We Can Be Heroes

by Kyrie McCauley

  what I had to say.

  He led me, winding

  through the party,

  tugging

  me behind him,

  his hand so warm

  covering mine,

  handed me a beer

  as we passed the keg,

  then outside to the fire.

  There was only one chair left,

  which he took,

  gesturing

  for me to sit on his lap,

  which I did.

  Then he took off his sweatshirt,

  pulled it down over my head

  and whispered in my ear:

  Don’t freeze on me, okay?

  I don’t want to be

  the asshole responsible

  for killing you.

  We Can Be Heroes

  Season 2: Episode 14

  “The Firearms Expert”

  MERIT LOGAN: What happened to Cassandra Queen? If you ask the sheriff of Bell, it was young love gone awry—and Nico Bell wasn’t an abusive killer, but a lovesick Romeo. Sheriff Thomas suggested that maybe Nico Bell didn’t even intend to kill Cassie that day, only scare her. To talk about the likelihood of that idea, I’ve invited Olivia Ocasio to We Can Be Heroes. Ms. Ocasio is a graduate of West Point. She served two tours in Afghanistan and is regarded widely as an elite markswoman and top firearms expert. She has testified before Congress on several occasions in relation to this expertise.

  MERIT: Thanks so much for joining me today, Ms. Ocasio.

  OLIVIA: It’s Olivia, please.

  MERIT: Olivia. Thank you. Can we start with a description of the firearm that Nico Bell used in March at Bell High School?

  OLIVIA: Of course. To start, he used two guns that day, which I haven’t seen reported on very often. The first was a rifle, manufactured by Bell Firearms. It uses .223-caliber bullets. This is the kind of weapon that is usually referred to as an “assault rifle.”

  MERIT: What distinguishes that kind of rifle from others?

  OLIVIA: Very little in the design. But this kind of rifle relies on extremely high velocity, and long, narrow bullets, to do what is it meant to do.

  MERIT: And what’s that?

  OLIVIA: To wound beyond saving. The danger of these bullets is that they cause an enormous amount of internal damage on impact. You can talk to trauma surgeons who have seen this. The damage from these rifles isn’t like a regular bullet wound, and CT scans highlight the difference really well. A regular bullet wound, like from a handgun, will show the trajectory of passage internally—a thin line. CT scans from rifle damage, like the weapon we are talking about, show widespread destruction—internal organs are essentially decimated by the force of impact.

  MERIT: So are they more deadly than other weapons?

  OLIVIA: More deadly than handguns, yes. Some other rifles are deadlier. But rifles like the one Nico chose are often used by mass killers because the bullets are cheap and lightweight. This is a question of access. Of who can get their hands on which weapons. Which is why I’ve testified in support of common-sense gun legislation. Not all guns are the same, and the law should reflect that.

  MERIT: That’s an interesting statement: Not all guns are the same. And it leads me to my next question. Can you talk about the second gun used that day?

  OLIVIA: It was a Bell Firearm handgun. Nothing special, except that it was very old. Probably taken from Steven Bell’s personal collection. I think maybe it belonged to the founder of the company. It was valuable and rare. Likely one of personal and historical significance.

  MERIT: Why two guns?

  OLIVIA: The rifle would have been extremely deadly and accurate across the length of a classroom. Cassandra Queen was struck in the head and died instantly. But Nico, having grown up with guns, probably would have known that he could hit her anywhere on her upper body and she wasn’t likely to survive it. The other classmate that was struck, however, was standing up. The bullet struck her leg. If it had hit her abdomen or chest, she very likely would have died, too. And then Nico dropped the rifle and shot himself with the handgun.

  MERIT: With the handgun. The collectible.

  OLIVIA: Correct.

  MERIT: Okay, let’s shift off that day. We understand what happened, and the weapons involved. We can draw a line and say that yes, Nico probably chose those two weapons intentionally, one for its deadliness and one for its personal significance. He wasn’t planning on just scaring Cassie. He meant to kill her, and probably planned ahead of time to take his own life.

