Thirteen year old James Clarke is always being picked on in school. He
hates sports, and he particularly hates Stingers, a schoolyard game in
which children throw tennis balls at each other. The other kids always
seem to throw the ball harder, when it's at him. His physical education
teacher, Mr Evans, has no sympathy for the boy, believing he just needs
to toughen up a bit. When James returns home from school after a rough
game of Stingers, his mother is mortified when she sees the bruises on
his arm and chest. She phones the school to try and put a stop to the
cruel bullying of her son. But her phone call only makes things worse,
as the bullying escalates to levels that nobody imagined possible.
Stingers was first published in the charity anthology, "I am not
Frazzle! And other stories for grown-ups".