Chapter 104

Kelloway was away in Halifax, shopping, and Porkbutt was tied out back when the shots were fired.
The newspaper had barely hit the streets of Wolfville. Rawle had barely cleared the fog of his hangover.
Athan was colouring a picture on the cool tile floor of the kitchen while Rawle did the morning dishes in the sink by the front window, overlooking Pleasant Street.
Cra-ck-ack-ack.
Athan burst into tears at the incredible cracking noise of the gunfire. Three or four bullets smashed through the window. One shot burst through the window frame, leaving a star-shaped ragged hole in the painted wood.
Something slammed him in the eyebrow. It didn’t feel like a small piece of metal hitting him in the skull, more like someone crushing his head with a cinder block.
He collapsed, his back arching over and the top of his skull slamming into the hard blue tile of the kitchen floor.
He heard Athan take a big breath and then continue wailing at the top of his lungs.
He thought to himself: What if they take him?
The pitch darkness rose up, blocking out his vision. He blacked out, completely.
When he came to, enough time had passed that Athan had calmed himself.
There was no crying. Rawle could hear babbling somewhere in the background.
His eyes were wide open but the world around him was gray and shapeless, like he was looking up at thunderclouds. The grayness shifted across his vision in weird, broken plates.
In a slightly more lucid moment, he figured out that he was lying face down on his front, with his right cheek pressed against the floor. Hemust have spun when the bullit hit him. There was a weight of some kind on his back, up near the shoulder blades. His neck felt numb. His first thought was I’m paralyzed, but then he understood that the weight was actually Athan. He was sitting on Rawle’s upper back, like a horsey.
His face suddenly came into Rawle’s view, through the fog, upside down with his little curls of hair stretching out from his forehead by the pull of gravity.
“Daddee?” he said, his little face was just inches away from Rawle’s nose. He could smell Athan’s sweet breath like a little glass of orange juice.
“Wha-happen?” His little eyebrows were furrowed with curiosity and concern for his dad.
He leaned back after getting no response and Rawle felt a tiny little finger dab into his right ear. “Dad….? Look! Look-a-la walote. Look, walote.”
‘Walote’ was Athan’s gibberish word for ‘water.’
“Looka-all-la-walote. What color ‘sis? Red.” He asked and answered himself. Kelloway had been grilling him on his colours, for weeks.
There must have been blood on the floor. Rawle rolled his eyes upward and could vaguely see some dark pools.
Jesus. There must be blood everywhere.
“Wake-up, Daddee. Wake-up-wake-up-wake-up…” Athan fished his tiny little finger into Rawle’s ear again. “Shhhhhh,” then, getting no response, he put his finger up to his lips. “Shhhh, daddee sleepee.”