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cleaning out the backyard and i found something.
a relic.
a time capsule.
vestige of young pissed off christoff.
it's a gun.
wooden gun.
something i made in my grampa's work-shed with a hammer, nails and a saw. think a buddy and i were imagining a movie, a war flick.
and since my mom was reticent to put a actual pellet gun in my hands, i had to wing it.
and i did.
but a gun.
guns.
they've played such a large role in my life.
good thing? bad thing? i dunno.
but it's me. and as time passes, thing change (i know, a real epiphany...)
wooden guns.
bb guns.
a .22.
shotty.
and Claire; the Ma Duece. my .50 caliber machine that poses with me in picture above. on the outskirts of al nasiriyah. right after the medi-vac.
sleeping with Her.
cleaning Her.
fixing Her when needed.
loading Her with armor piercing rounds; tungsten pointed, incendiary destroyers.
pulling triggers for reals now.
the steel butterfly sweaty, slowly slipping. my thumbs white. numbed.
pulling pine in the backyard as my friend ducks behind the cinder block wall.
i take cover as 7.62's pelt mud huts.
POOF! POOF! POOF!
Claire emitting FIRE.
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
'die mother fucker die!'
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
'die mother fucker die!'
and there's my friend. he's dead. and i stand over him.
'i know what you're thinking. ' did he fire six shots or only five?'
KABLOOEY!
head shot. you're dead.
we laugh and he gets up.
gramps offers us diet root-beer to go with granny's homemade bean and cheese burritos.
BAM!
he's dead.
by a .45 ACP, echoing in the high desert; round Bell Mountain, down the talus, and falling flat on asphalt.
a Ford Bronco ZOOMS in the night, the driver cants his head - a single shot fired.
still don't know why he did it.
why he pulled that trigger for reals. for keeps.
dumb kid.
They found him a few months later.
dental records.
dental records.
beside him: a bottle of grey goose, couple redbulls and, well, you know...
but i found a gun today and i think i'll put it somewhere safe.
