Murder After Midnight

Just over a week ago, a young man was murdered across the street from my house. I didn’t know him. I don’t know the people that actually live there (he was visiting). I don’t know why he was killed. All I really know is that he was shot, and apparently it took some time for someone to call 911.

The shooting happened around 3-3:30 am. I was awake and in The Imperium. The Imperium is my part of the house. It’s where all of my stuff is (except my DVD collection). It’s where I write, watch TV shows and movies, and make music. It’s about 12-15 feet away from the stupidly, annoyingly large front window in my living room, that looks right out on the house where the murder was committed.

I was watching Charmed (I had tried to watch it when it first aired, didn’t like, thought I’d give it another chance), when I heard gunfire. Two shots that I consciously counted (I think there were actually three shots, but only counted after the first grabbed my attention).

When I was young, my reaction to hearing gunfire was to drop to the ground (I was actually good at dropping simultaneously with the shots). Apparently, now that I’m old, slow and jaded, my reaction is to say “Huh, gun shots” and go back to watching my program. I never had a thought of calling the police. And it’s not like gun fire is a regular occurrence here. In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever heard any at this particular address.

I didn’t even get up to check what was going on until I saw the cop flashlights flashing around and then the heli spotlight. I then spent a bit of time observing the cops search and secure the area. I continued to watch them until well after sunrise when the CSU showed up and started doing their (his) thing. I updated on FB a couple times with minor details that I could discern.

At no point in that time had I given much thought to the idea that someone might have been hurt or killed. Mostly because I never saw an ambulance or EMTs arrive on scene.  And that’s messed up.

Hell, it was a couple of days before I thought about the other outcomes the shooting could have had. For example, as I noted, I was up with a huge window between the shooter(s) and myself. If there had been a misfire or the victim had been able to fire back, there’s a fair chance my window (and thus, myself) would have been in the line of fire. Even worse, my youngest was sleeping on the couch that night. The couch that is literally between me and the window. So there are alternate realities out there where parallel me or parallel my son has just been shot.

I’m pretty sure that the neighbors there (who haven’t been there very long) are drug dealers. I say that because there are a few of them, with really nice, really new cars even though they are young (and this isn’t an affluent area). More importantly, however, is the fact that every single day, a surprising number of people would come visit them, but only for a few minutes at a time. In fact, people would come and park in front of my house and wait for them to get home for significant periods of time, but only stay for a few minutes once the neighbors returned home.

 Now don’t get me wrong. I don’t actually have much of an issue with drug dealers. It’s a pretty American profession, and I’ve known some quite pleasant drug dealers. So at most, they were an annoyance, and only as a result of apparently being pretty popular dealers, resulting in a dramatic increase in traffic on my street and cars taking up space in front of my house. I’m a firm believer that you don’t’ park in front of a house that you are not visiting.

But I find that I am angry that they brought violence into my neighborhood. I grew up poor and lived in some dodgy areas, and one of the things I like about this neighborhood is that my kids don’t have to experience some of the much more negative aspects of growing up poor. But because someone couldn’t resolve a problem with words (or fists), I had to try and explain what happened to my eight-year old, diagnosed Autistic son who already has extreme worries about death (his, mine, his mother’s, the planet’s) what had happened. Without lying to him, because even when I’ve tried to shield my kids from bad things, I’ve always worked really hard to be honest with them about those things when they came up.

That all sucks a lot. But you know what?

It doesn’t suck as much as thinking a young kid may have died a stone’s throw away from me, and I couldn’t be bothered to call for help. That maybe if I had called as soon as I heard the shots, the story might have had a different outcome. It might not have. The cop I talked to said it didn’t look like help could have gotten there soon enough.

Though I’ve made missteps in my life, I’ve long strived towards doing the right thing (after a couple of incidents in my youth where my actions or lack thereof could have made a difference). I didn’t do that this time, and I don’t want to be a person who has become so apathetic, so cynical, so used to a shitty world that I just don’t bother anymore.

That would make me a part of the problem.

I would much rather be a part of the solution. I’m terribly sorry someone had to die to make me realize where I was at mentally.