by Sean Platt
Milo couldn’t hear what Mr. Heller said, or read his lips. But whatever he said, seemed to remove the fear in Manny’s eyes.
Milo’s mind was suddenly focused on the acrid scent of piss, though he wasn’t sure if it was Manny, Jessica, Mr. Heller, or himself who had lost control.
Mr. Heller turned to Milo and held his eyes.
Milo winced, preparing for death.
Why is he doing this? Why is he going to shoot me? What did I ever do to him?
Oh God, I don’t want to die.
“Please, don’t kill me,” Milo cried, tears streaming down his face. “I’m friends with Alex. You know me!”
Hearing his son’s name seemed to waken something in Mr. Heller’s eyes. He stared at Milo as tears dripped down his face. He looked back at the whiteboard and pointed at the word, “eleven” with the gun.
What does that mean? What the hell is eleven?
Mr. Heller then raised the pistol, but not at Milo.
Instead, Mr. Heller parted his lips and shoved the gun into his open mouth.
Oh God, no!
Mr. Heller pulled the trigger and Milo screamed.
* * * *
CHAPTER 2 — Alex Heller
Wednesday…
September 6
noon
Just like that. In a flash. Everything was gone.
Before he killed himself, Alex’s father shot and killed five of his students, including Jessica. He shot Manny and put him in a coma. And seemingly by accident, shot and killed a teacher, Sarah Hughes, in the next classroom.
And all Alex had were questions, and a bottomless well of grief.
No matter how many different ways he tried to pull sense from the senseless, Alex could not make sense of the tragedy. This was the kind of thing you saw on TV, that happened to other people, not to his friends — not to his family.
Everything felt like a bad dream where he hoped to wake up any minute and find things normal again. Except he wasn’t waking up. Nobody was. This nightmare was real and had shaken the entire island to its core.
Neither Milo nor Katie would return his calls.
He wasn’t sure if it was because they didn’t want to talk to him, or if their parents had forbidden them to talk to the son of the madman.
Alex sat in his bedroom, staring blankly at the television as it broadcast collages of the funerals from earlier, photos of the victims, photos of his father, reporters standing outside the school, a flock outside the funeral home, and even the island’s most famous celeb, Jon Conway, though Alex wasn’t sure what the hell he had to do with this. The only thing Alex was grateful for was that the reporters were finally gone from the front of his house.
The TV cut to a reporter in front of the island’s police station, where Alex’s mom was now, answering yet more questions she didn’t have answers to. Probably variations of the same questions they’d asked him.
“Do you know why your father did this?”
“How long has your dad owned a gun?”
“Did he ever talk about any of his victims?”
“Has he ever hit you?”
“Has he ever hit your mother or sister?”
Alex’s answer was the same for all the questions. “No.”
Alex was as shocked as anyone else, if not more so.
Since he didn’t have answers, the police ransacked their house, seizing every computer, flash drive, and journal his father had kept over the years. Alex wondered if they’d yet found some answer in the “evidence” they took, and maybe that was why his mom was down at the police station.
He watched as the TV showed a blonde reporter talking. He didn’t bother turning the volume up. Not like they’d said anything new since Friday, just speculation heaped on top of sensationalism. After the reporter said her piece, the TV flashed to a familiar video that Alex had almost forgotten about, an interview with Alex’s dad after he’d won a Washington State Teacher of the Year award three years ago, a prestigious honor for the island and the school, in particular.
Alex turned the volume up to hear his father discussing the importance of connecting with students and how he used stories to teach. As his father spoke through the TV, Alex felt a sudden hollow in his stomach, realizing that confiscated computers meant confiscated photos of his father. This video on the news might be the only chance he’d get to hear his father’s voice again. Alex grabbed his TV remote and hit record on the DVR to record the segment.
His father looked so happy in the video.
So normal.
So unlike the man who opened fire in his classroom, who killed his own students. It made no sense. Alex’s father was a devoted man, who often spent his own time and money to help teach his students, above and beyond the job. He loved teaching and he loved his students. His dad was practically a genius. Surely, he could have struck it rich had he done anything other than teach.
For his father to do something like this, there had to be something wrong.
If that were the case, the next question was, for how long had something been wrong? The sting of guilt for not noticing was sharp. While their family was relatively close, especially compared to other families Alex knew, it wasn’t like they had real conversations, at least not many that went more than a few inches below the surface. Alex was wrapped up in his own world, with his own problems, and rarely allowed his parents a glimpse inside, or looked beyond his to see into their worlds.
If things were different, would he have seen the signs?
Could he have prevented the massacre?
The TV returned to a scene outside one of the funerals. Alex lowered the volume, stared at his cell phone, then dialed Milo again.
Still no answer.
He left a voicemail. His fourth.
“Please, Milo. Call me. I need to talk to someone,” he said, trying not to cry.
He hung up, feeling stupid for talking about his needs, when Jessica, the girl Milo had a big crush on, was dead, and their closest friend, Manny, was in the hospital in a coma and on life support.
