Here in this Sorrow Chapter 22

Chapter 22

There was blood everywhere in the stairwell, going up and down the stairs. Stephen Joyce lay on the landing going up. Blood leaked from a ragged, charred hole in his purple Bugle Boy T-shirt.

Christian climbed the stairs and looked for an absent pulse. He nudged the body with the toe of his combat boot and scowled at the lack of response. “Clark always liked you,” he said solemnly. He then smiled and shrugged. “You shouldn’t have jumped at me.” His eyes followed the blood trail up the stairs and shook his head. “Why go up?” he questioned aloud. “Only one way down that way.” He jammed a new clip into his gun, chambered a round and went upstairs.

The hallway was filled with screaming, panicked kids. He pushed through he door into the maelstrom, standing calmly among them as they dashed about. One girl ran into him from behind the almost knocked him over. He spun to face her, but she was long out of sight.

The three teachers, Mr. Holowinski, Mrs. Tremier and Mr. Johnson were trying to gain order. They were sweeping people towards the library at the end of the hall.

Christian kept his head down and his handgun tucked away inside his coat as he joined the wave of people. He was pushed and shoved along with the people who had no clue it was him they were going to hide from. All around, nothing could be heard but the frantic screaming of children who didn’t know if they would live to see the next day.

“Come with me!” Mr. Johnson was yelling. “Come to the library! Come with me!” he shouted. The children followed in blind faith.

Christian was ushered through the doors like everyone else. No one looked at his face. No one noticed the hand tucked in his coat. People were being organized into the tables, onto the floor, anywhere they could sit and be quiet. Christian filtered himself to the back of the crowd as Mr. Johnson pulled the doors closed and locked them. When he turned towards the room, Christian stood there, still looking at the ground.

“I need a phone,” Christian mumbled. His words were drown out by the hysteria behind them.

“What?” Mr. Johnson asked and then gasped. “My God, you’re bleeding! Are you hurt?” He bent down to inspect Christian’s slashed face, only to find a gun pointed at his eye. Before he could fully register what was happening, it went off. The bullet tore up through his left eye, through the rear cortex of his brain, and out the top of his skull. His hand rose up to scratch at the wound before he slumped to his knees.

The gunshot silenced the screaming.

Christian walked into the room and leaned against the counter. He wrapped the gun on the wood surface, as if to gain the attention of all present. He glowered at them for almost a minute. Most were seated, but some still stood. Every person was tense, watching Christian. “This is it,” Christian said. “We’re all here so you can all learn why this happened. We’re here so that you can all know why you died.” He banged the butt of the gun on the counter again to emphasize his last word. A few people let out muffled shrieks. “I’ve been treated like dirt long enough,” he said. “How many of you have spit on me before?” he asked, randomly pointing the gun around the room. When silence answered his question, his face grew tense. “How many of you have fucking spit on me before!” he screamed, calming a moment later. “How many of you have thrown spit wads, snow balls, rocks? How many of you have tripped me, or punched me?” He quieted momentarily, his eyes falling on Ben Tramer and Nick Caufield. “I see at least two of you that have.” He smiled, a tear creating a greasy track through his smudged make-up. He sniffed and said, “Today, you’re all going to be sorry.” He stood up straight, more tears leaking from his eyes. “And what about the rest of you? You think you’re fucking innocent?” His voice was high pitched and hoarse. “You aren’t fucking innocent.” He began to pace back and forth behind the counter. “How many of you have ever helped me? When I was on the ground, getting pounded by six guys who were all twice my size, what did you do? What did you do when it was one of your friends?”

Mrs. Tremier stood up and held her arms out to him. “Christian, this isn’t right...”

“Shut the fuck up!” he screamed, pointing the gun at her. “I was talking, wasn’t I?” He motioned with the gun for her to get on the ground. “How do I call outside from here?” he asked.

“Why?” she asked, kneeling slowly.

“Just fucking tell me!” he shouted. “Tell me how to call outside!”

“Just dial zero and wait for the dial-tone,” she whimpered.

Christian went behind the counter and put the guitar case on it. He picked up the phone and dialed 911. When the operator picked up, he calmly said, “My name is Christian Duke. I’m a student at Robert Zimmerman High School, and I’ve just committed murder.” He paid no attention to the operator on the other end trying to talk to him. “I’ve already detonated three bombs, and I have enough hidden to destroy the whole school. If I see a single police officer, I will blow up the entire building. Tell the police to stay outside.” He slammed the phone down and went over to the guitar case. He unzipped it and pulled out the shotgun, four clips for his handguns, and two more pipe bombs. He laid them all out neatly on the counter.