  OLIVIA: I would agree.

  MERIT: Okay, Olivia. I appreciate your candor here, so I’m going to ask an odd question. Do you like guns?

  OLIVIA: I’ve built my career on understanding guns. I believe in the Second Amendment. But no, I wouldn’t say that I like guns.

  MERIT: Can you explain that?

  OLIVIA: Guns are a means to an end. In the military, that end is often violence against another human being. But in civilian hands? Without proper training, regulation, understanding of the weapon, and laws to keep those guns safely stored in the home, that turns into a practical free-for-all where citizens have access to any type of weapon they want. We’re treating guns like toys. I’ve seen people argue that they should be able to have any gun they want just because they want it. There’s no accountability in that. No respect for the weapon’s deadliness when it inevitably falls into the wrong hands.

  MERIT: But what about someone’s right to defend themselves?

  OLIVIA: Well, I think the more important question is, whose right? Because I can tell you that the gun lobbyists aren’t speaking up when Black citizens with legally owned firearms are killed by police. They don’t care about toddlers finding guns in the home and shooting themselves. Or women who are victims of intimate partner violence, held prisoners in their own homes because of the constant threat of a gun’s presence. There’s an enormous hole in the gun lobby’s logic and it’s the question of who is protected by a gun. If we have the right to a gun, don’t we have the right to be kept safe from a gun, too?

  MERIT: But can’t women defend themselves with a firearm?

  OLIVIA: Well, no. Cassie Queen couldn’t. All she could do was say she was scared and ask for help. And many women who have defended themselves with a gun against an abuser have gone to jail for it. Every woman I served with in the military had their own firearm and expert training on how to use it. But look at statistics on assaults in the military. So the Second Amendment doesn’t apply equally for everyone. Generally speaking, those refusing to talk about common-sense gun legislation are already an extremely privileged group of people.

  MERIT: Does that group include people like the Bells?

  OLIVIA: Exactly like the Bells.

  Mural 2

  TITLE: ARIADNE

  LOCATION: THE HIGH SCHOOL AUDITORIUM

  Beck

  AT JUST PAST ELEVEN THE NEXT night, Beck slipped out of her farmhouse, sneaking past her grandfather where he’d fallen asleep on the couch watching the news. She was careful not to wake him. She wouldn’t know how to explain her plans.

  Beck was on her way to meet a ghost. Again.

  And to commit a crime. Again.

  Beck rushed across the yard, eager to get to the van. Eager to reassure herself that the last two nights with Cassie weren’t some strange trick of the universe.

  But she didn’t have to worry.

  Cassie was there.

  Beck could see her glow through the window before she even opened the door. Ghost Cassie was bluish all over. It was just a tint. Like moonlight was shining on her, except it was a new moon tonight, and the glow came from Cassie.

  “Hey, Casper,” Beck said, climbing in.

  Cassie laughed, and Beck thought maybe she was more solidly there tonight than last time. Beck could make out the individual waves of Cassie’s long hair falling over her shoulders. The other nights it was just one dark mass.

  “Casper,” she said. “I like it.”

  �
��I have a surprise for you,” Beck said. She pulled her phone out of her backpack and connected it to the little portable speaker that Vivian had left on the passenger seat. “It’s new.”

  Beck pushed play on the album and watched Cassie’s face as she realized what she was listening to.

  “She dropped another album?” Cassie asked.

  “Just a few weeks ago,” Beck said.

  “Oh my God!” Cassie shrieked. “We’ve spent two nights in this van and you didn’t tell me?”

  “We were a little preoccupied, Cass. With the whole . . . haunting thing.”

  “Unacceptable,” Cassie said. “My otherworldliness doesn’t trump new music from her.”

  “Well, I’m sorry that my priorities aren’t as screwed up as yours. But I promise you can listen the whole time we paint.”

  “Right. Vengeance list. What does tonight’s vigilante mural look like?”

  Beck opened her sketchbook and turned it to Cassie.

