Surviving School

Needless to say I learned to look out for myself and fight my own battles after all that we've been through. It's tough but it has to be done if I'm to survive and keep my sanity.

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However I still have the problem of Mr. Loren. I decided that strict action was to be taken. I had to fight this battle alone but I needed help. I contacted a few old friends who used to live on the estate with me in Brixton. They didn't like me and I didn't like them but we all had an unspoken understanding and when there was trouble we looked out for each other. We had to for our own safety. These people were the sort of people who you wouldn't want to meet out on a dark night on your own!. These were people who the Mafia wouldn't even want to do business with! They were really that bad. They offered me a few solutions to my 'problem' and I said I would get back to them with my decision in the next few days. It was a lot to mull over. I decided to leave it a few days in case things got a little better which I sincerely doubted. For the next week Mr. Loren bullied me like never before. He hit me; he even beat me with metre sticks. I had bruises down my body, I was in real agony. I decided to leave him in the grasps of my mates from Brixton. He had to be taught a lesson like never before.

For the next week Mr. Loren was absent from school. Everyone thought he was just ill. The school knew nothing of his whereabouts. As time went by people seemed to forget about Mr. Loren as we now had a replacement Maths teacher who was absolutely brilliant and I longed for her to stay on full time if Mr. Loren was not to come back.

As time went by I forgot all about Mr. Loren. I just assumed that he had learnt his lesson and fled the country. It wasn't until one night when I really realised what had happened.

I was walking back from town one evening when I passed the Television Rentals store. I always liked to have a glance at what was on because I had never owned a television before. I was wandering around the shop glancing at the programs on the various screens. When suddenly I saw the latest news bullet flash up onto the screen. An unidentified man had been reported missing matching roughly Mr. Loren's description and had subsequently been found by police searching the area. Police had scoured sections of woods and lakes when a few passers by had noticed a floating body in an old marshy lake on the outskirts of town.. My heart seemed to stop beating momentarily. I didn't know what to think. I decided that the best course of action was to run to the other side of town to gather what was going on.

I had never run so fast in my life. When I reached the crime scene the whole area was cordoned off with tape. I asked whether the body had been identified yet and they said that the corpse was still undergoing identification. After hours of patient waiting the corpse was identified as a one Mr. Loren. I was horrified at the news. I left for home as swiftly as I could escaping without trying to look so suspicious. I didn't know why I was worried though because I never carried out the crime. I never intended for anything like this to happen anyway. All I wanted my mates to do was give him a good beating to get the message through to him that he should leave the country.

I got home and went straight up to bed without saying a word to anyone. The next morning I tried for hours to get through to the boys in Brixton. Eventually when I did get a reply it was an elderly woman who had just moved in and knew nothing of any boys that used to live there. The boys had obviously decided to leave and rightly so after what they had done. I thought I was in the clear. I picked up a newspaper on the way to school the following day and it had the horrific build up story of what had happened to Mr Loren the night he had been murdered.

It said that he had been shot five times in the head and chest and had sustained serious bruising all over the body. The paper was asking for witnesses to come forward. Even Mr. Loren's family was offering a reward for the capture of his brutal murderer. A shiver ran down my spine. All I hoped was that the murder weapon was still in the safe hands of the Brixton boys.

A few weeks later the murder weapon had been found in some nearby woods. The gun was to be checked for fingerprints and I knew that it would have the Brixton Boys' prints all over it.

I was wrong I had been framed. I remember as a boy shooting pigeons with a small colt pistol that the Brixton boys had given me. When I left I returned it to them as I no longer needed it and said I was mending my ways. They weren't best pleased as you could well imagine. I now know why they were only too pleased to help me. They wanted to get me back for all those times when they did something wrong and I ratted on them.. I now know never to trust a living soul again.

tried life on the run for a few days but eventually I couldn't take it anymore. I handed myself in. I knew I stood no chance of defending myself as the gun had only my prints on. I am now facing a secure unit then when I'm eighteen I will be moved into a secure unit.

After a few weeks of life inside I learnt of the sad death of my father, which inevitably lead to the sorrowful suicide of my Mother.

Jamie Stickler

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