Graham Downs

Stingers Graham Downs

First published in the charity anthology, I am not Frazzle!, Stingers tells the story of young James Clarke. James is always being picked on in school, and he particularly hates Stingers, a schoolyard game in which children throw tennis balls at each other in an attempt to cause as much pain as possible. His physical education teacher, Mr Evans, has no sympathy for the boy, believing he just needs to toughen up a bit. When James returns home from school after a rough game of Stingers, his mother is mortified when she sees the bruises on his arm and chest. She phones the school to try and put a stop to the cruel bullying of her son. But her phone call only makes things worse, as the bullying escalates to levels that nobody imagined possible.