sunflower🌻 || Elizabeth Olsen x OC

silence

Florence
[TW - shooting, death]

A loud noise.

A scream.

And then silence.

My head couldn't make out what it just heard. You always think you would know what to do in situations like these, but you don't.

Struck by shock, I just stand frozen and look in the direction from which the bang came.

Then I hear another shot. It seemed to be even louder than the one before. Finally my brain starts working again and I flee into one of the aisles, lurking through the gaps to make out where the shooter stands.

Bang. Another shot, another scream.

Tears start to fill my eyes, making my vision blurry. I want to scream but know better and hold my hand in front of my mouth to prevent any sound.
It starts to get more difficult to breath. In my mind I am thinking about all the things I haven't done in my life, thinking this would be my last day.
I should've bought myself that damn loop station months ago. Now, I'll never know if I could've made it in the industry. I'll never know if people would have liked my songs and resonated with them.

Bang. Another shot, another scream.

Does the person want money or do they just want to kill innocent people? I try to remember how many people were in the store. It wasn't that many, right? Then my mind wanders to the woman from earlier who asked me about the present for her boyfriend. My head hurts at the thought of her being one of the victims. Please be alive, please be alive.

Then I saw the man.

I gasped for air and immediately ducked back behind a shelf. But the face was instantly burned into my memory.

It was the man in the parking lot earlier. The one I almost ran into and who was frantically looking for something.

Guilt comes to my head. He must have been looking for his gun. I could've stopped him. And now there is probably innocent people that are dead.

These thoughts fade away for the moment when I hear little noises and in the next moment the woman from before rushes into the corridor opposite me.

Thank God, she's still alive.

Her face now no longer bears the beautiful smile from before, but an expression of pure fear. The previous glow in her green eyes is also gone and replaced by thick tears running down her cheeks.

She notices me and I can see that she is also relieved to see me. I try to give her a weak smile to tell her that we will be fine. However, I don't even believe that myself.

That's when I noticed the shots have stopped.
Is he gone? But then, I hear footsteps. There are getting louder and louder, meaning he is coming closer to us. I look around myself to see if the shelf has anything useful to defend myself from the man. But how am I going to do anything against a gun?
The only thing I can find is a glass bottle, so that's what I take and go to the end of the aisle that is nearest to the middle corridor and therefore nearest to the other woman.

That's when I see the man step between our aisles.

But he doesn't turn to me, he hasn't even seen me because the moment he stepped in our direction the woman let out a small scream, causing the man to look at her.

The panic in me rises, however, this is the only chance I have to stop this. I strengthen my grip around the glass bottle and slowly step closer to the two. Why hasn't he shot her yet? What is he saying to her?

I can't make out what the man is saying. He is getting closer to her, which causes the woman to stumble and fall to the ground. Her eyes are filled with fear and she's crying: "Please don't do this. I can give you all the money you want. Don't kill anymore innocent people.. please!"

The man now stands directly in front of her, hovering over her. "I don't want your money. I want you. But if I can't have you, then no one will!" he said calmly, his voice sending shivers down my spine.

What happens next is only a blur for me. The man raises his gun and the woman intertwines her arms in front of her head so she doesn't have to see it happening. That is when I jump forward and clash the water bottle with all of my strength against his head, making him fall to the ground. His body is now lying on the floor, between me and the blonde woman. Not moving.

Did I kill him?

"He's probably still alive, just unconscious. We have to get out of here", the woman who has stood up from the ground by now, shouts. And before I can do anything she grabs me by the hand and runs to the entrance of the store.
I will never forget the images that I saw in these few seconds. Bodies lying there in every aisle.

Finally outside I can see police cars arriving at the scene. We're safe. We did it.

I feel the pressure stop and start to relieve but that's when the shock hits me and suddenly I can only see black. The last thing I can feel is arms holding me and preventing me from falling to the ground.

_____________________________

I hope you liked the second chapter. I know it's pretty dark but I felt the need to have the chapter be only the shooting.
With the recent school shooting in Texas, I thought about if I should be even writing about such thing. However, I feel like it is even more important now. We need to bring awareness. And there needs to be a drastic change in gun laws.