Some people ask me, what is it like to knife someone? It’s funny really. Everyone in my neighborhood carries around a blade of some sort. You see these tough kids with switch knives, sometimes even box cutters. And then a junior high girl with her brother’s pocketknife. I have a small switch blade my friend got me. He’s eighteen so he could go and buy one legally. The reason he gave it to me was because he thought that I deserved it, but maybe he just wanted me to protect myself. They say that once you use your knife once, you can’t stop using it. Almost as if the power of welding it is addictive. Knives mean a lot to. One time when I was ten I saw a drug deal where a man got ripped off because his knife was smaller. It’s not the size of the knife, it’s wether you’re stupid or not. It takes guts to fight, and it takes even more to not fight. The only time I’ve ever had to use my knife was last December. This was before I had the switch blade, and so I was still using a pocket knife. I remember sitting on a park bench, freezing cold. I was alone, but I wasn’t lonely. It was late at night, and everyone was inside, but I didn’t blame them. The air was bitter and the wind threatened to cut open my face. Through the sharp breeze, I heard a voice. “Hey.” I said, thinking it was someone from the neighborhood. It wasn’t. The conversation we had wouldn’t lead someone to believe we had a fight. He asked me if I was holding, meaning did I have drugs. I said no. He asked me how old I was, and to me, that was a red flag. This was when I grabbed my knife in my pocket, my hand savoring the sudden warmth and break from the winter air. I told him it was none of his business. He looks at me, and he is almost smiling. He takes a step towards me, and this is when I show him the knife. What is it like to cut someone? Cutting anything else, and this sounds kinda sick, but I think it feels like cutting a tomato. How do you cut someone? That’s a different story. You need to hold the blade from beneath, and your thumb should be going up the length of the blade, instead of wrapped around it. Never stab, only slice, otherwise, you’re to easy to over power. Those are the basic rules, otherwise, keep your head, and keep your balance. You should do fine. Anyways, the knife didn’t faze him. He laughed in my face. How could a tiny kid like me expect to do him any harm. He tried to grab my arm, so I ran the knife across his body, starting at his shoulder, and going to his hip. He was silent, he didn’t say a word. Instead, he looked at what I had just done in disbelief. The knife had torn through his clothes, and red started to appear at the edges. I didn’t think I had cut him deep, just enough to tell him I meant business, and maybe leave him a scar to remember me. He didn’t look at me again, instead he left. I never saw him again, as far as I knew, he just disappeared into the snow. When my friends had heard the story, they didn’t believe me. Until they had remembered the boy from a party that night. When the story spread, no one was afraid of me, thought I was cool or anything. They already knew who I was, baby Gibbons, the tiny blonde girl. They began to think about knife fighting. Sometimes the bigger knife loses, if you’re good enough to use a smaller one. They laughed at the metaphor, but I can think of a better one. The underdog will win with skill.