Cameron Adamski · @MiniCannibal
9th Dec 2014 from TwitLonger
A Tiger Hunt
When outsiders commented on Cameron, they usually complimented how focused he was in school. Rarely looking at his cell phone, seemingly oblivious to any discussion or use of electronics that might disrupt the teaching environment. He preferred to wander aimlessly around the campus at free times such as lunch, enjoying the freedom he had been denied for years.
It was a bitter irony that he wasn't the only one of his peers to forgo video games in favor of something a little more real. Tristan Rucker, the bully, was also partial to the outdoors. He and his friends took full advantage of how close his house was to the middle school and walked there almost daily. Cam saw them, and often they saw Cam, but they hadn't caused him more than passing trouble. It didn't occur to him to take a different, longer way home.
Not until the day they followed him.
The famed indifference of Tristan's stepmother had finally worn thin, and she ordered the whole pack of six eighth graders to find some other way to entertain themselves than shooting at cans and mock targets in the back yard.
The other boys had Airisoft guns, but Tristan had a pellet gun, and suggested they go bird hunting. Any of them could shoot, really. The higher-powered toys could do as much damage as the real thing to something fragile and little.
They fanned out into the thin belt of trees on the far side of the street, city kids fancying themselves tiger hunters on safari, crouching and moving slowly through imagined jungle.
Held late by practice, Cam passed in front of Tristan's house a minute or so later, text books tucked under his arm for the break. It was Friday. No more school until the New Year. He didn't have to see the hateful place again, except for the winter concert. He couldn't bring himself to be excited about it anymore. At least he would be there with his fathers, and Nate, and his brothers and sister and everyone who could make the bad people stay away.
A certain tiger hunter caught sight of the boy with hunched shoulders walking home. Innocent cruelty curled his lips into a smile, and Tristan called in a hushed voice to the others. They followed, human shapes flitting between bars of shadow cast by the trees, barrels of their toy guns flirting with the ground.
Tristan kept his aloft. It was no toy, but a gift from his father that he had been taught to take great care of. It received better treatment than even those he called friends. He made a game of lining up a shot at the little faggot's backside every so often, and when Cam stopped to cross a street, he held a hand out towards the dimmest of his group. “Give me your gun.”
“Why?”
“Just /do/ it!” already he was wrenching the cheap plastic handgun from the other boy's grasp, aiming, leaning his pride and joy against the tree when he fired.
Cam jumped. It was barely a sting, so far away and from a weaker model, and he was unfamiliar with the sensation. He'd never played war games with real guns. The closest he could come was thinking that someone had thrown a small rock at him, and he turned, already sure of who he would see.
There was a second shot as he turned, this time a bright and stinging pain to his arm. One of the others had taken up the game. That's all the hive mind of cruel boys took—every weapon was shouldered, all triggers pulled, except the boy that Tristan had disarmed.
Cam had never known true panic of this kind. A backpack would have shielded his back, but he had forgone that today as he often did. The books clutched under his arm did little. The pain didn't register as non life threatening—it was there, immediate, humiliating, and terrifying. He took off at a run, but only made it a few steps before stumbling. Every instinct screamed for him to keep going as a triumphant cry went up from his antagonists and a few came out of the trees, crossing the street. But his books lay on the ground like war casualties, pages fluttering and spine bent, something he'd been taught never to do. The teachers never ceased their reminders that text books were expensive, and Cam dreaded the thought of what would become of them if he left them on the sidewalk even more. He didn't want to have to tell Will and Hannibal that he owed the library money. Right now he wanted nothing more than to curl up in Nate's arms and never, ever move again. A few more shots ripped new pain to life as he hesitated, eyes on the books behind him, and made the choice to make a dive for them.
Angry at being left out of the game, the boy Tristan had disarmed at the beginning grabbed the pellet gun off of the tree and shouldered it, aiming awkwardly, joining in to take his own stab at the faggot.
Cam's fingers scraped against the concrete, snatching up the books, one shot burning across his temple. His eyes were teary, vision blurry, and his back was on fire. The road home seemed too long.
“What the fuck? Put that down!” Tristan was prying the gun from his friend's hands, whether because it was capable of piercing a human skull or because it was /his/, it's impossible to say. But when the struggle ended in a few second's time, there was nothing to be seen on the other side of the street. Some blood on the sidewalk, but the boy had fled, choosing to cut through back yards and hedges rather than the straight shot down the sidewalk.
He was gone.