And Pulled the Trigger

This story is based on the Chardon, Ohio school shootings. This happening was too close for comfort, as I live only a county away from the small town of Chardon. My prayers go out to the families and the kids that were involved in this senseless tragedy. Three are reported dead, one died early the day of the shooting, while the others died just today. Two are still in critical condition at the hospital. This is a reminder of what can happen with bullying. Don’t do it, because the life you’re saving may very well be yours. God Bless Chardon!

“Please, don’t shoot.” I pleaded, tears streaming down my face.

Back track to two years earlier. There was a new kid at the school who had come early our Freshman year. Automatically, he wasn’t accepted. That’s what happened in such a close-knit school as ours. We lived in a tiny town, no more than 2000 people, and our local high school had only four hundred students. About a hundred per grade. Often less.

The new kid was different. Most of us wore cameo to school, we wore our cowboy boots that we actually worked in. Half of us lived on farms. The other half worked on one. When the new kid came, he immediately stuck out, like a single, black as night cloud in an otherwise clear sky. He wore black t-shirts, often band shirts for bands like AC/DC, Metallica, and Ozzy Osbourne. And he forever was listening to screamo. While the rest of us listened to sweet as sugar pop songs, and heart-wrenching country, the wailing sounds of Korn and Marilyn Manson blared from his chunky headphones. A few of our close-minded parents swore up and  down that the kid was listening to the Devil’s music. Half the student body said the same thing.

I mostly watched, wanting to help, but I was worried about my reputation. To help the goth kid would ruin me, so I watched in pity as the bullying began. At first it seemed harmless. A rude comment or an “accidental” tripping here and there. They apologized to him, but as he walked away, I could hear their snickers.

Eventually, it got bad. They would call him a Devil worshiper, and they often pushed him into the lockers, just to rough him up, they said. The teachers did something at first, but eventually, they ignored it. They were the sports stars. The same seniors that dominated the fields of baseball and football, and they stormed the basketball courts. They were invincible, they could do no wrong. I had my boyfriend in my own grade. He was a superstar; everyone said that he was the next big thing for sports. He was dressing Varsity his Freshman year, earning a playing position by sophomore year. He participated in it; it was like a right-of-passage thing. To be accepted into the elite group, you had to be cool enough to yell taunts at the goth. The meaner they were the better.

Why don’t you go die? Go shoot yourself, nobody will ever love you. If you hang yourself, you can be with Satan, the one you worship. You’re a disease, and why don’t you go to those inner-city schools. You can find the devil-worshipers like you there. I just gave them a glare and held onto my boyfriend’s hand. He’s probably going to bring a bomb to school; I wouldn’t be surprised if he was a terrorist. He’ll be a suicide bomber when he grows up.

Why didn’t I do anything? I could have told them to stop; I could have told the principal. My boyfriend would have listened to me, had I asked him, he would have put a stop to the bullying.

The month before it happened, the goth started posting…horrifying things on Facebook and Twitter. He wrote a poem, talking about how he wanted people to bow at his feet, and that he wanted us all to die. We all saw it, we all could have reported it, but we didn’t. It just seemed to make us more powerful, seemed to make our terrorist comments about him accurate. We never would have imagined that he would act upon it.

The day before it happened; before everything changed, he posted that he was going to bring a gun to school on Twitter. Again, we did nothing. We were invincible, nothing could hurt us. We got all A’s, whether we deserved them or not. The boys needed to get good grades to be in sports, I needed them to be a cheerleader. Nobody stopped us, we were so powerful.

That morning, I was in the library with my boyfriend, his two football buddies, and a pair of nerds. I was frantically trying to finish my trig homework, because I at least had to have something on the page. He walked in calmly, with a huge bulky jacket. I didn’t bother to look up from my homework until I felt my boyfriend’s hand clench on my arm. I looked up reluctantly to see his pale face, his gaze locked on the goth kid.

He was holding a shotgun, which must have previously been hidden in his backpack. He had a wild look in his eye, but he spoke calmly, “You told me that I would shoot the place up. Are you happy now?” Then he pointed the gun at my boyfriend and pulled the trigger.

I screamed as he crumpled to the ground, a red spot appearing on his chest. The kid shot one more person before the other football boy ran out. The nerds were being blocked by the shooter, and they huddled in the corner, crying to each other. I was on my knees by my boyfriend, crying over his motionless body, my knees getting soaked in a puddle of blood. I could hear the sound of the gun cocking and turned to see him pointing the shotgun at me, a flat, expressionless look on his face.

I was literally on my knees in front of him, completely at his mercy. He could have very easily killed me, right there. It would have been so easy to do. Just a twitch of the trigger finger, just a bullet into my body. It could have ended so quickly for me, and I was almost completely sure that I would soon see the light at the end of the tunnel. “Please, don’t shoot.” I pleaded, tears streaming down my face.

His wild eyes searched my face as I cried, taking huge gasps of breath and hiccupping. By now I could hear the principal over the P.A. system, telling us that shots had been fired. No kidding. I thought grimly. The Kid with the gun eyed me up and down, deciding whether he would shoot me or not. I pressed my lips together and sent up a silent prayer. Please don’t kill me, please don’t kill me.

Finally he said his decision. “You didn’t hurt me. You could have done something though, and you didn’t. But you don’t deserve to die. Having a dead boyfriend is enough.”

He was stroking the barrel of the gun, almost lovingly. I had stood, watching him warily. I had gone over to the two other in the corner, hugging them even though I wasn’t friends with them before. Suddenly, before any of us could do anything, the kid put the gun to his own head a pulled the trigger.

Now I am a senior, and I still haven’t gotten over it. What could I have done to prevent it? Why did none of us speak up? Three were killed on that horrific day, one of them being the shooter himself. Everyone asks why. Why did he do it? Why did he kill himself? I don’t ask those questions.

Why did we bully him? Why did it make us feel good to make somebody else feel so small? Why didn’t I do anything about it? I’m over a grave now, but not my boyfriend’s grave, like one would suspect. I’m over the grave of the boy who took people’s lives, and ended by taking his own. In my hand was a small, pathetic bouquet of wildflowers that I picked myself. I kneel down, looking at his headstone. I am silent for a long time before I finally lay down my flowers and whisper, “I’m sorry.” Then I turn and walk away, not looking back