The smoking gun
Art by: Jeffrey Richter
Thousands of children grow up in foster care each year. Most of those children are never adopted. In fact, most of those kids age out of the system; forever lost in a filing cabinet or a digital wasteland of empty hopes and dreams.
Now, I'm a 32-year-old coke and heroin addict; I work in a sleazy strip club where you can get a blow job in the VIP room for the right price. The hope that I had in my early youth had been buried; numbed by drugs and beads of sweat that splattered from the bodies of strange men. I was innocent then; with innocence, there is naivete with naivete, theirs only ignorance behind childish eyes. At this point in my life, I feel like I should've been aborted.
I'm bitter, sad, and aging; my green eyes are sunken and hollow and my skin is dry and cracked. My red hair has no grey yet, but it's dull and lifeless. The rest of me appears rail thin and sickly. A few good years of drug abuse has devastated my once desirable appearance.
I'm about to be 33, and I look and feel middle aged. I've decided that I'm ready to cleanse the planet of my wretched existence, but I'm not going out alone. If I'm going to clean up the world, I'm going to take out as many as possible.
I met up with my drug dealer who sold ammo as well. I had no money, but as a woman whose sole purpose contributed nothing more than self-preservation, I had more to offer him and seven other men.
I pack an automatic weapon, a pistol; and a gorgeously sharp knife with brass knuckles for the handle. As I admired the Barretta 93R, one man who sat in a chair lacing up his shoes asks,
"So, what do you need all these guns for anyway?"
"Spring cleaning," I reply.
Without hesitance, I unload a simultaneous round of bullets into every single one of them. I grab the car keys off my dealer's corpse, put the Barretta in the medium-sized duffel bag I brought with me, and quickly headed out the back door. I drove to the foster group home that I grew up in. It was late, so the building was dark and empty; all except for the receptionist. She's an older lady with brown hair and gray roots.
"May I help you?" She asks skeptically due to my withered appearance.
I made no reply, I took the knife hiding behind my back and swiftly slit her throat. I ripped her blood splattered badge off her blouse so I could get through the highly secure building. I wiped the card on my jeans and swiped it. The doors to the day room opened; it is just as I remembered; crowded and smelly. Kids slept on the floor, couches, and chairs; very few were lucky enough to get a bed. Everything stunk of discarded offspring.
From my right, I notice an older black nurse approach me from the nurse's station.
"Ma'am, what do you think you're doing?" She asks unequivocally.
I noticed children stirring awake amongst shamefully self-made floor pallets. I hastily whip out the automatic weapon I used to kill my dealer and his indigent crew. The duffel bag drops to the ground; as if everything were in slow motion, bullets go flying killing the nurse and several sleeping kids near her. Blood splatters and pools begin to form then suddenly, I'm bombed by awareness. Children scream and cry and I know theirs no turning back.
I wasted no time and I began taking out as many as possible. Children ran into their rooms as I followed them. I stopped at room 23B, a girl sat calmly in her bed. I looked at her and she looked at me; I felt like I knew her.
Ten years ago I had a daughter that I gave up to the system, ignorantly thinking she would be ok. I walk into her room, close the door, and sit down next to her. She did not flinch or turn away.
"Are you going to kill me?" She wonders innocently.
I lovingly brush some of her hair behind her ear and warmly reply, "Yes."
"Is it going to hurt? I'm tired of everything hurting." She says.
My baby girl is only ten, and she's already contemplating suicide. This time, I had to do right by her.
"Baby, I'm going to offer you something that no one else was ever willing to give you; freedom from pain."
She leans into me and I kiss her on the head as I wrap my arms around her. I sing to her as I pull out the .44 magnum. I put the gun to her face and quickly pull the trigger, blowing her skull off. I nuzzle closely into her neck, feeling content and at peace. My face wrinkles into a smile of tranquility as I put the gun under my chin. Right as the cops bust in the door to my daughter's room, I pull the trigger. For only a fraction of a second, the lights flickered. I was then cast into oblivion and the world around me went black.
THE END
