The Butterfly Song

I felt a glass root beer bottle crunch under my foot as I leapt up. Everywhere people were screaming. They flooded past me, a herd of colors whizzing by. My head was spinning.

Was that really a gunshot?

Even as I puzzled the question, another shot cracked through my ears. For a minute it didn’t register. After all, it was the Fourth of July. I’m hearing fireworks, that’s all. But then came another shot and more screams and I caught sight of security guys racing through the crowd. Slowly I realized what was happening, and panic seized my whole body. Throat contracting, I turned to run with everybody else. But there were obstacles everywhere, and I tripped within seconds, tumbling down on my stomach. In that moment, I turned and looked back, to where all the people were coming from.

And I saw him. The gunman. He was wearing all black, including a hood that hid most of his face, and sweating heavily. He was coming towards me. He raised that .45 semi-auto and fired another round, aiming randomly as people scattered like frightened birds, screaming in terror. I ducked my head, trying to make myself as flat as possible. The gunman was about forty-some odd yards from me and firing wildly in all directions. I looked up at a patch of people still trying to figure out what was going on. One by one they turned, saw the gunman, and started racing away.

The last of them didn’t even get to take one step. She was wearing blue shorts and a flowy white blouse.

Only thing missing was red.

I should have closed my eyes, but I didn’t. I saw everything. Her face when the bullet tore through her was like nothing I’d ever seen or imagined before, and not at all what I expected. For a minute all she did was stare down at the gushing hole in her side, as if she wasn’t sure how it had gotten there. Then her eyes swung back up to the gunman. She didn’t fall or bend over even. She just pressed her hand against that growing red stain and stared up at the man who’d made it. And the expression on her face was pure, simple sorrow.

I wanted to close my eyes, but I couldn’t. I watched. I watched as the gunman and his victim shared a look that seemed to last a thousand years and a millisecond all at once. Then he turned away and fired again.

And she fell.