  “Wow,” she said, reaching out to brush the page. She pulled back at the last moment, as though she remembered just then that she couldn’t actually touch anything. “I always loved that myth.”

  “I know you did. Do. Sorry,” Beck said. “This is weird.”

  “Yeah, it’s weird,” Cassie agreed.

  They fell into a familiar quiet together, listening to Cassie’s music until Beck pulled up to Vivian’s house.

  “Replay that last song again?” Cass asked, and Beck started it over again for her.

  Vivian and her mom lived alone in a little townhouse. Her mom was a night-shift emergency room nurse, so Vivian had been alone overnight since she was twelve. Beck knew that she used to get scared. Instead of bothering her mom at work—they needed the money, and her mom couldn’t afford to lose her job at the only hospital in the area—Vivian would text Cassie instead. And Cassie would text back as late as it took for Vivian to fall asleep.

  Beck used to tease Vivian for it. Said she was scared of the dark.

  As if Beck didn’t know what it was like to hate being alone.

  But Vivian was a perfectionist, which left very little to tease her about. Beck had to seize what opportunities presented themselves.

  They’d decided to start this second mural around midnight. The location they’d chosen wasn’t as visible as the billboard had been. They could start earlier, and with any luck not be seen.

  Vivian’s front door opened a moment after they parked. She must have been waiting by the door. Beck knew when Vivian spotted that glow through the window. Her face lit with something joyous, a look full of so much love and longing, and Beck felt a pang of something at the sight.

  She’d always been so busy torturing Vivian, she didn’t imagine what it would feel like to make her happy. Vivian was the worrier, anxious, trying to be the best at absolutely everything. And she did it. She was so good at everything she did. Top of the class. Fastest on the track team. Fast enough to earn a track scholarship to the premed school of her choice. Vivian was what the high school guidance counselors called “driven.”

  And it had always annoyed the hell out of Beck.

  Why kill yourself trying to meet everyone else’s definition of perfect?

  But tonight, when Vivian climbed into the van, she was genuinely smiling, despite her exhaustion.

  And for once, Beck didn’t feel like tormenting her.

  “Hey, Beck. Hi, Cass. Like the music?”

  “Of course I do,” Cass said. “She’s a lyrical genius. Beck, restart that last song again.”

  “You are, too,” Vivian said, pressing skip to start the song over.

  “Were,” Cass said, switching tenses.

  Cassie had always been writing music. And poems. She was particular with her language, using words to paint pictures the same way Beck did with acrylics.

  Beck drove them to their destination, parking the van on the far side of the building just in case any rogue cars drove by tonight.

  “I can’t believe we are doing this,” Vivian said, craning her neck to look through the front windshield at the wall they were about to paint.

  “I can’t believe you are doing this.” Beck turned in her seat. “Okay, Casper, you’ve got your music. This should take us an hour or two.”

  “Casper?” Vivian asked. She was looking at the sketchbook.

  “The friendly ghost,” Beck explained.

  Vivian could have leveled Beck with the look she gave her.

  “Are you kidding? You cannot call her that.”

  “Why not? She likes it,” Beck said.

  “It’s funny,” Cassie confirmed. “Not like ha-ha funny. But it’s definitely funny in a wow, how the hell did we get here kind of way. You know?”

  Beck smiled at Cassie casually joking about her own ghostliness, as only Cassie could, and then stuck her tongue out in Vivian’s direction when she knew Cass was looking, making her laugh.

  “I don’t know,” Vivian said. She turned, catching them making faces behind her back.

  “Well, use your imagination. It’s gotta be in there somewhere,” Cassie teased.

  “Buried down deep,” Beck said. “Under a memorized list of every bone in the human body.”

  “We should get started,” Vivian said, pivoting to the subject at hand and ignoring Beck’s barb. She was all business, as usual, even when that business was a crime.

  Beck had to admit, she was still surprised Vivian was even there.

