Chapter 1: Pam Collins

Wilbur Carper Collins, IV, was a rich asshole. He came from inherited wealth and managed to fritter away a good portion of it during the course of his alcoholic life, while being self-assured of his acumen and skill in the business world. In his mid-thirties, he married Cindy, the daughter of a business associate, whose body was privately described by members of Wilbur’s social circle as “pneumatic.”

Cindy’s slim figure was topped by some incredible 36Ds, and he made sure every one of her outfits was tailored to emphasize her bountiful chest. She bore him a beautiful daughter, Pamela, and then decided she should, for a substantial cash payout, renounce her marriage and her daughter. She moved to Europe, and little Pam never saw her mother again.

Wilbur did not handle being abandoned well and dove farther into the bottle. He, too, lost interest in his daughter through no fault of her own. When she was eight and clearly neglected (emotionally), Wilbur fobbed his sad little daughter off to his Aunt Lana.

Lana had a tiny interest in the Collins family fortune, enough for a middle-class lifestyle, and took on the difficult job of coaxing the little girl out of her shell of isolation. With love and care, Lana helped Pam grow out of her childhood neglect.

Lana died when Pam was 17, after a long illness. She had made sure that Pam would be provided for with a trust and title to the house they lived in together. Pam was a senior at the same high school that Dale Loomis attended.

Partly owing to her history with negligent parents and the burdens of nursing her ailing great aunt, Pam was very shy and socially inexperienced in dealing with her fellow students and others.

That’s when a couple of huge and aggressive men caught her leaving campus after the final bell and tried to force her into a car, intending to rape her.

But Dale was nearby and realized what was happening. There’s an expression, “seeing red,” and that’s exactly what Dale experienced. Focused on Pam, the bullies were unaware that flying towards them was vengeance personified.

Dale’s first blow was to the back of bully A’s head, causing his face to crash against the car’s roof line and breaking his nose. At almost the same moment, he launched a kick sideways into Bully B’s knee. More or less, that knee was destroyed: ACL, MCL, meniscus, all out for the season. Maybe for the decade.

Unwisely, dazed Bully A turned around to face his attacker. At that moment, he sustained severe damage that resulted in the permanent loss of at least one testicle. Dale knew it was time to flee; he grabbed Pam and blurted out a line from a movie.

“Come with me if you want to live. They might have a gun.”

They made it down the block and around a corner out of sight, leaving the two aggressors writhing on the ground.