Futility 

   This is a narrative of events and some fiction, I saw an incident and it resonated in my head, one thought came to me. Only a country’s armed forces should be allowed guns and knives, in no way should such weapons be allowed on the streets. What brought on this view? I saw a man who had been shot and who was dying, I heard his wife scream for help, I saw a car speed away, I heard two bangs all thrown together in my shocked mind in a cacophony of evil deeds that will be with me forever. I’m confused though, why the bangs after the car went? I hope I don’t get flashbacks. I must help educate people on this issue of murder by firearm or knife, how unacceptable it is. Also this can tie in with the loss of Sophie Lancaster two summers ago, a lovely gothic lady who was killed for being alternative defending her boyfriend. The words SOPHIE tell it all – STAMP OUT PREJEDICE HATRED INTOLERANCE EVERYWHERE. Now weapon use on our streets can be added to this cause and any other evil act done by people for whatever reason with illegal lethal weapons. Through my writing I can help make a difference and help people realise that if you aim and fire a loaded gun at a person you will kill them and be on a murder rap; it’s not a water pistol full of water, you’ve got a 9mm bullet and will end a life, period. I was walking back from the pub after a boring night out, early coz my heart wasn’t in it. I was not very drunk and could walk straight rather than staggering down the road.

   I feel the last part of my innocence went away from me on that late summer evening, call it my 911 to be over dramatic but it’s just that. A hysterical wife, whose husband was dying not a yard from me affected me quite a lot and I have to live with her screams. If only I could have helped and done more. If only… but life doesn’t work like that, “if” is just that, one of the many variations that could happen but didn’t happen. Do I feel any better living with her screams or seeing her husband dying on the floor, knowing two men have been caught less than thirty-six hours later for the hideous crime? My answer has to be yes and I want the bastards to burn in hell for leaving a wife a widow and her two kids fatherless. Some things should not be seen or happen at all, this was one event I got caught up in by fate. I ask fate why I was picked on that dark night to be part of this wicked awful real life drama. I don’t think I’ll never know but I accept my role in it by fate and that alone, I did my best. I’d do it again and I’d like to think anyone else would too, your duty as a good person and all that. If this is what coppers and ambulance people see in their jobs, they can keep their jobs coz I never want to do that job and experience that, even if it involves saving people and helping them. That’s enough, what goes with it entails things above what I can try to deal with. How do they deal with it? The medics were very calm that Friday night, they were trained to do a most difficult and dangerous job. I was asked on the phone is it safe to send the medics? Yes I replied, not knowing where the gunman was, still around? We could all be the next targets; I could for being there, for being a witness.

   Days later after that awful weekend that changed my life forever, totally overshadowing my own personal problems with the woman I was involved with and having no job, I felt the make up of things had changed in many ways inside me, that I hardly understand. I do know my own problems are nothing compared to the problems people have like losing their husband. I vowed myself to be a better person and not to cause undue trouble in life. Will I be able to stay true to this new vocation I set myself or is it because I’m in shock at seeing a murder? My father says the trauma will pass and the edge will go. He was a copper back in the day, real old skool. You come to Oldham and kick off, you’ll get a real fuckin’ hammerin.’ Not like today, all forms and paperwork and no tough and ruff ‘em police. How would my father deal with the men who shot dead a defenceless husband? I can’t answer that.

   I know that I’ve not been sleeping in the aftermath of the attack, at night bad images kept me awake – haunting me? Her screams piercing the still night air. The shot man moving after a few minutes, though he was out of it, his eyes closed unaware of what was happening, I hope. I’m glad I saw no blood flowing onto the floor, no bullet hole deep into his body, brains splattered on the wall or actually saw him shot by the shooter to fall down mortally wounded. How would I be after witnessing that awful little list of evil? What if that pistol was turned on to me? Terror belongs to the night stopping my sleep in the night hours, I sleep from 6am to 2pm like I did the night shift but I do no job, no I suffer the trauma of events from the night a few days ago. I’m going to write this story to say no more guns and also knives on our streets, even though this is a war. I saw a casualty of war Friday night; his family suffer the collateral damage. I see the flash backs, in no way as bad as their loss. The only people who should be allowed these powerful terrible weapons should be the military, that bit is clear to me. Is it possible to remove every weapon from our streets? What do you think?

   I know all about guns, I’ve seen the films to know which end to shoot. I know that there are different types of handguns like revolvers that take six bullets in a revolving chamber; these weapons date back to the days of the cowboys. Then there are the pistols with a magazine in the handle, a more modern design with more bullets dishing out more death. The modern guns take up to fourteen bullets in two rows of seven in their boxy magazines in the handle. Some even fire on fully automatic just like the larger machine pistols (and these can spit out over a thousand nine millimetre bullets a minute). Truly wicked inventions very well designed and with one purpose in mind, to kill and maim. Mankind certainly made an invention to please the Devil, this time with easy death and tragic traumatic after affects lasting a lifetime for witnesses and family members.

   Another shooting in a different part of my town, a few weeks before this event I witnessed, used one of the most deadly and over designed machine pistols ever invented – the Mac-10. This can fire 1,200 bullets a minute but the mag only holds thirty. I saw a picture in the paper with coloured markers indicating where the small bullets had fallen around a man. I counted many markers. The rest of the shots would have hit him, I imagine killing him instantly. Both events maybe linked with the usual suspect words thrown in, drugs, gangs, tit for tat killing. Even if both murders are linked, I say enough is enough. Yes, drugs are bad and need to be eradicated by the authorities in whatever way they can, from the poppy fields of Afghanistan or the jungles of Columbia to the streets of our towns and cities. Remove the guns and knives, break up the gangs, stop young people joining gangs which give them a sense of belonging, an alternative family, a feeling of power and respect between members and other gangs and lastly, gives them access to the weapons of war, guns and knives of ferocious power.

   I imagine the guy I saw immediately after he was shot didn’t suffer much but I can’t be sure, only the medical staff, people there before I was on scene and of course God, can be sure. With two men in the cop shop being questioned, that is a good result but the event should never have happened, just like each murder and attack should never have gone down ending lives and tearing families apart. Enough is enough in this vicious war. To me it looks like everyone has a story and knows someone who has been a victim of violence in every built up area in the country.

   I talked to my forklift truck instructor who was a marine for twenty-five years, he said put the event at the back of my mind don’t keep thinking about it. He’s right. I told my artist friend when I saw her, wearing her lovely green dress and green eyeliner, a real English lady. She was shocked when I told her and how I’m trying to move on after this awful event. I hope time sorts it out. The marine explained the need to look to the future but how such incidents can come back months in the future. It all depends on the individual. I hope I’m over it and that is that. I’d help someone again. I’m not selfish. I’d put my own safety aside and enter danger to try to help. I know my own danger and flashbacks will be the cost of such a foray by myself. What would my witch friend Juniper’s Daughter do? Let’s find out…