💾 Archived View for low-key.me › gemlog › elphinstone-bridge-shooting.gmi captured on 2023-01-29 at 15:35:05. Gemini links have been rewritten to link to archived content
⬅️ Previous capture (2022-06-03)
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On the narrow sidewalk of the bridge from my hospital to my hostel, the press of bodies is usually tottering somewhere near overwhelming. It only thins out early in the day and late at night which is why I was surprised and grateful to find it quite a few steps removed from overwhelming on this afternoon. This in no matter affected the urgency that this city seemed to infect everyone with and in front of me, a mother was pushing her child to stop playing and hurry along.
The child though would have none of it and with his finger gun, he kept firing off into the air and at random passersby. Everyone however moved with the casual indifference of a city dweller who knows they might never see this face again or see it every day and yet never bother noticing it. His sheer enthusiasm though was arresting and I slowed down to let him stay ahead of me for as long as our paths didn’t diverge.
The bullets wouldn’t stop and neither would the immortal people around us until one did. He’d been just a step away from the boy when he was shot and the boy had already moved on to his next target when he realized that the man had stopped. The boy did too and so did I. The man’s eyes widened in shock and his hands clutched around his belly while his mouth widened in pain. For just a second did he hold his pose, lest people start piling up behind us. Then he flashed a smile at the boy, dropped his hands and walked on.
The boy’s face split into a wide grin, his shooting spree ended with the satisfaction of a happy victim. I smiled my way back to the hostel, happy collateral damage.
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CC0 low-key, 2022-05-05