Lies I've Told Again

There was a book by Harlan Ellison called "Rumble" which was a fictional account of his hanging with a street gang in NYC. This was his first book. What left an impression was a tall tale about how he couldn't afford to buy a switchblade so he oiled a pocketknife and learned to flick it out real fast with his thumbnail so it looked like a switchblade. I worked on this as a young teenager, and it may be possible, but I could never do it. We all had Cub Scout knives or hand me downs from our Dads or older brothers. We were white trash, but my mother refused to admit it because our house was clean. There were a couple of brothers in our neighborhood that came to school all bandaged up because they had gotten into a razor blade fight with each other. There were bullies around our neighborhood, kids that would try to take your stuff or kids that wanted you to do their homework, or kids that just wanted to prove themselves. I was always the tallest, so if they could make me say uncle, I suppose it proved their manhood. I had run-ins. And behavior I have yet to explain to myself very well. There was a kid that wanted to fight and I ignored him. One day a buddy and I were walking over to a little deli a few blocks from school for lunch when we were jumped by the kid and two of his friends. One of the kids tried to hold my arms, but I shook him off pretty easily. The kid looked scared at this point, but he had his fists up. I told him I wasn't going to fight him. He hit me. So I got down on one knee and told him again, this time with a smile, that I wasn't going to fight him and I was saying uncle.
He hit me again and screamed at me and then left with his friends. My friend didn't understand why I didn't fight. He would have helped. I don't know why I did what I did.
I was working at a drive-in restaurant and one of the jobs I had was to sweep the gravel off the edge of the parking lot (have I written about this before?). I was out there one evening and one of the car-hops came over and we were just sort of taking a break and she'd heard about the almost fight and wanted to know why I hadn't knocked his block off.
I preceded to tell the tale about poor (Johnny) who had challenged me a couple of years ago and, boy, I felt awful afterward because it turned into a knife fight and poor (Johnny) ended up in the hospital and I would never forgive myself. All of this very understated. And everyone believed me then.
I wasn't ever bullied again.
I assumed it was because everyone believed I was a pacifist and that I wouldn't fight or really give in.
One night out at the quarry where we would swim sometimes after work, we were just sitting around and shooting the breeze, and one of the guys just casually asks me how was it to kill a guy? And did I spend time in jail for it? He had heard I was real good with a knife.