You and Me, Kid

○ Chapter 16 ○

TW: School Shooting

I'm sorry, papa, Autumn cried silently, screwing her eyes shut as the door to her classroom was rammed into, but I don't think I'm gonna be coming home.

That isn't something a six-year-old child should have to think, nor should it be something any child should experience. The feeling that they won't be coming home, the thought of trying to protect themselves against an armed person with a gun in a setting that is supposed to be for learning and making friends. Kids shouldn't have to go through this, no one should. No parent should wonder if their kids are going to come home at the end of the day or wonder when the phone's gonna ring to tell them their kid didn't make it out.

Gunshots rang through the classroom; kids screaming in terror. Their teacher, a kind woman called Mrs Stuart, jumped up and stood in front of her students, protecting them from this madman. Another gunshot rang out; their teacher slumping to the ground as blood began to pool around her still body. More screams. Millie ran from under the desk to the teacher, screaming for her to wake up.

It was her mother.

The gunman noticed the child in front of him and quickly reloaded his gun, aiming it at the blonde and shot. Millie slumped over her mother's body, their blood mixing together. The gunman grinned and began shooting randomly, bullets ricocheting off the walls. Children had to dive out of the way in order to not get shot, though some weren't so lucky. People got skimmed by the bullets, or they were lodged into their skin, their arms, their legs. Others got them lodged in the head or chest because they weren't quick enough and so joined the ranks of those who died prematurely at someone else's hands.

A bullet was soaring towards Autumn, and her eyes widened. This is it, she thought, pulling her legs to her chest and arms wrapping around them. Leah and Jamie had bolted out of the door when they had the chance, leaving Autumn in the room. This is it. I'm sorry, papa but I'm not gonna be coming home. She mutely screamed as the bullet lodged into her right upper arm, eyes watering as the pain began.

Just as he was about to shoot at another student, another child, another friend, a SWAT team entered and dragged the gunman out after disarming him.

Twenty kids died that day. Three adults were killed. Plenty more, kids and adults alike, were injured in the attack.

This isn't something anyone should have to go through. And yet, it's normalized. There's so much glory surrounding guns that people use them to get their five minutes of fame. It's sickening.

Parents lined the playground, eyes wide and panicked as they looked for their children. Pete had all but speeded to get to the school, not caring if he broke any speeding laws. Not that he ever did. As the students began filing out of the school, there were paramedics bringing out stretchers covered in white clothes. Bodies of children and adults alike were lined up on one side of the playground while those who had survived lined the other, their parents sobbing as they held them. Looking at the bodies they were bringing out, Pete began to panic more when he realized his daughter hadn't come out yet. Where are you? He thought, seeing Jamie and Leah run out. They're safe, but where's my daughter?

Twenty minutes went by when his daughter came out, a paramedic guiding her to the back of an ambulance. Seeing this, Pete ran over, heart in his throat as he thought about what could be wrong. Getting to the ambulance, Autumn was sitting next to the paramedic that guided her out as another carefully extracted a... bullet from her right arm?! Walking closer, Pete knelt in front of his daughter as she sobbed. "Papa!" She cried, trying to hug him. The paramedic that was now stitching her arm up quietly told her to stop and that she'd be able to hug him in a minute. Autumn understood why and closed her eyes as the paramedic continued to patch up her arm. Once she finished, she wrapped the six-year-old's arm up and allowed the father-daughter duo to hug, the child sobbing as she clung to him.