Cote Smith - Hurt People

“Then don’t.”

“Nothing’s going to happen, Ag. Everyone thinks this guy’s gonna come after their family, but that’s never the case. I’m sure he couldn’t care less.”

“Yeah, but what about your job?”

“That’s my problem. Nobody else’s.”

My brother stomped sleepy-eyed into the kitchen with his weekend bag, asked if we were going or what. My dad told him to wait his turn to talk, but my mother was already on her way to the front door.

“You’ll pick them up before church?” my dad said, hanging in the doorway as my brother and I ran into the hall.

“In the morning. Yes.”

“Hey, if the van isn’t fixed, you know I can give you a lift on Sunday. I’m available for rides, or whatever else you need.”

“I appreciate that,” my mother said. “But the check is enough for now. I don’t want you doing anything you don’t want to do.”

I looked at my dad. Her words hurt him, but he didn’t take us and walk away. He stood in the open door and rebounded with a smile.

“Lucky for you I’m becoming a new man. All I do now are things I don’t want.”

“Ah,” my mother said, “so you’ve been rehabilitated.”

“Yep, the system works. Ask anybody at the station.”

My mother looked at me, though I don’t know why. She kissed the top of my head, rubbed my brother’s back. “I just wonder if it’s one of those things,” she said. “Where it’s meet the new, same as the old.”

* * *

After we grilled out for dinner we didn’t go to the video store. Our dad came downstairs in jean shorts and a polo shirt with our city’s emblem on it. Holstered on his hip, for everyone to see, was his gun.

“Get in the car,” my dad said. “I want to show you something.”

He drove us out to a part of the city I wasn’t familiar with. We sped past the fenceless baseball fields and the city’s water tower, the trailer park where no one owned a shirt. My brother and I kept our eyes out the window, watched the falling sun flicker through the trees. Eventually we asked our dad where we were going, but were glad when he wouldn’t tell us, when he said sorry, it’s a secret.

We pulled into a small, loose-gravel parking lot packed with squad cars. Again we asked where we were. He waved us on and said to follow and be quiet. We walked up a hill on a worn dirt path, me trailing my brother, my brother my dad. When we got to the top, we saw a crowd of policemen standing around with their guns out. Some were cleaning their clips, others practicing taking aim. In the field behind them was a row of shadow-shaped targets, hovering like ghosts.

“Stay close,” our dad said, leading us to the other officers. Out of the seven policemen, only three were in uniform, but they all had bulletproof vests strapped to their chests. Alan came up to my dad, grinning. He asked my dad how he was doing, and if he was going to come out to throw darts tonight. He didn’t say anything about seeing us the other day, whether or not they caught the burglar.

“Can’t,” my dad said, “got the boys.”

“Bring them along!” Alan joked. “We could always use another DD.” He patted me on my shoulder and it stung. “Seriously, though, we’ve missed you these past couple weekends. And we’re not the only ones. I know a couple ladies who put out an APB.”

My dad stepped away from Alan and whistled for everyone’s attention. The officers gathered around him, holstering their guns, and waited in silence for my dad to speak. My brother and I stood at my dad’s side, like we were his best lieutenants.

“The Chief couldn’t be here tonight. He had a council meeting with the mayor. But because we’re all trained professionals…,” my dad said, and paused to let his men snicker, “… I know you all will be on your best behavior. Don’t make a fool of me in front of my boys, OK?” He put a hand on our backs and I felt my face redden. “All right, let’s line up.”

Once everyone was in the proper place, lined up against the wooden railing, my dad explained how the drill would go. Each officer would empty two clips. The first would be freehand. Upon my dad’s order, the officers would aim the gun at the shadowy bad guy and fire like it was any regular daytime shootout. But for the second clip, the officers would have to wait until the sun set. At that point my dad would give a signal, and the officers would flick on their black flashlights to light up the dark target, the unseen threat.

Our dad came over with two pairs of plastic earmuffs. “Take these,” he said. I put the earmuffs on, but they were too big and kept sliding off my head, onto my neck. “I want you guys to watch from over there,” he said, pointing to a splintery wooden bench, far away from the railing.

“That looks crappy,” my brother said. “Why can’t we stay by you?”

“These are live rounds.”

“So?”

“Listen, you’re not even supposed to be out here to begin with. But the Chief’s gone and I thought you’d might like to see this, see your old dad in action.” My dad blinked his eyes, waiting for us to say something like cool or oh yeah. “You know, if your mom found out, she’d probably kill me. You’d have a dead dad on your hands.”

He walked back to his men, the sun blinding him into a silhouette. I thought about his words, a dead dad on my hands. I imagined a miniature version of my dad. An action figure, small in my palm, the sad ending to one of my brother’s warped plots.

We sat on the bench and watched our dad get everyone in position, help them settle in their stances. When everyone was in their proper place, he shouted, “Ready!” and the officers raised their guns, pointed them at the targets. For a second, I felt bad for the targets, the black, faceless blobs. They weren’t holding a gun or a knife, or anyone hostage. What had they done? What was their crime? But before I could say anything, my dad yelled fire and, again, it was too late.

The sound wasn’t the sound from our stupid movies. It was a long-lasting pop, one that blasted my ears and rattled my chest, making me feel hollow. It was the sound from the Stranger tape, and with it came everything I tried not to think about. I immediately put my hands to my head, pressing the earmuffs as hard as possible to shut out both thoughts and sound. But this trapped the noise inside me, so that the booms circled from my head to my heart in one continuous terrible loop.

I felt my brother nudge me, and when I looked over I saw that he was shaking with laughter. I didn’t get what was funny until I realized he was laughing at me, his scared baby brother. I opened my mouth. I tried to tell him that he was scared too. He thought of the same things I did, went to sleep each night with the same worry, and just because he had Chris and I didn’t, that didn’t mean he was any safer or better than me.

After every clip was empty, our dad gave the OK to retrieve the targets. The men held up their victims so the fading sunlight could shine through the holes where the bullets had hit. My dad examined each sheet, giving tips to those whose targets went untouched. The hand of one man, who hadn’t hit a single thing, was bleeding badly and in need of a bandage. The gun’s kickback had pinched the man on his first shot. He hadn’t fired a gun since his training, he said. “Well, that’s why we’re here,” my dad said, and grabbed a first-aid kit to patch the man up.

After the man’s bleeding was stopped, our dad came over to see how we were doing. “What do you think, boys?”

I wanted to tell him that I didn’t like this. The noise. The blood. And I didn’t want to be here.

“Can I shoot a little?” my brother said, his eyes fixed on the men and their guns.

“No, son. This is official police practice.”