  She’d thought for sure Vivian would back out of this plan. She’d always been so obsessed with a clean record. Straight As. Perfect attendance. Anything that would give her the advantage to get into her dream school.

  “Leave the windows down,” Cassie said. “That way we can at least talk while you work, and you can listen to music with me. But first you have to restart that last song one more time.”

  “Cassie, we’ve listened to it three times already,” Beck said.

  “You can’t say no to me. I’m dead.”

  “Well, I’m not restarting it. It’s already seared into my brain.”

  Beck and Vivian left the windows open and started to work, pulling out the spray paint. Vivian began to group like colors together, and line them up in order of when they’d need them.

  Beck rolled her eyes but let her do it.

  Vivian propped the sketchbook open for Beck and was passing her the first can when they heard it. That song had restarted.

  They ran back to the van, leaning through the open window.

  Cassie was beaming, her finger hovering over the skip button on the music app.

  “Did you just press that?” Beck asked.

  “I did,” Cassie said.

  “You literally gained new ghostly powers just to listen to that song again?” Vivian asked.

  “Sure did,” Cassie said.

  “Fine,” Beck said, putting her hands up. “You earned it.”

  “Keep practicing,” Vivian said. “Maybe you’ll, like, be able to pick things up or something.”

  “Like what? I’m still stuck in the van. The best I could do is organize Beck’s piles of clothes on the floor. They’ve been in here since March, by the way.”

  Vivian laughed. “Leave it. Unless you think your unfinished business in life is teaching Beck to be tidier. In which case, get used to being a ghost stuck in an old, smelly van, because you aren’t going anywhere.”

  “Hey!” Beck said. “You love Betty. And this old, smelly van has been carting you two around town for years. Show her some respect.”

  “Betty is great. We love Betty even when she decides to not start in the dead of winter while we are freezing our asses off,” Vivian said. “It’s your mess we’re critiquing.”

  Vivian and Beck moved around the van, pulling out the stepladder they needed to reach the higher parts of the wall. It was a large design. They had coverage on almost all sides, and it was summer, so no one would be around. But it was still a risk.

  “Imagine if we could go back in time
and tell Past Vivian she’d be helping me destroy school property,” Beck said.

  “Well,” Vivian said, handing Beck her next paint can. “Depends on how far back you go. I think any version of me from March onward would surprise you.”

  “You’re right. I thought you’d be distracted with getting ready to leave for college.”

  “I’m not,” Vivian said.

  “Not distracted?” Beck asked, tugging her mask into place. Tonight, she was painting a maze, and she had to focus to make straight long lines on the side of the building. They had chosen the wall outside the auditorium, where Cassie had taken the stage so many times.

  “Not going,” Vivian answered.

  Beck stopped painting. Vivian wasn’t going to college? She’d dreamed of that admittance letter since they were kids. Vivian had always wanted to be a doctor. And she’d gotten into the premed program of her choice.

  “Do you want to talk about it?” Beck asked.

  “Nothing to talk about,” Vivian said. “Can’t run anymore. So, no more track scholarship.”

  Beck pulled the paint can trigger again. She tried to focus on the lines—the design was more complicated, and she didn’t want to make a mistake.

  But she couldn’t leave it alone.

  “You’ve wanted that school since we were nine,” Beck said.

  Beck remembered, because it used to make Beck feel a warm prickle of jealousy whenever the subject came up. Vivian always had those big dreams, and she never once apologized for it or tried to make them seem smaller than they were.

  Beck could barely move beyond the survival mode she’d been stuck in.

  “Things changed,” Vivian said.

  “That’s not good enough,” Beck said, whirling on the ladder to face her. Each of them had a mask in place to shield them from the paint fumes, and all Beck could see of Vivian were her eyes. Illuminated only by the van’s far-off headlights, they were dark and wild and angry. Beck recognized the warning in them. The one that said Don’t corner me or I’ll bite. But Beck knew a wounded creature when she saw one. It was like looking in a mirror.

  “You have to go,” Beck said. “You can borrow money and apply for grants. Did you even talk to the school—”