“Christian,” Mrs. Tremier said, her voice a terrified whisper. “Christian, is it true?”

“What?” he demanded harshly.

“Are there more bombs?” she whimpered.

“It isn’t going to matter to any of you,” he said. He wiped the tears with a gloved hand and put three of the clips in his pockets. He held onto the fourth and picked his hand gun off the counter. He walked around the front and leaned against it. “Ben Tramer and Nick Caufield, come up here please,” he said stoically, looking at the ground.

“Christian, don’t,” Mr. Holowinski pleaded. “You don’t have to do this.”

“Would Ben Tramer and Nick Caufield come up here, please,” he repeated sternly. When the two slowly rose from their tables, Christian said, “Mrs. Tremier, Mr. Holowinski, I just want you to know that you and Mr. Johnson killed all of these kids.”

Mr. Holowinski stood up and snarled. “That’s enough!” He took a step forward and found the gun pointed in his face. He took a deep breath. There were tears welling in his eyes. “Christian, please,” he pleaded. “Don’t do this. You are better than this. You are smarter than this.” He looked at the ground. “I know it’s hard. I know they treat you like shit, but this is not the way to go about things. You have to be strong. You have to be stronger than them.”

Christian’s lips twisted. He sighed and his whole body shuddered with a sob. “It’s too late,” he said. “I’ve already started this. I need to finish it now.” He pointed at the counter with his other hand and said, “Ben, Nick, sit against there.” They slowly got out of their seats and walked to the front of the library, sitting down against the counter as Christian ordered.

“Christian,” Mr. Holowinski said. “We’ve always been friends. We’ve always been able to talk to each other. I know what it was like here for you, I went here too...”

“Shut up,” Christian snapped.

“You know, I was just like you in school.”

“Shut up.”

“You know this isn’t right.”

“Sit the fuck down and let murder these two!” Christian screamed, aiming the gun at Mr. Holowinski, tensing his finger on the trigger. “You think you can talk me out of it because we were friends? All you ever did was tell me that I’d never stay like this, that I would turn out like you! Well, I’m not like you!”

“Murder?” Mrs. Tremier interjected. “You feel guilty about this, don’t you?”

“Guilty?” Christian hissed. “Did Ben feel guilty when he hit me with a rock and knocked me unconscious last year? Did Nick fee guilty when he pantsed me in gym class?” he yelled, slamming Nick’s head into the counter with the muzzle of the gun. “No, he didn’t feel guilty, instead, he got a bunch of guys to shove my head in the toilet after class!” He was crying freely now. “It wasn’t just my head in the toilet either, they made sure it was good and full! Do you know what it feels like to tell your father that you came home early, reeking of piss, because someone gave you a swirley?” He shook his head. “I doubt any of you do,” he whispered. He pointed the gun at Nick’s head and looked away.

The room erupted when he pulled the trigger. People clung to each other. People tried to run. Both teachers were on their feet.

“Shut the fuck up!” Christian was screaming. He fired the gun twice into the air and waited for the quiet. “And now we have Ben,” Christian boomed. “Last winter, I was walking home from school, minding my own business, just wanting to get in out of the cold. Ben and Jim Smitt–who is now dead, might I add–drove by and hurled a small rock that hit me in the head. Luckily, I didn’t fall in the road, I fell in the snow bank. I was unconscious for five minutes, and when I woke up, I had a concussion and needed three stitches. I was completely disoriented, and had to be taken to the hospital when a neighbor saw me and called an ambulance.” He crouched in front of Ben and pointed the gun at his head. “That is when I first decided to do this. I was sitting in the emergency room with my father yelling at me, saying that I must have done something to you, and I decided I was going to kill you. I waited, and as I waited, the angrier I got, and finally, I decided to kill everybody. Just think of that, Ben, you made me kill all of these people.”

“Please don’t,” Ben pleaded. “Please don’t kill me...”

