So when Kevin had pulled the Model 686 out of his backpack and aimed it at the TV, Elliot had yelled, “Like a fucking BOSS!”
That had been the first time Kevin had smiled all day. Maybe all week.
He focused on the TV. To pull the trigger meant that all of this was real. It meant that he had actually stolen the gun from his mother, which seemed worse in so many ways than planning on murdering the school bullies. If he torched off a round, then he had crossed a boundary. If he didn’t fire the gun, and replaced it without ever firing a shot, then it never happened.
Kevin couldn’t do that, though. He had decided that shooting Jerm and the other two assholes wasn’t worth it, but he couldn’t bring himself to simply put the gun back. He had to fire it, to make it all significant. All of it, all of the panic, all of the dread, would continue as if nothing had changed, if he couldn’t pull the trigger.
He had no idea what would happen if he fired a bullet through the TV.
He knew that he would probably put a big damn hole in the TV, of course, but he didn’t know what would happen to him inside. Would anything change? Would he still suffer silently from the bullying until he cracked? Or would he find strength and know that he could endure anything? He hoped it was the latter, but he wasn’t sure.
And he wouldn’t know until he squeezed the trigger and let the hammer fall on a primer, sparking that special contained explosion that blasted a cone-shaped hunk of lead into the cathode ray tube.
So he steadied himself, planted both feet shoulder-width apart, grasped the wooden grips with both hands, and filled the notch in the back sights with the white dot on the foresight, and slowly, ever so slowly, settled his forefinger on the smooth trigger.
“Holy fucking shit,” came a voice over one of the hills of garbage.
Kevin flinched and almost jerked the trigger. He and Elliot spun to find Jerm and the other two clambering down a pile of old cement pylons and tangled rebar. Morgan and Javier approached cautiously, like they were sneaking up on a yard where a mean dog might be home. Jerm, though, he never hesitated, never took his eyes from the gun. He ambled forward with all the confidence of a drunk climbing behind the wheel and insisting that, hell yes, he could drive.
“Don’t fucking tell me you had this at school,” he said. “You did, didn’t you?”
Kevin couldn’t move, couldn’t blink. He felt encased in ice. Jerm was on top of him before he realized what was happening. Jerm got close enough that Kevin could see how tight the Miami Heat jersey clung to Jerm’s pudgy frame. Saw how acne had destroyed the round face, decimated by fresh craters like the surface of the moon. Noticed how a fresh galaxy of ripe pimples had spread across the low forehead and the double chins.
Elliot froze as well, like a possum hoping nobody would notice was still there.
Jerm grinned. “Wow. I mean, holy fucking shit.” He whistled at the beauty of the handgun. “Your mom’s?”
“Yeah,” Kevin croaked.
“And what exactly did you have a gun at school for, huh?” He squinted in mock confusion. “For us? Shit. For us, right? Gonna teach us a lesson, huh? Damn. Didn’t think you had the balls. Guess you showed me, huh?”
Kevin swallowed helplessly. He’d forgotten all about what the revolver could do, what damage it could inflict. He might as well have been holding onto a hunk of cast iron he’d picked up in the dump.
“Good thing you didn’t shoot us, right? Woulda caused a hell of a mess.” Jerm eyeballed the TV. “Easier to shoot that, I guess. Hey, tell you what. You let me shoot that TV a couple times, then we’re outta here, leave you guys alone. We’ll let it go this time. You say no… man, we’re gonna hafta go tell Harrison.” Mr. Harrison was the vice principal. “Then your mom’ll know what you did.” Jerm crossed his arms, looked down at Kevin. “Just let me shoot the TV once. It’s the least you can do, you know? Then I’ll give it back and we all go on our way like nothing happened. Promise.”
And there it was. An opening. A way out of this awful mess. Kevin looked to Elliot for help, some kind of guidance, but Elliot kept his eyes on his shoes.
“Just one shot,” Kevin said, hoping his voice wouldn’t crack. He took the handgun in his left hand, grasping it by the barrel, then held it out to Jerm. “Just one. I gotta get it back.”
“Sure, sure. I hear ya,” Jerm said and took the handgun. He hefted it and whistled again. When he looked back at Kevin, those dull brown eyes had gone cold, as if tiny pinpricks of light were all that was allowed to reflect despite the summer sun in the cloudless sky. “I cannot believe how fucking dumb you are.”
He turned to his buddies. “I mean, holy shit. Can you believe this? How fucking stupid can you get?”
Elliot’s eyes had gotten impossibly huge and flicked back and forth from Jerm to Kevin. He looked like he wanted to crawl into a hole, pull dirt and garbage over his head, and hide for a few weeks.
The full realization of what he had just done hadn’t yet hit Kevin. At first, he merely felt the familiar shame of being mocked by Jerm, a reflex action that happened automatically, but when the scope of what had just happened finally sank in, he felt it with an almost physical blow, as if Jerm had kicked him in the solar plexus. He thought he might throw up again.
His first coherent thought was of his mother. What would he tell her?
Then he had more immediate concerns, because Jerm had gotten over his own initial shock over being handed a loaded gun and was now aiming it at Kevin’s face.
“Motherfucker.” Spit flew through the gaps in Jerm’s teeth. Then, just for emphasis in case everybody hadn’t heard him, “Motherfucker!”
He stepped closer and jammed the barrel against Kevin’s forehead. “Gonna bring a gun to school and shoot me, motherfucker? Really? I mean, fuckin’ really? I oughta blow your fucking brains out. You should’ve shot me when you had the chance. How’s it feel now, huh, being on the wrong end? Your mommy ain’t around to help you. How do you think that’ll sound to her? That you went and got your brains blown out by her own fucking gun. Fucking hilarious.”
He dropped his voice to a whisper. “Think that’s what I’m gonna do. Blow your fucking brains out and kill your little faggy friend too. Let your mommy find you all the way out here, dead in a fucking dump.” His breath smelled of hard-boiled eggs and onions.
Morgan and Javier took a page from Elliot’s playbook and froze as well. They’d been around Jerm enough to know that he was needlessly cruel and unpredictable. It was beyond just possible he might shoot Kevin. In fact, they thought there might be a damn good chance he might just snap and shoot the kid in the head. Neither of them wanted to admit it, but they were scared. Terrified down to their bones. They thought Kevin was a sniveling little shit, and had no problem fucking with him day in and day out, but this, this was something altogether different. This was something they could never take back.
Javier was the only one who could say anything. “Jerm, man. I think you made your point, you know?”
Jerm didn’t look like he’d heard. He kept moving the end of the barrel, still strangely cool in the heat and dust, in tight circles against Kevin’s forehead. “Yeah. I’d laugh my fucking ass off, waiting for that cunt to find you here, head all gone. And if they did find me, shit, I could just claim self-defense, with it being your gun and all.” His face went slack, and his eyes bored a hole somewhere above Kevin’s hairline, lost in his own fantasy world.
Kevin didn’t dare to breathe. The barrel drifted over his forehead in looping figure eights, like a nearsighted cobra deciding whether or not to strike. He wanted to squeeze his eyes shut tight, and pray that he would never hear the gunshot, but he was still frozen, and couldn’t tear his eyes away from Jerm’s slack, masklike face.