My Friend – Bill Arnold

Bill Arnold was my childhood friend. We were famous best friends. We met when we were twelve in Mr. Kouches art class at McKenzie Junior High. I was working on a watercolor that would be chosen to tour the world in a Red Cross Art Show, I one of a hundred students chosen from across this nation.

“That’s a very fine work of art!” I heard Bill say as he stood behind me. When I turned to see who was giving me a compliment I was gazing into the eyes of a very tall blue-eyed, bond haired Nordic boy. I knew right away this was the new boy my friends had recently told me about, who played on the field with his shirt off exposing large welts on his back. When our peers asked him how he got these wounds, he told them from his father.

Bill’s father had a…