A state of disobedience

Galilee Episcopal Church, Virginia Beach, Virginia

Alvin had noticed one of the counter-snipers, the one on the roof of the Cavalier Hilltop. As he said later, he was uneducated, but not exactly stupid. Where there's one, there's liable to be more than one.

He promptly removed himself from view, trying to look as innocent as possible as he did so. From a window lower in the steeple, blending into the shadows at the far side, he kept a watch of the podium where he believed the President was going to stand during the press conference.

Alvin knew little of the personal security measures taken by the Secret Service where the life of a President of the United States was concerned. And he was a hunter. A center of mass shot was natural to his experience, though he had taken head shots when everything was perfectly suited to them. Yet the more he looked at that podium, the more he tried to picture the not very tall woman who was going to stand behind it, the more he realized that a center of mass shot just might not be possible.

Damn, damn, damn. I'm a good shot, Daddy always said so. But a head shot? At this range? I dunno. And, then too, I don't know if'n I can go through with it: looking a human bein' in the face while I shoot her. I dunno.

Alvin shook his head, uncertain. Then he reached into his back pocket and pulled out his wallet. There was a little money in it, but, he thought, Ain't gonna have no use for money where I'm goin'.

He pulled out an old picture of his wife. Even at the best of times, she had been no more than slightly pretty. Yet Alvin had loved her with all his heart. To him, she had always been beautiful, inside and out.

He gazed at the picture, longingly, for some appreciable time. His mind went back to a time he had been happy, to a time when he'd had a decent job, a normal family, a wife. He didn't so much think about as feel the indignation of being subjected to the whims of a doctrinaire and arrogant social worker, of being forced onto charity, of being threatened with the loss of his children.

Alvin closed his eyes, shutting off the image of his wife as she had been when he had first seen her and replacing it with the shrunken, pale, husk of a woman in a cheap hospital bed, with needles and tubes stuck into her as she had been when he had last seen her.

Finally, he was sure. Nope, these people, and especially that damned president, have got to take responsibility for what they done. They had all the power; they're responsible for what happened to me and my woman. I can do this.

Satisfied, he turned his eyes back to the podium.

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