Only Child(3)

POP—16?POP—17?POP—18



—sounding really loud now and screams in the hallway and more crying in the closet. Miss Russell stopped talking to us and instead she talked into the phone: “Oh God, he’s getting closer. Are you coming? Are you coming?” Twice. Nicholas opened his eyes and said, “Oh!” and then he threw up. All over his shirt, and some throw-up got in Emma’s hair and on my shoes in the back. Emma did a loud shrieking sound and Miss Russell put her hands over Emma’s mouth. She dropped the phone and it fell in the throw-up on the floor. Through the door I could hear sirens. I’m really good at telling different sirens apart, the ones from fire trucks, police cars, ambulances…but now I heard so many outside that I couldn’t tell—they were all mixed together.

    POP—19?POP—20?POP—21



Everything was hot and wet and smelled bad and I started to feel dizzy from it all and my stomach didn’t feel good. Then all of a sudden it was quiet. I couldn’t hear any more POPs. Just the crying and hiccupping in the closet.

And THEN there were a TON of POPs that sounded like they were right by us, a lot of them in a row, and loud sounds like stuff crashing and breaking. Miss Russell screamed and covered her ears, and we screamed and covered our ears. The closet door opened because I let go of the metal piece and light came into the closet and it hurt my eyes. I tried to keep counting the POPs, but there were too many. Then they stopped.

Everything was completely still, even us, and no one moved a muscle. It was like we weren’t even breathing. We stayed like that for a very long time—still and quiet.

Then someone was at our classroom door. We could hear the door handle, and Miss Russell let out her breath in little puffs, like “huh, huh, huh.” There was a knock on the door and a loud man voice said, “Hello, anyone in there?”





[ 2 ]


    Battle Scars


“IT’S ALL RIGHT. Police are here, it’s over,” the loud man voice said.

Miss Russell stood up and held on to the closet door for a minute, and then she walked a few steps to the classroom door, very slow like she forgot how to walk and maybe she was having pins and needles like me from sitting on her legs. I stood up, too, and behind me everyone came out of the closet very slow, like we all had to learn how to use our legs again.

Miss Russell unlocked the door, and lots of police came in. I saw more out in the hallway. One policewoman was hugging Miss Russell, who was making loud sounds like choking. I wanted to stay close to Miss Russell and I started to feel cold because now we were all spread out and not close and warm anymore. All the police were making me feel shy and scared, so I held on to Miss Russell’s shirt.

“All right, guys, please come to the front of the room,” one policeman said. “Can you line up over here?”

Outside our window, I could hear even more sirens now. I couldn’t see anything because our windows are high up and we can’t look outside except when we climb on a chair or table and we’re not supposed to do that. Plus, Miss Russell pulled the shades down when the pop sounds started.

One policeman put his hand on my shoulder and pushed me into the line. He and the other police had on uniforms with vests, the kind where bullets can’t go through, and some had helmets on like in a movie, and they had big guns, not the regular ones from their belts. They looked a little bit scary with the guns and the helmets, but they talked to us in a friendly way: “Hey there, champ, don’t worry, it’s all over now! You’re safe now.” And stuff like that.

I didn’t know what was “over now,” but I didn’t want to leave our classroom and Miss Russell was not at the front of the line with the line leader. She was still off to the side with the policewoman, making choking sounds.

Usually when we have to line up to leave the classroom, everyone pushes and shoves and we get in trouble because we’re not making a nice line. This time we all stood really still. Evangeline and Emma and some other kids were still crying and shivering and we all stared at Miss Russell and waited to see if she would stop choking.

There were a lot of sounds coming from outside our classroom and shouting from down the hallway. I thought it sounded like Charlie’s voice shouting, “NO, NO, NO!” over and over again. I wondered why Charlie was shouting like that. Maybe he got hurt from the gunman? To be the security guy in a school when a gunman comes in is a very dangerous job.

There were other crying and calling sounds, all different kinds—“Ooh, ooooh, ooooh,” “Head wound DRT!” “Femoral bleed. Get me a pressure dressing and a tourniquet!” The walkie-talkies on the police’s belts were beeping and beeping, and a lot of talking was coming out of them that was fast, and it was hard to understand it.

The walkie-talkie from the policeman at the front of the line beeped and said, “Get ready to move!” and the policeman turned around and said, “Moving out!” The other police started to push the line from the back, and we all started walking, but very slow. No one wanted to go out in the hallway where all the crying and calling sounds were still happening. The policeman in the front was high-fiving the kids that walked past him, and it was like he was making a joke. I didn’t give him a high five, and he kind of did a pat on my head instead.

We had to walk down the hallway to the back door where the cafeteria is. We saw the other first-grade classes and the second-and third-grade classes walking in lines like us, with police as the line leaders. Everyone looked cold and scared. “Don’t turn around,” the police were saying. “Don’t look behind you.” But I wanted to see if I was right and if it was Charlie shouting “NO, NO, NO!” earlier and if he was OK. I wanted to see who was screaming.