Picked on and beaten up in school, Charles Jones recalls the day he brought a gun to class, determined to do in his tormentors. What made him hold back? Why does he think his childhood as an inner city African American gave him an advantage the two teenagers in Littleton, Co., did not have? Jones, now 22, writes for YO! Youth Outlook, a publication by and about young people published by Pacific News Service. (First of four essays by YO! writers on the "losers" of Littleton. The first two will run today, the last two will run on Friday.)

SAN FRANCISCO -- I carried a gun to school when I was a lot younger. I'm 22 now. I never took it to the next level to actually use it.

In 7th grade I was a target for everyone and anyone and an easy one at that! If it wasn't because of my size, then the clothes I wore made me the butt of jokes. It wasn't just that my parents were not well off and my clothes reflected that, it was that my personal sense of style and fashion left me open to bitter jibes.

Imagine meeting a young man about 4 foot 5 inches tall with very light skin and freckles, wearing turquoise 501's, Pro-wings and a reddish afro as high as a cloud. I cried a lot, many a time in the classroom. One day, when the teasing all got too much for me, I got into a fight with another 13-yr-old named Larry. Needless to say he beat the @*$# out of me.

I was not only a target for bullies, I was too weak to do anything about it. I thought to myself, I can't let my school mates think this of me. So I fought more and more, until, win, lose or draw there was no one I was afraid of.

But I was still being picked on and still getting beaten up in and out of school. Two days after my 13th birthday I carried my mother's pearl-handled 22-caliber revolver to school. I hid it from my teachers but I knew where to get it if someone messed with me again. I had every intention of using it against one boy in particular.

I played out the scenario time and time again in my head. But then I began to think about what would happen to me if I did try to shoot him and I fantasized about being killed by the police in a shoot-out. I became sick with fear, and changed my mind.

I was afraid of dying at the hands of police because two friends of mine had already been killed by gun violence. I also knew that the other boy could have had a gun. The last thing I wanted was to give him the pleasure of wounding me and laughing in my face -- or even killing me! Once you understand fear the way I saw it then even you would hold back from shooting someone else, no matter the reason why.

But I don't think those young men in Littleton, Colorado understood fear and the police the way that I do having grown up black in the inner city. White people are born the winners in America. The system is built by white people for white people; therefore, whether they'll admit it or not, most of them feel they have a right to a better life.

When white people become losers, they are really losing -- they are becoming like niggers.

For most of us who aren't white, life is about being born on the losing side and making your way to the winning side. If you're white, most of the time you're born on the winning side of the stick and your life is a struggle not to fall off.

Growing up in a ghetto environment, I saw lots of people resort to violence -- sometimes out of meanness but often just because they were trying to survive. Young black people sometimes say they don't see the future and they can't think about living beyond tomorrow. Whereas, these dudes in Colorado killed because they felt their lives were already over. These white kids saw tomorrow but it wasn't the tomorrow they wanted to see. For good or for bad, they took their destiny into their own hands.

I'm willing to let my future come to me. I guess the difference between those boys who actually go out and shoot up their schools and me is that my will to live far outweighs my desire to kill.