Josh Daniels

Joshua "Josh" Daniels (born 1980) is the main antagonist in Carl Deuker's 1997 sports novel entitled Painting the Black. He is a 17-year-old football and baseball jock who first appears as the neighbor and classmate of main protagonist, Ryan Ward. Ryan and Josh become good friends for the majority of the book as Ryan has never had someone his age living in his neighborhood before. Josh is really good at both football and baseball as well as one of the "popular kids" at Ryan's school. Josh sits next to all of the football players at lunch and Ryan became a part of their table as well. Josh is also very arrogant. Josh grabs the bra of Celeste Honor, a girl at Ryan's school as she walks down their lunch table so hard that she falls down. Another girl at the school named Monica Roby (whom Ryan has known since kindergarten) tells Josh that it was a jerk move and he laughs about it. However, Josh gets suspended and Monica pokes fun at Josh while he's gone by writing an article within the school newspaper saying he's a lost dog named "Jocko Spaniel". Ryan gets angry at Monica for it. Later on, Josh's villainy really starts to come into play as he tries to get back at Monica by wearing a wolf mask alongside his friend at nighttime and stripping Monica naked. They even start physically abusing her to where she is on the ground and they try to rape her. Ryan does a great dead to Monica by helping her to her house. Ryan doesn't want to rat Josh out so he lies to the principal as well as an FBI agent about the case, telling them they don't know who did it. This likely could be Josh's mental manipulation over Ryan. Once Ryan finally tells the truth, Josh gets very angry with Ryan and tells him that he thinks he's selling him out to Monica. In the end, Josh is no longer on the football or baseball team and has to do forty hours of community service as well as anger management class.