Boris and Sam
Neither had ever liked the other. They had nothing in common, wanted different jobs
fights in the pasl when they were younger.
-
and they had had
Until recently, tley had managed to ignore each other - even to work together when necessary but, in
Year 11, there had been a string of clashes. It began over a discussion of uniform rules for L-ower
School pupils - both the boys were on the Student Council and, after one meeting where they clearly
irritated each other, at the next meeting they openly disagreed.
Both boys went about trying to get the rest of the Year l l pupils on their side what was interesting was
it. Boris had neither money nor tact, and his method was just to intimidate
people; Boris's friends daredn't go against him - in this way he built a little gang of yes-men around him.
Sam was wealthy and (on the surface, at least) sociable; he gathered support by lending people money,
CDs etc, and inviting them rouad to his place for parties - as long as they promised not to be friends with
Boris.
the way they went about
Each dirfy trick and mucky look increased the boys' mutual hatred. When one of Sam's friends badmou&ed Boris, it was the last straw. The two boys openly set about trying to ruin the other.
Why didn't theyjust have a huge fight, and get it over with? Well, it would have been just too damaging
for them both if they had done so - neither could afford to be permanently excluded. So they did
everything possible to hurt each other without actually having a one-on-one fight.
Once, Boris trapped Sam's little brottrer in a classroom and wouldn't let him out all lunchtime. Sam
didn't go and try to push him out of the way - he just passed sandwiches through the window until Boris
got bored.
And when two Year 7 boys started a feud, Sam helped one, and Boris's friend Lee helped the other. But
still Sarn and Boris held themselves back from fighting each other.
Both Sam and Boris believed that they were in the right, and that the other boy was the troublemaker.
They endlessly slagged offeach other. And they competed everything fiercely to gain the highest
mark in the Technology exam, to score the first goal in the football, and so on.
As time went on Boris becarne increasingly aggressive. He beat up a couple of his gang who looked as
through they might be wanting to make friends with Sam. In t}re end, he forced his friends to stay with
him all the time, and not even talk to Sam and his friends.
And all the time, there was tension in the air at school - the feeling that at any moment there would be a
HUGE fight and dozens of people would get expelled. A group of girls even got a petition about it.
There was a nasty moment when Boris found out that Sam had been spying on him and his girlfriend.
A:rd there was a terri$ing crisis when a rumour went round that Boris was bringing in a knife for his
psycho friend Fidel to attack Sam with.
(After that moment, both sides backed off a bit, but the feud went on ualil the end of Year
failed his exams and left the school.
1
1
, when
Boris