THE COMBACK
By T. W. Gibbings
I can’t remember his name. I’m not even sure he’s still alive. Steve? Stevie maybe? Perhaps neither; but that second chimes the loudest of Year 12’s fading peals.
We formed our bond – such as it was – in Evolution 1.01, where Stevie and I were unique in our rationalism. Our desks were surrounded by Christians. We were besieged by believers. Naomi (I can remember her name), the smartest, nicest, most righteous girl and editor of the school religious rag, Young Christian Creationist Weekly, sat next to me because she was in love with me but couldn’t give into sin.
Her trammelled desire might have been easier to dismiss did she not possess a figure to throw Richard Dawkins upon his knees, clamouring for the tonsure. She sat on one side of me; Stevie sat on the other. I talked with Stevie mostly, spinning to Naomi only for a reaction to another of my hilarious Homo erectus gags, or when not looking at her became too much for my howling, virginal libido — say, every 37 seconds.
But I digress.
Stevie’s was not a companionship I would have sought, necessarily. His awkwardness didn’t bolster my fragile schoolyard credibility. He wasn’t particularly tall, see, and the cut of his jib was not redolent of the heroism sung in songs. He was all angles and apexes — elbows, knees, chin and prominent, grey teeth. His hair was buzzcut short and he was thin. Twig arms and stick legs, his clothes hung on him like slack sails. He was old — 20 — and hadn’t been at school for a couple of years, apparently.
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