The gunshot cut off his words. This time, no one screamed, no one tried to run, no one wanted to play hero. When the body slumped to the side, Christian spun around. He walked up the table in front, where a blonde girl clung madly to a brunette, their features masks of horror. He hopped on the table and waved the gun around the room. “How many of you have suffered at his hands before?” he cried, kicking books and pencils off the table. “These people run our lives and all we can do is pretend we like it!” he screamed, stomping the table to emphasize his words. “Well, I don’t like it! I’ve helped people who were getting their asses kicked in the past, only to go home with a worse beating of my own. No one ever helped me though. You’re all just as bad as people like Ben and Nick, because you let this happen. You kiss ass to all these motherfuckers, just because you hope they will leave you alone! It’s not just them either. You shove your noses up the asses of all the rich kids, all the kids who dress right, all the girls who put out, everyone! You have a net of ass kissing going, because it’s the only way you can convince yourselves you feel good! If you have two people on their knees behind you, then it justifies the person you’re kneeling behind.” He sat down Indian-style on the table. “Maybe some of you will be lucky. You won’t be fatally wounded, or you’ll play dead, or something like that. I know that the chances that I actually kill all of you are pretty slim. Hopefully, if you survive, you’ll take this message to heart and spread it to the world. Maybe you’ll realize that living up to the status quo is not a positive thing.”

“Plea... Please stop,” the blonde girl at the table stammered.

Christian looked down at her, cocking his head as he inspected. “What’s your name? I’ve seen you before, but I don’t know you.”

“L... Laurie,” she sputtered. “Laurie Myers.”

Christian pursed his lips. “I want to ask you a question, Laurie. Be honest, because this isn’t going to effect the outcome at all, okay?”

She nodded exaggeratedly, her face streaming with tears. The brunette girl pulled away from her a little. “What do you want?” Laurie asked.

“What did you think of me before all this?” Christian asked. “When you saw me in the halls, what did you think?”

“I don’t...”

“Yes you do,” Christian prodded gently. “When you saw me walking through the halls, what thoughts crossed your mind? You can’t say you didn’t, because everyone saw me. I had green hair three months ago. I was the only person in school with green hair, don’t tell me you didn’t see that.”

“You seemed nice enough...”

Christian shoved the muzzle of the gun up against her upper lip. “I told you to be honest. What did you think of me?”

She sobbed. “I thought... I thought you were scary!” She let go of the brunette girl and huddled down in her chair. “You’d walk around the hall dressed all in black with skulls all over your clothes. What were people supposed to think?”

“That’s right!” Christian wailed, jumping to his feet. “If any of you had to pick out a kid most likely to do this, it would be me! Maybe Clark, possibly Shannon, but almost all of you would pick me.” He started walking back and forth on the table. “For some reason though, you still made fun of me. Jamie Hertz, hasn’t called me anything but ‘psycho’ since tenth grade,” he said, pointing the brunette girl. “So if any of you make it out of here alive, I want you to learn this lesson. Even if it’s out of fear, try and treat everyone like a human being.” Without looking, he fired the gun three times into Laurie and Jamie.

Jamie fell over instantly, bleeding from the hole in her skull. Laurie flopped around on the ground for a moment, her one arm that wasn’t shattered by a bullet clutching the side of her neck that blood was fanning out from. She bled to death quickly and went quiet.

The rest of the room was chaos. People were running all about, looking for cover as Christian fired on them blindly. Shredded paper and wood flew about as bullets exploded into bookcases. The debris fell into pools of blood spilling from the opened bodies that got in the way. Christian jumped off the table and backed towards the counter, continuing to shoot at every opportunity. He climbed on the counter and straddled his shot gun and pipe bombs. The pistol emptied and Christian dropped it, pulling a third from the holster on his right hip.

“Stand up!” he screamed. “Stand up so I don’t have to come for you!”

More than a dozen dead or dying were strewn about the floor, staining the orange carpet as their life seeped away. Panicked sobs rose from behind all of the four bookshelves, as well as a few of the tables that had been pushed on their side for cover. The door to the back room had been closed.

He put the gun in his holster and picked up the discarded weapon from the counter. He reloaded and chambered a round, putting it back in his shoulder holster. He drew the half-empty gun off his waist and jumped off the counter. He picked up the shotgun by the pump, shaking the weapon to pump a round into the chamber. He walked to one of the tables closest to him. When the two boys and one girl behind it saw him, they tried to scramble. The buckshot tore into them and dropped all three. They flopped around on the floor until bullet from the Glock silenced them.

Determined, Christian walked to the counter and picked up the two pipe-bombs. He put the shotgun and one of the bombs back in the guitar case and shouldered it. He holstered his Glock and pulled Clark’s Zippo out of his coat pocket. He went to the doors, unlocked them and lit the fuse to the bomb. He threw it as hard as he could to the back of the library and stepped outside.