Owen the Outcaste

Everybody knows somebody like Owen. He was a big kid. The fact that he wasn’t as flabby as he looked couldn’t save him. He was still the target of merciless middle school taunting, ostracism, evil looks, threats-

He really was quite smart, but this only set him up for more bullying as the more athletic types tried to bribe, blackmail, cajole, or otherwise force him to give them the answers for their homework.

When coaches realized he wasn’t as weak and useless as he first appeared, those athletic coaches tried to interest him in joining their teams, but the ridicule he constantly suffered as the victim of their team’s members unnerved him so badly, made him so nervous,  he became self conscious to the point that he couldn’t catch a football, tripped over his own feet, ran the wrong way, confused any instructions anybody gave him… in general, messed up so badly he couldn’t play their games by their rules up to their expectations, and so suffered another round of bullying, this time from the coaches, who acted like they believed they could challenge him out of his ‘rut’ by trying to humiliate him in front of the younger bullies who saw this as renewed license to call him names and taunt him in front of their classmates.

When he was a little nervous he perspired heavily.

He was taller and wider, much more conscpicuous than 90% of his classmates. He was sensitive and kind. But it seemed that no young woman with any self respect at all would dare consider going to anything like a school dance with him.