The gunfire is uncomfortably close.
It's a Sunday night and the shots ring out with an eerie and unfamiliar clarity, followed by an unpleasant screech of brakes and the sound of a gunning engine. Firecrackers, I think to myself, but instinctively I know better although I don't know how I know. I haven't heard gunfire since I was a child and don't think I've ever heard pistol shots except once a very long time ago, but still I know. In a matter of minutes, less time than it takes to dial 911 almost, the neighborhood is filled with sirens, flashing lights and fear. Uncharacteristically, the dogs are indifferent to the commotion, they barely raise their heads even when a police car slowly cruises by, its searchlight carefully trained on the front of each house. It turns out to be a drive by shooting in the next block, a mere two houses and two yards away, and while there's some property damage, no one is injured and the shooters make a clean getaway. The neighborhood will likely not recover quite so quickly and there are bound to be aftershocks in the neat little rows of houses so close to my own. I've never felt unsafe before, I realize, and sleep is longer than usual in coming this night. Gunfire, I discover, will do that to you.
The thought that it might have been targeted is unnerving but the thought that it might have been random is even worse.
The following morning's social media postings report that it was an isolated incident, possibly a case of mistaken identity. The police investigation is on going, the assailants will surely be apprehended, we are encouraged to not overreact. It makes for good press, I suppose, but I find no reassurance in the statements.
The idea that a carful of gun-toting thugs would invade and shoot up a quiet little street that decorates and puts up Christmas trees on the sidewalks each holiday season unsettles me.
If they'd shot at my house, the little nurse tells me with a smile I don't quite like, they'd never have gotten out alive.
Somehow not the answer I was hoping for.
The thought that it might have been targeted is unnerving but the thought that it might have been random is even worse.
The following morning's social media postings report that it was an isolated incident, possibly a case of mistaken identity. The police investigation is on going, the assailants will surely be apprehended, we are encouraged to not overreact. It makes for good press, I suppose, but I find no reassurance in the statements.
The idea that a carful of gun-toting thugs would invade and shoot up a quiet little street that decorates and puts up Christmas trees on the sidewalks each holiday season unsettles me.
If they'd shot at my house, the little nurse tells me with a smile I don't quite like, they'd never have gotten out alive.
Somehow not the answer I was hoping for.
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