Renewal 7 - When the Student Is Ready by Jf Perkins Page A

looked at each other like, what happened to Dad?
    Eugene laughed in a dry, raspy hack. “Ya know, there used to be a thing called southern hospitality. But, hey, if you don’t want to be hospitable, that’s ok by me. We’ll just get in our truck and head out. Try not to shoot us in the back.” The man started backing away. He gave a little two fingered wave to the men on the sides and slipped behind the well shed. I could practically feel Kirk focusing his entire will on his trigger finger. He wanted to shoot that man. He really did.
    I heard a bang on the sheet metal roof of the barn, followed by scrabbling footsteps. While I was watching Eugene, my guy had escaped from view and climbed on the barn roof. It was easy to do. Kirk and I had done it last summer, until we got tired of the adventure. The footsteps were traveling up the barn to the peak. Then, they were walking along the ridge in my direction. The boy from this morning dangled his legs over the roof, hung from his hands, and saw both of us lying on the plywood platform. I imagine he saw two little boys, and that triggered his foul grin. He took a quick swing out and landed, boots first, right between us. I remember just having time to register how bad he smelled before he kicked me in the face.
    Well, he aimed for my face. I flinched to the side and he hit my shoulder instead. I could feel myself sliding off the edge of the platform, some eighteen feet in the air, and I grabbed for something to hold. The only thing in reach was the boy’s ankles. I had them, but my hands were slipping on the waxy leather. That was the first time I ever really saw Kirk move. I was busy watching my young life flashing in little strobe-light bursts, but it’s not like they say. I wasn’t seeing my past. I was seeing right that moment in broken instants. In one of those instants, I memorized everything there was to know about those boots. In the next, Kirk was not moving as much as he was flowing like gray liquid. In the instant after that, the skinny boy was impaled back-first on those jagged boards my dad had intended as camouflage. His ankles were horizontal now, making it easier to hold on. Another flash had me back on the platform, but I’m sure I didn’t do it. The final flash was the muzzle flash from Kirk’s automatic, blowing the top of the boy’s head off.
    Old Eugene didn’t take too kindly to watching his son die in a few chaotic seconds. He also didn’t like the way his boy’s ragged remains were dangling out of the top of that barn. Eugene found his revolver in his hand and began firing wildly around Kirk and me. In a strange moment of realization, I discovered that his son made a pretty good shelter from gunfire, and I huddled close to the body. I tried to ignore the bits flying off. Kirk had forgotten the whole event. He was calmly aiming and firing, and men were yelling.
    Eugene was too clever to throw his life away. He dove into the cab of his still-running truck, chucked it into gear and launched in a roar of engine and a spray of flying snow. He actually ran over one of the men taking cover under the truck. The other guy rolled out in time, but all of them made one fatal error. They knew they had bitten off more than they could chew, and they knew their leader was taking off without them. In the heat of the moment that equaled a mental command to run after that roaring diesel lifeline. In normal circumstances, the speed and chaos might have saved them. With Kirk pulling the trigger, nothing was normal.
    I watched his face as he worked. I was still recovering from my near fall to the floor, but he was fully in the moment. The task at hand was clear to him. The rules of engagement had been crossed and he finally was free to do what he was born to do. Aim and fire, aim and fire. Eugene escaped. No one else did.
    We all took a few minutes to gather our wits as we heard the truck fade into the distance. Dad seemed to have crossed some threshold where this