Chapter Twenty Five - The Gunshots

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John

It was two. He remembered it was two because the noise shot him out of his sleep and the digital clock was glowing fiercely in the corner of his eye. He remembered it all. He remembered the blood that appeared in his mouth when he heard it.

Tonight was different. Harry was sleeping. She slept through it, most of the time. The roaring. But tonight was different. Dead silent. Except for the door.

He heard it open, and shut. And open. And then, the men. Talking. Loudly. Louder. Louder, and louder. And then there was the slamming in the kitchen, so close to his mum. So close to Harry.

And then gunshots.

Harry was awake when John climbed out the window, only opening it enough to climb through. Her eyes opened for barely a millisecond before John caught her eyes with his and gave her their silent code nod: "Keep your head down and shut up."

He jumped out the window, and ran across the yard to a next door neighbor. His name was Fargo.

He had a face that a pitbull might be afraid of, and a voice that a villain might cower from. He always wore suspenders and a grim frown, punctuated by the deliberate drawl in his rugged voice. And he took his sweet time with just about everything unless it was smoking a cigarette. John rapped and rapped on his door - Fargo took longer than forever - and when he answered, he was wearing footy pajamas.

"Hi," John said, "need to use your phone."

"You can't come in here," he said.

Fargo looked surprised when John shoved his way through, and when he was about to tell him off, John turned. The look he gave Fargo was nothing short of furious. John made his way to the nearest phone, which was in the kitchen, next to a fridge. John dialed 999 as Fargo stared. "There's men in my house," he told the operator. "They have guns, and my sister is in there."

John sat in Fargo's kitchen while he waited. He must've had a wife; ruffles adorned every curtain and there were hand sewn pillows everywhere. There was a bunch of brownies on the kitchen counter, and John helped himself: "Damn. You can bake."

Fargo took a cigarette out of what seemed to be nowhere, and lit it quite casually. "You smoke, kid?"

"No, thank you."

"I wasn't offering you one," the man said as he puffed. John scoffed.

"I'm a sixteen year old boy in your house at two in the morning who just told a 999 operator that there were men inside his house with guns. Of course you were offering me one."

Fargo ceased to speak and sucked on the cigarette as John awkwardly ate another brownie. "Your wife home?" John said.

"She's dead," Fargo mumbled.

When the police came, John thanked Fargo for the brownie and walked out to meet them. Fargo shut the door behind him.

"I think there're men in my house," John said. "I heard guns."

"Okay. We're going to park and then we're going to go in with you."

Oh, delightful, John thought, looking forward to being shot in the face. John wasn't really scared, though - well, that was a lie - but he felt calm. The tension wasn't affecting him as badly as he'd anticipated. In fact, when they parked and told him to open the door:

"It's locked."

"Locked. How'd you get in, then?"

"The window, sir."

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