Mickey Fiorenza
MARCH 14, 1987
In the first of what would be a lifetime of rumbles, reputed class nerd Eric Feezell found himself pitted against the indomitable Mickey Fiorenza—notorious Hostess Cupcake stealer and closet nose picker—one dewy morning recess on the foursquare courts.
Suspecting that Mickey would strike at some point that memorable Wednesday—the suspicion was primarily based on Mickey’s cryptic utterance, “I’m going to beat you up real bad today, Feezell the Weasel”—Eric armed himself with a juice-box straw and a pocketful of sand before playing foursquare. Hoping to get the drop on Eric, Mickey appeared from behind a wall like what he stupidly thought was a ghost, wildly waving his arms and shouting, “I’m here to beat you up, jerk poop!”
Unfortunately for the unsuspecting Mickey, Eric got the upper hand with the swift launch of a large red bouncy ball directly into Mickey’s gigantic and stupid-looking nose. A viselike headlock around Mickey’s slimy neck followed, accompanied by Eric’s maniacal laughter and triumphant declaration that if Mickey was hoping to get some Hostess Cupcakes that day, sorry, but he could eat this instead. Mickey then retreated from the scene, choking on playground sand like the stupid fart sniffer he was.
Scottie Hansen
SEPTEMBER 15, 1991
Cucamonga Middle School bully and eighth-grade badass Scottie Hansen had never lost a fight. It was rumored that he had bested the entire high-school roller-hockey team one afternoon the previous year, and that he had also held his ground with renowned local pugilist Jonny “the Detoother” Mosely.
It was therefore stunning to witnesses when relatively unknown seventh-grader Eric Feezell, after having been pantsed by Scottie in the middle of first period, vowed revenge on the rugged campus enforcer. “Let the gates be the bell,” Eric was heard quoting from one of his favorite prison movies as he pulled up his “Bitchin’” shorts in haste. “What gates, dumb-ass?” replied Scottie. “Let the bell be the bell, then,” said Eric, quickly reconsidering.
Amid energetic cries of “FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT!” and “Eric’s going to get his ass kicked off!” the two faced off just outside the cafeteria. Eric knew he would have to fight dirty, and thus planted his foot square into Scottie’s balls with a Mr. Miyagi–inspired “Heeeyahhhhh!” that completely silenced the 700 or so onlookers. “Oh, face!” someone yelled from the crowd, which began chanting Eric’s name reverentially.
“Anybody else want some!” many recall the shirtless Feezell yelling like a fucking madman, pectoral muscles pulsing sweatily. “Lemme know when your balls are, like, not hurting or something, ass face!” he taunted the dethroned bully. Hansen, writhing on the ground with his hands cupped over his crotch, flinched as Eric leaned down toward his dumb misshapen head:
“Scratch,” Eric whispered menacingly into Scottie Hansen’s ear. “Burn you.”
Chase Brady
JULY 14, 1996
Eric never went looking for trouble, but trouble usually found him somehow.
In the sweltering, hellish heat of a Saturday afternoon that summer vacation, high-school misfit Eric Feezell and some equally unpopular friends sought the air-conditioned sanctuary of the Milliken Avenue Taco Bell. While Eric waited in line to order a 7-Layer Burrito and some Cinnamon Twists, a large group of jocks began mad-dogging him. Never one to let a mad-dog stare go unanswered, Eric threw a scarier, more polished look right back their way. “You wanna go a round?” one of them finally worked up the nerve to ask. This was Eric Feezell he was asking—of course he wanted to go a round.
Eric stepped calmly out of line, his homeboys behind him now, ready to throw down—while from somewhere behind the cadre of jocks appeared the mouthpiece: corn-fed mule and high-school quarterback Chase Brady. “How do you want to do this, Chase?” Eric said coolly. “One to one from the chest,” he quoted, even more coolly, from American Me, “or we can just all get down.” Chase, who unbeknownst to Eric was also a huge Edward James Olmos fan, came back with the chilly vocal tinge of an equally formidable rival gang leader: “Yeah, we can all really fuck this place up, huh?” he said, as the onlooking Taco Bell patrons came closer to soiling themselves with each passing second.
Both Eric and Chase stood silently, mad-dogging one another intensely, each awaiting the other’s first move. Eric finally broke the tense silence.
“Actually, we should probably go outside.”
“Yeah, there are kind of a lot of people in here,” Chase agreed, rubbing his chin pensively.
“Follow me,” Eric instructed.
But while heading toward the door, Eric spotted on a nearby table a half-eaten Nacho Supreme, which he proceeded to smash into Chase’s big dumb jock face before applying a perfect roundhouse kick to the side of his stupidly gargantuan head, knocking him like a rag doll through the nearby window.
Standing over Chase Brady’s lifeless shell, Eric, in his best Commando-era Arnold Schwarzenegger imitation, squashed it that afternoon like only a true bad man can:
“Happy Bastille Day, asshole.”