Jimmy Bob Bullosk oozed miserableness and reeked of hate. He was a modern-day Grinch with a heart three-times too small. For you see, he was a bully. He picked on the weak. And he mocked the helpless. For 23 years, he had left broken spirits and noses in his wake. But today, on the eve of his 24th birthday, Jimmy Bob was about to learn the meaning of empathy.
It had started at an early age with Jimmy Bob. When he was six, he tripped the little girl in church, causing her to bust her chin and bleed on her new dress. Jimmy Bob thought that was hilarious. He had spilled the milkshake on the special-needs child in the cafeteria. He taunted the little boy by mispronouncing his name until the boy cried. It would be fair to say that Jimmy Bob was a jerk. But some would call him something much stronger.
Jimmy Bob lived and worked in the small Mississippi town of Bucksburg. One Tuesday afternoon, while walking home from his construction job , he saw a small, bespectacled man crossing the street.
“Hey F****T!” he called out the gay slur so people as far away as Jackson could hear it.
The man looked around, like he didn’t know what was going on.
“Yeah, I’m talkin’ to you q***r!” Jimmy Bob launched another slur at the unsuspecting man.
“You talking to me?” the man asked in a very un-Di Niro-like way.
Jimmy Bob felt the rush of endorphins he got when he picked on someone weaker than himself.
The bespectacled man, who was just passing through Bucksburg, looked up at the large man walking his way. Jimmy Bob towered over him when they met in the middle of Main Street. The man tried to walk around the hulking bully, but every time he moved, Jimmy Bob moved in the same direction, blocking him.
“Um, excuse me,” the bespectacled man said politely.
Jimmy Bob laughed and knocked the man’s hat off his head. He then pushed his folder of papers out of his arms, causing a blizzard of forms on the ground.
The bespectacled man just looked at Jimmy Bob without emotion. He looked back down at his paper and said, “I really wish you hadn’t done that.”
Jimmy Bob laughed. And then he took a swing at the man, aiming right for the bespectacled man’s spectacles.
In a quickness that was unhuman, the bespectacled man grabbed Jimmy Bob’s hand and stopped it in mid-punch. He then said something that Jimmy Bob couldn’t understand and a shock of electricity traveled into the hulking bully’s body. Jimmy Bob fell to the ground and began to seize.
As he lay on the ground flopping around, Jimmy Bob relived every incident where he bullied another person. Except this time it was much different. Jimmy Bob felt the other person’s pain.
He tripped the little girl in church again, causing her to bust her chin and bleed on her new dress. He began to cry and feel shame. He felt the searing pain of the chin wound. He once again spilled the milkshake on the special-needs boy in the cafeteria. But he felt the humiliation as the cold chocolate ran down his back and the other kids laughed. Jimmy Bob rolled on the ground in pain as he saw him arguing with his young wife. He punched her in the face. But this time, it was Jimmy Bob’s teeth that fell out as he lost consciousness.
The bespectacled man looked down at the broken bully and said, “I am the answer to so many of your victims’ prayers. I was sent to teach you a lesson. I pray you’ve learned it.” He then reached into his coat and placed a card on the bully’s cheek. On it was golden printing that read:
Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these.
The bespectacled man looked up to the sky and said, “Mission accomplished Boss.” Then, he smiled and disappeared.
