Summer, 1998. I was curled up on the sofa watching Young and Dangerous, my eyes stinging from the glint of Chan Ho-nam's blade on the TV.
Just yesterday, Zhang Qiang from the class next door had stolen my lunch money and slapped me in front of everyone.
The girls in my class crowded around to comfort me, while the boys laughed.
Clutching my summer homework, I watched the word "coward" blur beneath my tears.
That summer, I got up at five every morning to run and hung from the pull-up bar until my arms went numb.
I beat the punching bag until it was stained with blood, and the number on the scale dropped by a full thirty pounds.
On the first day back at school, Zhang Qiang reached out for my steamed bun again, as usual.
I heard a soft crack as I gripped his wrist and dislocated his bone.
"Now," I said with a smile, wiping the cold sweat from his face, "who's the loser?"
