Papa Needs a Gun
The only trigger I ever pulled was R2.
Gentle Note: This letter contains discussions of gun violence, police shootings, and the death of a former student. Please read with care.
Dear Myles,
This first time I saw a gun in flesh and blood I was in middle school.
The school bully stuck one tip inside another boy’s mouth, and made him take his shirt off in the cold and made him do pushups. He cried as he struggled to life his body out of the fresh snow. The bully laughed, and so did we. I wonder if we all had the same thoughts that afternoon — would we be next?. It’s funny how you can force the body to crack a tear in a smile when you are afraid you could die.
Growing up in Brooklyn, besides that encounter, guns were strangers. We heard them on New Year’s Eve and the Fourth of July, somewhere between the fireworks. I still remember the look we gave each other that said “yeah...that definitely wasn’t a firework.”
See, we heard them, but we rarely ever saw them. The closest most of us came to understanding what they could do was through a video game, where the only trigger we ever pulled was R2.
The closest I ever came to a gun was when a police officer rested his hand on his holster as he asked me three times in a row if I had drugs on me. I was in the park, visiting home. I couldn’t have been more than eighteen. When I told him no for the third time, I remember him looking almost disappointed. His hand never moved though.
The first time I shot a gun was at a range. A college friend took me some years ago and showed me how to load it. I struggled badly. On the PlayStation, all I had to do was press the square button to reload. At the range, it took every muscle in my hand to force bullets into a magazine.
As my hands fumbled, I couldn’t focus. The man in the booth next to us held a gun that demanded two hands, one foot planted in front of the other. Every shot he took, he had to brace himself so the force wouldn’t overtake him. And me, I could feel each one in my chest and in my ears, like someone’s fist was trying to find me but couldn’t.
I remember standing there on the verge of tears. How could someone point this at another human being? What kind of mind do you need to load bullets, empty them, and load them again?
Because Officer Jason Van Dyke fired 16 shots in Laquan McDonald back. McDonald was 17 years old. It was that day I learned a 9mm holds 15 in the mag and one in the chamber.
I wonder how many times that officer in the park would've reloaded if I turned my back like McDonald.
When I was a teacher, I ran a boys’ group. It was a space where young men could ask questions and make sense of what was happening in their minds and bodies.
L, the star of the basketball team, came too. He was a brilliant young man. I still remember the dance he did after passing his senior math project as a junior. That day he jumped higher than I’d ever seen him jump. Higher than he ever did for a dunk.
That same summer, I woke up to a text from another student.
“I’m sorry to bother you, Marc, but I don’t know if you heard. L was killed. He was shot in the head.”
I’d give anything to see him jump one more time.
Here in the South, guns are not strangers. Everyone seems to have one.
My neighbor has three cars. He told me he keeps a gun in each of them.
The man who came to mount our TV stretched to find the stud, and I caught the glimmer of steel tucked into his waistband.
We had a playdate with one of your friends from school. His dad told me he keeps a gun in every room. Then he reached over to the wall unit and pulled one out as casually as if it were a piece of china sitting on display.
Your uncle never wears a belt. He jokes that if his pants ever fall below his waist, it’s because he forgot his gun.
Here in the South, guns are not strangers. Everyone seems to have one but me.
One Friday night, while I rocked you to sleep, I heard your mother yell, "Someone's in the back." I put you down and went to find my shorts. Then the power went out. Thankfully it was the power company, but what if it hadn't been? What if it had been someone who came to take the little I have? What would I have done? Plead for my life and leave it at the mercy of someone carrying more than I was.
Do you know there are people who have nothing to lose? People who will let loose a round or two to take everything you have.
Faith is not bulletproof. Do I need a gun too?
**
I wrote this for you when you were just a few months old, but I never pressed send.
Guns are on my mind again.
Just last week I armed the alarm, and instead of setting it to Home, I accidentally set it to Away. So when your mother woke up early to get some reading done, the alarm went off. I fumbled for my phone and ran to the front door, and now I’m fumbling through the thought of what if a man met me there with one.
The Bible I read says, “Fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul.” But I’m not afraid for my soul. I’m afraid of not being here in the flesh for you.
I love you, and there’s nothing you can do about it
Love,
Daddy
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