I faced classical options: Fight or Flight. Yet, owing to the odd silence when I'd expected taunts, another seemed feasible: Bluff. I sensed that their fear exceeded mine. My ailment had attracted their malice yet — like the nuns' object lessons — it triggered fear that might be manipulated. I chose Bluff.

Wearing a guess-I-showed-you glare, I bent to retrieve fool's cap from dust while eyeing my still-on-his-ass antagonist. Instead of replacing the dusty cap on my fishbelly-white dome, I jammed it in a pocket, turned, and sauntered out of the schoolyard and home as though I'd just thumped a school bully. Had I heard howls of derision while walking away, the day's lesson would've been as lame as catechism. Yet I heard only the hush of fear behind me, then the sounds of recess cautiously resumed.

Vivid memory ends there. I wanted to quit school but Mom nudged me to return the next morning. "Act like nuthin' happened," she advised. That I did — but no more Stigma Cap. The nuns squinted disapproval, but could no longer make me wear stigma on my gleaming, born-again noggin.

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