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Tom's
Page > Writing > Degrees & Inches - Chapter 2
| This is an exert from Chapter Two of Degrees
and Inches. Please note that these works must be considered only as ' in progress'. Most of it is in a raw, unedited form. It contains numerous misspellings, grammatical errors, run-ons, fragments and every other possible error. including personal judgment, opinion and stereotyping. But I've found that when the mood to write strikes me I better get my thoughts down on paper. The editing will also take place here so there will be constant changes. |
"When you think you can be a man, you just let me know!" Marsha Sipes took two steps out of the kitchen into the living room. She was, no doubt, walking to the bedroom- about to slam that Goddamned door again. He reached for the Glock on the top of the refrigerator. It was a family tradition- when you walked in the house you always placed your duty weapon on the top of the refrigerator. It was a habit picked up from watching his father come home from work. You always put the weapon up high so the 'little people' couldn’t get to it. Now John and his brother Tom both did it in their homes as did their sons. If you didn’t put the gun up there it meant you were getting ready to leave again. Once the weapon was put up there it meant you were home. It was sort of a comedy at family functions. At Thanksgiving there were so many police officers in the family you’d sometimes knock down four or five guns, if you weren’t careful. Although his body faced the refrigerator John’s head was sharply turned to the right. He didn’t need to see where the gun was. It was always in the same spot. On the left side with the muzzle pointing away. He felt the fingertips brush against the .40 automatic, then it was in his right hand. The movement of the weapon to its firing position was fast and smooth. As soon as it cleared the cabinets it was thrust out and pointed toward the hall. The muzzle snap-aligned to where his eyes were already looking. The top of the gun was first a blur. Closing his left eye for a precision shot, he focused on the rear sights, the front sight slightly blurred, seeking its target. Rage had led him inexorably here. Now it provided him with the opportunity, the means and most importantly, the need. The rage had finally distilled into hate. He hated her. Two more steps. She was making the jog around a chair in the living room- out of his vision. When she took four more steps he would shoot his wife. It had to be done very quickly. The hate, the anger- or whatever the hell he was feeling, was not going to last. There was just enough adrenaline for a single shot. If he didn’t kill her right now he wouldn’t, he couldn’t do it again. But right this second he wanted her fucking dead! "Just a second" he though, as his peripheral vision tracked her movement into his line of fire. His index finger moved from the frame to the trigger of the model 22, and depressed the trigger safety. Two more steps. "Snap." Marsha flicked on the light in the hallway. John smiled. She didn’t know she was making herself a better target. He didn’t need the night sights. She now moved out of his peripheral and into his sight picture. He gently elevated the front sight so that his shot would impact at the base of her skull. Death would be instantaneous. He thought about it later. It seemed so unreal. He didn’t want Marsha to suffer- just die. Just for her to be dead- that’s all. It wasn’t so much to ask, was it?. He’d given twenty-seven years of his life to her. He’d be out of prison by now if he shot her that first year. He took in a breath, and let it halfway out. She was twelve feet away- walking at a slight angle. He allowed for the angle and her rate of movement. The front sight steadied. John calculated he would aim at a point about one inch in front of her right ear lobe. At her fast walk the .40 caliber semi-jacketed hollow point bullet would enter her neck just behind her ear. The round would be traveling around 1,400 feet per second- fast enough to cause the bullet to expand as it struck her flesh. The bullet's lead core would distort dramatically sending out talons of metal held together by the copper jacketing. Her brain stem would simply cease to exist- and then so would she. No pain, just oblivion. She didn’t have a chance. The side of Marsha’s face was reaching the center of the site picture. John’s index finger drew the trigger back to the point of just short of the weapon firing. The sights were now dead-on. "BANG!" John noted her head was gone. But something was wrong. There should be blood on the wall or at least a hole. Even if he missed there should be a hole in the fucking wall. "Shouldn’t I have heard the damn thing fire?" He looked at the pistol in his hand in wonderment. What the hell happened? It didn’t shoot- the Goddamned gun didn’t fire! "BANG!" John jumped. It was the bedroom door being slammed. The reason her head was missing was that it was now in the bedroom- with the rest of her apparently intact body! "What the fuck?" He turned his body away from the refrigerator and thumbed the magazine release on the side of the pistol. The mag slid smoothly from the weapon into his left hand. It was fully loaded. He dropped it into the pocket of his pajamas. He changed his grip with his thumb on the backstrap. Using two fingers in front of the rear sights he pulled the slide back just a fraction of an inch looking into the ejection port for the reflection of light from the cartridge. It was there. John refitted the Glock back into his hand and pointed the weapon at the floor. Grabbing the slide with his left hand he snapped it backwards and let it go. The full cartridge ejected and fell to the floor. Again he pulled the slide back and engaged the slide lock. Inspecting the weapon he noted the magazine well was empty; there the receiver was clear. Releasing the slide he pointed the weapon down again and using the sights aimed at a tile on the kitchen floor. Using the same trigger pull he dropped the hammer onto an empty receiver. "Click." "Musta been a bad round" marveling at the odds of having been issued bad service ammunition. "I need to go buy a lottery ticket." Looking around the floor he saw the ejected cartridge next to the dishwasher. Picking it up he examined the primer- it was perfect. No indentation- not a mark on it. He just didn’t fire the damn thing. "Fuckin’ wuss!" Mechanically John reached back into his pocket for his magazine and re-inserted into the well. A pull on the slide and the Glock was reloaded. He re-ejected the mag again and fed the cartridge back into it and then inserted it back into the weapon. The .40 pistol was then placed in the same spot on the left side of the refrigerator with the muzzle pointing away. Turning off the kitchen light he weakly walked down the same hallway. John looked at the wall again- just in case he missed something. At the end of the hall he flipped off the hallway light and then turned the doorknob to the bedroom door. "I guess it’s time for round
two" he said to himself. |
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