that one time someone had a gun

My first internship was in college. I had asked for a placement at a domestic violence shelter that my college had not previously assigned students because it was in a particularly dodgy area of town. I had a reason I wanted to intern there (another story, soon) and so I got the director to sign off, begged my professor, and was off and running. I had no real idea of what I was in for, other than convinced I would change the world. Green as a frog on Sunday.

I was assigned mostly to playing with the kids and co-facilitating some groups. I don't think they felt I had skills beyond that, and I am certain they were right. I had 2 evening shifts a week, and I loved every second of it. This shelter was pretty rough - the neighborhood was terrible, a crackateria next door, and women earning a hard living on the corner. Inside the shelter women were coming straight from their abusers, and the kids were out of control, angry, and traumatized. There wasn't a lot of money to provide extras - we used government rationed food, relied on donations, and everything had that distinct smell of old mops.

One night I was in the community room holding a 3 day old baby. The mom had a few other kids so her hands were pretty full. I remember thinking I had never held something so small in my life.

All of a sudden I heard what I thought was firecrackers. I didn't think much else until one of the women screamed someone is shooting at the building and everyone in the room fell onto the floor. Remember, I was green, green, green - I'd never heard gunfire in real life before....it's almost embarrassing now to think of it but I was doing the best I knew how. What struck me later was that the rest of the women knew what gunfire sounded like, and also exactly what to do.

I laid down on the floor on top of the baby still cradled in my arms, and single file we crawled on hands and knees out of the windowed room into the windowless hallway. There were about 10 of us, plus kids. I was the only "staff" person there, and someone had to go into one of the offices to call 911. So I did, on all fours, and then came back. There was one moment I had to stand up level with the windows and thought maybe this is it...but nothing happened and it quieted down soon after. We could still hear an occasional gunshot, and we didn't know who was doing the shooting. Many of the women had escaped violent situations, and some felt certain that their man would try and kill them if they found them. One woman in particular had been shot three times by an ex-husband who'd followed her through half a dozen states. She was an artist - and her work still hangs on my wall today.

After two long hours there was a knock at the door, followed by: open up, it's the police. Just as I did there were more gunshots, and what I will forever remember as a woman's death scream. It's was one of the most horrific sounds I've ever heard. The cops quickly told me to shut the door and they'd be back when they could. Another hour passed before they came back. That's a long time in a windowless hallway. They'd caught the man with the gun, the man who was not shooting at us in particular but at the building nonetheless.

Someone died that night. I'll never know who she was, but I know I heard her spirit leave her body. The college tried to pull me out after that, but I refused, begged, threatened to drop out. I knew it was an important place for me to be, and I knew I had so much to learn.

What happened before will come next. It's a trickier story, one with less guns but a lot more bullshit.