As long as he’d been friends with Milo, Alex had been the more popular of the two. Milo had always been his nerdy sidekick. But he loved the guy like a brother. Milo was hysterical, and into the same games, movies, and stuff Alex liked. He was the perfect hangout buddy, never too serious, never depressing, despite his family problems, and almost always around. Perhaps the coolest thing about Milo, was that he was an awesome writing partner. The two had written several scripts together, TV shows and movies they hoped to someday pitch to Hollywood. But suddenly, none of that mattered.
Whatever friendship they had was severed by the inexplicable actions of Alex’s dad.
Alex considered calling Jesus, Manny’s brother, to get an update on Manny’s situation beyond the TV reports. But Alex figured that he was the last person in the world that Jesus, or his family, wanted to hear from.
He set the phone on his bed and crawled under his covers, listening to the soft white noise bleeding through the baby monitor. His six month old sister murmured in her sleep, and he hoped she wasn’t gonna wake up soon. Aubrey was too young to understand that “Daddy is in heaven,” and kept looking for their father, waiting for him to come back home. It broke Alex’s heart, and he wasn’t very good at comforting his sister. At least if his mom were there, she could cuddle with Aubrey and distract her.
Alex felt a flash of anger at his father.
How could he do this? To his students? To his family?
But as soon as the flash came, Alex felt more guilt.
His father wouldn’t do this. Something must’ve been wrong with him. There was no other explanation.
Alex closed his eyes, exhausted.
He needed a nap.
He rested his head on a pillow, but only for a minute before the itch at the back of his head worked its way forward and forced him to his feet.
Alex opened the door to his father’s office and flicked on the overhead light. He stepped inside, picturing his
dad sitting behind his desk, facing the doorway, looking up from his work and smiling. He hadn’t always smiled when interrupted; most times, he was too busy to even look up. But Alex chose to remember the times he had looked up, happy to see him.
The office was a disaster. The cops had tossed books from shelves, dumped boxes unceremoniously onto the ground, and pulled all the drawers out of his desk, leaving them sitting in a pile. Wires and cables were tangled atop his desk where his father had his computer set up so neatly just a few days ago.
The office looked like it had been robbed. And in a way, it had been, of everything his father had created.
Alex felt a sudden rage at the cops for leaving this mess for him and his mother to clean.
He grabbed one of the empty cardboard boxes that had been in the closet loaded with files and school paperwork, then sat on the ground and started putting stuff away. He didn’t know what he could do to help his mom through this, but there was no reason she should have to clean the cops’ mess. And maybe, if the cops hadn’t taken everything important, Alex might find some answer to why his father snapped.
He’d been cleaning for about 20 minutes, and had gotten through the bulk of the mess, putting it into boxes and books back onto the bookcase. He wasn’t sure what they would do with all of his dad’s stuff.
There was something so alien about a person’s possessions once that person was gone. It was almost as if they took on new properties — ordinary made special, mundane made magic, and junk turned to treasure imbibed with memories — somehow transformed by the absence of their owner.
It gave Alex an idea for a short story about a dead man’s possessions mourning their owner. He filed the idea away to mention to Milo, and then wondered if he and Milo would ever write together again.
Or was their friendship as dead as the bodies being buried this week?
Alex picked up an old baseball off the ground and placed it back on a wooden stand on the bookcase. Alex wondered what the ball meant to his dad. It wasn’t signed by anyone, nor did it appear to be from a professional baseball game, at least as far as Alex could tell. Alex had seen it a hundred times, yet never thought to ask his dad what made the ball so special.
Alex was surprised to find so many books by authors he liked, such as Stephen King, Clive Barker, George R.R. Martin, Ray Bradbury, Neil Gaiman, and Phillip K. Dick, among the tomes of classic literature.
Alex had never known his dad was into so many of the same authors as he was, and felt the same hollow thud that had been thrumming through his body all morning. He should have known more about his father; a few minutes here and there might have made all of the difference in the world.
It wasn’t as though they never discussed fiction.
They’d talked about writing a lot, in fact. His dad had always wanted to be a novelist, and had started a few books over the years, but he’d never let Alex read them. He said he wanted to wait until he’d written something he could be proud to show his son.
Though Alex’s dad was a harsh critic of his own work, he’d always been supportive of Alex’s efforts. He seemed to genuinely enjoy many of Alex’s stories, though he didn’t shy away from offering constructive criticism. Alex regretted not showing his dad the scripts he and Milo had been working on. He had wanted to wait until they were polished, more mature, something which Milo could feel proud of.
But now . . .
Alex closed his eyes, wanting to cry, to let it all out.
But he couldn’t.
He hadn’t cried since the shooting, even though he was sad, devastated, and all the things that should make you cry. But the tears hadn’t come.
Why?
Alex wondered if that meant he didn’t really love his dad.
He picked up a photo from the box, of him and his dad down at the shore on the north side of the island before it was fenced off. They’d spent the weekend, just the two of them together, camping and fishing. Alex was eight and holding the tiniest fish you could probably catch with a hook. It was his first fish and the bobber almost dwarfed the thing, but to Alex, at the time, it had been the size of a whale. His dad had held the camera outstretched to squeeze them both into the frame, and though the picture was slightly out of focus, it managed to capture the magic of the moment. The photo was in a thick brown frame, placed prominently on his father’s desk. His dad said he put it there to remind him why he worked so hard, and so he’d remember the things that were truly important.
