"The parents had their child on a leash."
by Alan Nicoll
Copyright 2003 by Alan Nicoll, All Rights Reserved
The parents had their child on a leash. I shot them both. The crowd screamed and scattered like a school of herring being attacked by a school of piranha, but I ignored them. I went up to the screaming girl and squatted down. I think she was about four years old. "It's all right," I said. "You're free now. They'll never have you on a leash again." As I spoke softly to her I unbuckled the harness from around her body. She looked up at me.
"Thank you," she said, and then she kicked me in the nuts. It hurt.
Driving on the freeway, rush hour, hot, miserable day. I was in the rightmost lane, creeping along at about 45. Some jerk in a pickup came in from the right, trying to "merge" in front of me. He picked the wrong car to try to cut off. I shot him. His truck wavered for a moment, then skidded up sideways and plowed up about forty feet of ice plant before it came to a stop. As I went past I heard the jerk yell, "Bastard!" Some people.
I walked toward the newspaper racks at the corner. A fat white guy was putting coins in the slot for the Times. I stopped and waited while he opened the box and took out a stack of six papers, emptying the box. As he lowered the lid I shot him. His eyes stared at me in surprise as he sank to the sidewalk. The papers fell from his nerveless fingers, sliding across the sidewalk. I reached down and picked up one of the papers, scanning the headline. It was something about a recent rash of random shootings. Since I didn't have to pay, I saved fifty cents.
I'm seeing my psychiatrist tomorrow. He says I have a lot of hostility. I'm taking my gun.