thought about it much, but I just kind of liked myself the way I was, even if I had started to grow hair in areas that never occurred to me I'd ever have hair, unless I saw some old guy naked in a locker room at the Jewish Community Center when I went with my dad.

But Mom had always said that, ever since she and Dad had told me about how they'd wanted me to have a little brother or sister, but couldn't. I'd never quite understood why, but she always sounded kind of sad about it. Dad just grunted. But up until I'd gotten into the fifth grade, she'd kind of just taught the same year at her school as I was in, and then worked her way back down as I outgrew elementary school. She'd harped on me about those vegetables, as long as I could remember, though. At some point, I'd even started to like some of them. But not the cauliflower.

I'd taken one piece, but I should've seen that coming from a mile away it wouldn't be enough. I stuck my fork into the last flower sitting in the ugly green ceramic bowl and practically choked on it as my dad finally paid some attention to me. I guess he'd finished chomping on his own dinner.

How was your first day back at school today, Jason?

I looked at him. Fine, I guess.

I didn't have much to say about school. Slumping further into my chair must have said everything. I had no desire to be there, only I had to multiply that by a hundred since I'd gone for two whole weeks free of it.

Nothing exciting? he asked, a big smile forming. No girls kissed you in the hallway? You didn't run in the winning touchdown at the football game today?

Come on, already, Dad. He'd done this every single day since I was like six years old. He really wanted to start up his whole routine again? But everything about my dad was a routine. He woke up at the same time every day, and he'd have two cups of coffee and toast, then be out the door before I'd even made it into the shower. He ran this plumbing supply company, which I figured made him a good amount of money since my parents had added a whole second floor—my bedroom— a couple years ago. But he had to be out of the house early to take deliveries to plumbers all over town, so I almost never saw him in the morning.

But his routine spread to the way he made his deliveries, which I knew since I used to join him sometimes if I didn't have school and couldn't stay home by myself. He always took the same route around town, from south where we lived to east, to north, to west, to the warehouse, which was back south, about two or three miles from our house. When he came home, always at around six unless he had some kind of emergency, he would check the mail, complain about bills, then spend a half hour with the TV on and a newspaper in front of him until Mom called us for dinner. He read the sports section first.

I hated sports.

But when we came to dinner he'd always ask that same question. And the answer, at least so far, had always been the same. Except the idea of kissing a cute girl in the hallway didn't sound so bad these days, even if it did feel like it would probably never, ever happen.

* * *

As I washed my face while getting ready for bed, a little stab of pain hit my left cheek as I rubbed my soapy hands against it. I think I flinched from the surprise of the pain more than the pain itself, but I had a feeling where the pain had come from. I rinsed myself off, and with my face still dripping, I looked more closely into the big mirror that spread across nearly the entire wall of my bathroom. Yup, there it was. A zit had started to form. Ick. I hardly ever got any of these, but when I did I got so embarrassed. I hated those big, stupid red blotches that would show in the middle of my face. I touched it again, just to test the pain again, but this time I didn't flinch.

Fortunately it wasn't as bad as some people. Greg Sherman, this big jock at my school, had it really bad. That was how I could tell him apart from Will, his twin brother. Sometimes you could count constellations on his face, but for some reason people still thought he was cool. I shrugged at my reflection. He was mostly just full of himself. Some things I just didn't get.

I began to look a little more closely at my face in the mirror, beyond the pimple. For the first time, I could see what my dad had been talking about a few weeks ago when he'd asked if I'd wanted an electric shaver for Hanukkah. I put my hand up to the growth and felt it. I hadn't noticed it before. Maybe I should pay more attention to myself, I thought. It didn't come close to scratching me like my dad's stubble used to when he would hug me.

I didn't especially like him hugging me hard like that anymore, since I was almost as tall as him now. Plus, I'd turned fourteen a few months ago, and it just felt weird. I didn't know why. It gave me a strange shiver just thinking about it.

Getting hair on my face was okay, I figured, but shaving every day seemed like it would be a pain in the butt. Plus, it meant I was starting to grow up, and that scared me. I liked being kind of little, though I didn't know why. It didn't feel right to be different from people I knew, like my best friend Adam Goldman or even Matt, who totally looked forward to getting taller and growing bigger muscles and stuff like that. He might have wanted to be able to stand up to his brother, though.

I let out a sigh as water kept dripping from my face. At least the hair on my face was still a little bit lighter than the hair on my head. My mom called my thick hair her favorite brown-haired mop. When I was little, she used to call me her little John Lennon, because she'd cut my hair with a bowl over my head. I put a stop to those haircuts when she drew blood and my dad said I could start going to his barber with him. Now my hair looked pretty normal, I guessed, with a part on one side or the other, depending on how I felt like brushing it that day. I always secretly laughed at the guys at my school who still got those bowl cuts.

Rubbing the top of my head, I saw a few dandruff flakes fall out and rest upon my yellow counter. I growled at the flakes of dead skin, wishing they weren't a problem, especially when I had seen so many people catch hell from others who made fun of that stuff. Luckily I had enough hair to hide it and escape torment from at least that, but it had become a habit to shake of my shirt when I thought I might have a snowstorm on my shoulders.

The bright lights over my head actually started to burn as I gave myself a closer look, but they also brought out every little thing on my face. I couldn't believe it! I had freckles. And one of my eyes was a tiny bit browner than the other. Oh wait, maybe not. I shifted my head one way, and then the other. Just the light. Now I was being stupid—better to focus on taking care of the zit.

My mom had bought me some pimple cream last year, and even though I'd been totally embarrassed and freaked out that she'd gotten it for me in the first place, I was glad I had it to put on now.

I pulled the canister from the drawer at my right and opened up the container for the first time. It felt cold on my face as I drew a circle, making a white cream pie right on the spot. Maybe the zit would be gone by morning. It kind of smelled, so hopefully it wouldn't spread too much around my pillow.

Once the cream was on, I put it back into the drawer and stepped back to see all of me better. I smiled into the mirror. I was pretty good looking. No doubt about it. Maybe I'd even get a girlfriend out of my looks one of these days. I could see a little bit of my belly through my pajamas, but I wasn't fat or anything like that. I just wasn't super skinny, not like Matt. Yeah, I was right there in the middle. Just right. I flexed a muscle, though I knew I couldn' find much there, then shrugged and turned out the light as I walked out of the bathroom and into my bedroom to hit the sack. School tomorrow would definitely be an effort.

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Chapter 3 – Tuesday

Jennie Swanson smiled at me as we all shivered outside, waiting for the school bus. I smiled back as a flush of excitement warmed me. She had a way of doing that to me lately, even though she'd otherwise ignored me at school ever since we'd finished sixth grade.

She turned away quick-like, which meant only one thing. Matt and Frank. Matt punched me on the arm to let me know he had arrived, like I needed the notice. I gave him a dirty look but stood next to him anyway, my back turned halfway from Jennie now.

The Swansons had lived across the street from us since before we even moved in. When we were little, Jennie and I had played together all the time. Though I've known Jennie since I was four, I'd never thought about her like a girlfriend until this year, when she'd all of a sudden gotten really pretty. I don't know if it was the makeup or her body or the new way she did