A man like that doesn’t shoot up his classroom.
Not my dad.
The sound of the doorbell repeatedly ringing broke the silence, and sent a fresh panic flooding through Alex.
Someone was pressing the doorbell over and over, as if the house were on fire.
“What the hell?” Alex said, racing downstairs to reach the door before the noise woke his sister.
He threw the door open and saw a short, beefy man in a dark blue tee shirt, jeans. Bruce Henderson, father of Teddy Henderson, one of the victims of the shooting. He was holding an aluminum baseball bat in his hands. Before Alex could even gasp, Mr. Henderson started swinging and screaming.
Alex ducked, but just barely in time, and the bat caught him in the back, sending him sprawling to the porch crying out in pain.
“You’re gonna pay!” Mr. Henderson screamed, his face an angry red, eyes wild.
“Please, Mr. Henderson,” Alex cried, “Don’t hurt me.”
The man froze, bat over his head, poised and ready to strike. Then something shifted in his face, as the rage turned to confusion, as if he were shaking off cobwebs from the thick of a dream. He looked down at Alex, as if he was surprised to see him there, and then up to the bat, seemingly surprised again to find the weapon in his hands. He lowered the bat, looking around, as if lost.
Alex breathed a sigh of relief and started to stand. But then, just as Alex thought he was safe, Mr. Henderson’s eyebrows arched in anger, and he raised the bat again.
A gunshot exploded cracked behind Mr. Henderson, and a man in a black Paladin Security uniform appeared seemingly from nowhere, aiming a pistol at Mr. Henderson, screaming, “Drop the bat!”
Mr. Henderson turned to the security guard, and then, again, looked like he’d just been woken up, and realized what he’d been doing.
“Put the bat down,” the guard repeated.
Mr. Henderson looked up, then at Alex guiltily, and placed the bat on the porch, gently as if it might explode if he wasn’t careful.
“I’m so sorry,” he said, breaking down into tears as the guard grabbed one of Mr. Henderson’s arms and twisted it back, and then the other, handcuffing the man. Once Mr. Henderson was restrained, the guard turned from Alex, and used his radio to call dispatch.
“This is Sanders. We’ve got a situation over at Mr. Heller’s house.”
As Sanders started to inform dispatch what had happened, Alex heard the sound of his little sister screaming from inside the house.
Oh shit.
He pointed at the house, “My baby sister! I’ll be right back.” Alex motioned to Sanders, who nodded okay as he continued speaking into his radio.
Alex went inside and closed the door, even though he wasn’t sure what he was supposed to do. He sure as hell wasn’t going to leave it open with Mr. Henderson on the verge of violence. Alex bounded up the stairs and into Aubrey’s room to see her red-faced, screaming, crying her eyes out.
He picked her up, and pulled her to his chest, “It’s okay,” he whispered repeatedly, holding her tight, rocking her in his arms as he’d seen his mom do a hundred times before.
To his surprise, Aubrey calmed down, snuggling her tiny face against his chest.
Oh my God, she’s letting me comfort her!
Alex finally cried.
He held Aubrey for a long minute, inhaling her scent and feeling the glow of being a big brother that he’d never felt before.
Aubrey was asleep in minutes, also to his surprise. He laid her back in her crib, cove
red her with her baby blanket, then went back downstairs in case Sanders had any questions or needed to take a statement from Alex or anything.
He went to the front door, just as a black Paladin SUV rolled up into their driveway. Sanders led Mr. Henderson to the SUV, placed him in the back, as the man kept crying, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry” to the guards, too distraught to see that Alex was in the doorway. Probably a good thing, Alex figured, afraid the man might see him and go off again and get himself shot.
Sanders returned to Alex, taking out a notepad and pen.
“Can you tell me what happened?” Sanders asked.
Alex stepped onto the porch, keeping the door partially open so he could hear if Aubrey cried again. The black van was still in his driveway, probably waiting for Sanders to finish.
Alex told him what happened, saying that Sanders didn’t miss anything, as he showed up pretty quickly right after Mr. Henderson got there.
“Thank you,” Alex said. “You saved me.”
“No problem, kid,” Sanders said, even though he was 30, tops, hardly an old man, with a baby face and brown hair, cut military-style, like all the guards who worked for Paladin. “Now, did Mr. Henderson say anything to you?”
“No, he just said ‘you’re gonna pay.’”
“Because your dad killed his son?” Sanders asked matter-of-factly, as if he were used to asking kids about their crazy dads who had just shot up the school.
“I guess. I don’t know what else he could’ve been mad at. I mean, I didn’t know Teddy all that well.”
“And you’re sure he didn’t say anything else?”
The way Sanders asked ‘anything else’ struck Alex as odd. As if there were something in particular he thought that Mr. Henderson might have said. Alex was about to ask what he meant when his mom’s silver Passat pulled into the driveway.