Being McKenzie Prince ✔

Dear Diary

Have you ever watched someone or something die? Have you ever watched the life slowly drain out of their eyes? The way their eyes glaze over in slow motion.

Skye and I were about fourteen the first time we saw someone die. It has burned itself into my mind ever since. It is not something that you can easily forget.

We decided to go to the Red Flag. We usually went there if we needed to get out of the house. Anywhere was better than being home alone with mom and Goliath while both of them were drunk and high. It was like World War III. The Red Flag used to be a home away from home. A safe haven.

The Red Flag was pretty popular back then. It was the busiest coffee shop in town. We sat two tables away from the window.

It was a normal day.

I think that is how most horror movies start;

"It was a normal day....and then everyone was killed on a camping trip"

We were in our own world talking when a grotesque man stormed into the café. The waiter close to the door got startled and dropped his plates. Skye and I looked up as the man stormed towards one of the tables that was next to us.

The person his rage and fury was directed towards was a small, scared, young woman with mouse colored brown hair. The poor woman attempted to pull back into her seat. She shook from fear. The fight, although only one sided, became louder and louder.

The owner of the Red Flag, Mister Gustav, rushed out of the kitchen to see what was going on. Everyone started yelling and no one noticed the Police car drive through the window of the shop until it was too late. The car rammed through the window shattering the glass towards the innocent woman, the furious man and Mister Gustav. We were flung from our chairs and the pieces of glass scattered around us. A few inches towards the right and we would have been the ones fighting for our lives.

Have you ever heard of the butterfly effect?

I became obsessed with the accident. I did some research and I found out that that is exactly what happened in the case of the Red Flag. A bunch of trivial things accumulating to cause a catastrophic event.

It happened like this.

As the fighting got worse inside of the coffee shop someone called the Police. The two police men who responded to the call were both extremely tired after a shift of about thirty two hours straight without rest.

As they responded to the call, a few blocks away two brothers were busy stealing a car. They believed that if they stole the car, which was a pink Taz, and sold it, that they could get enough money to pay for an operation that their dying mother desperately needed in order to survive.

While the two brothers were busy stealing the car, there was a young couple a few blocks away standing next to the road arguing about something. I am sure that if you asked them years later what they were fighting about that they would not even remember it.

The Police car came swerving around the corner on its way to the Red Flag the same moment that the radio call came in to report the theft of the pink Taz.

The same second the theft was reported the two brothers came swerving around the corner.

As the brothers drove around the corner the fight between the couple became more heated.

The girl ran into the road. The two brothers saw her and swerved out of the way.

The Police men, on their way to the Red Flag, saw the stolen car approaching.

The brothers started to panic when they saw the cop car, even more so because they were driving on the wrong side of the road.

A game of chicken commenced between the cop car and the two brothers.

The Police car swerved out of the way at the last second and drove against the pavement. They lost control of the car and drove directly into the Red Flag's window.

The man and Mister Gustav died instantly, but the woman lay next to our table bleeding.

We tried to help her, but it was already too late.