Our Hearts Will Burn Us Down Read Online Free Page A

his hands. Parents who did not, who shoved through the parking lot, who searched and screamed and looked toward the school, who watched a stream of faces continuing to emerge, none belonging to them. A chaos of teachers, of more and more students flooding from the doors and the library windows, of wounds and weeping and the splattering of blood, some of it ours, most of it from others stained across our clothes, an answer their parents would never find.
    We carried them with us upon our jeans, upon our sweaters and T-shirts and sneakers. We carried this answer, what remained. We gave them to police officers, to investigators, what evidence was left of them upon our clothes. As if spatters could speak. As if clothing bore a voice. We left them in the parking lot with police, and we also carried them home. On socks, on the tips of shoes. On the edges of belt buckles and earrings and upon the knees of our jeans. We wanted to wash them away, a swirling of pink down the drain,a stream we would watch until it ran clear as if the flow of water could circle us back. And we wanted to keep them, this stain. A mark that they were here, that all of us were. That what we were had been permanent, that this fraction had been whole, what we needed in those first hours after we returned home and then again in the coming days, when Caroline Black’s home incinerated, when the first of the fires began.

TERROR IN THE HALLWAYS
    Lone Gunman Kills 35 and Self at Local School, Devastates City
    THURSDAY, OCTOBER 9, 2003
    ST. LOUIS, MO—A student opened fire yesterday at Lewis and Clark High School in Midvale County, killing 28 students, three teachers, three staff members and one administrator. The student, identified as Caleb Raynor, 16, entered the school’s east doors at 9:04 a.m. on Wednesday armed with a sawed-off shotgun, a 9mm handgun, and 16 rounds of ammunition. Though Raynor’s path through the school is not yet known, police have confirmed that he first entered the principal’s office and the art room on the first floor before proceeding to the second floor.
    â€œWe heard shots down the hallway,” said Ben Bacaro, 17, a senior who was in a physics classroom on the second floor. “I looked out the class window and saw someone in black walk by and our teacher told us to get under our desks.”
    Raynor killed 35 people and wounded 22 in a rampage that lasted less than one hour. The death toll was announced this morning, though investigators are still in the process of identifying the victims and notifying their families. Police are retracing Raynor’s movements through the school, a shootout that ended in his suicide. Raynor’s body was discovered late yesterday in the school’s gymnasium.
    â€œHe walked into our classroom and there was just nothing,” said Kavita Thaman, 15, who was in a biology class on the second floor. “No anger, no laughter, just nothing. He stared at us blankly. Then he shot a boy next to me in the chest.”
    One hundred fifty law enforcement officials arrived on the scene at 9:22 a.m., along with five SWAT teams that later entered the school at approximately 10:09 a.m. after cell phone calls from inside the school reported that gunfire had stopped. FBI officials are also investigating the shooting and its cause. No motive has yet been determined though police are questioning Eric Greeley, 17, a close friend of Raynor’s who was not at school during the shooting.
    â€œSo far he’s not a suspect but we have some questions,” said Midvale County Sheriff Albert Corcoran. “Right now we’re just trying to deal with the magnitude of what has occurred.”
    The scene outside of Lewis and Clark High School was one of pandemonium when students were finally evacuated late morning. Parents waited for news of their children while students and teachers streamed from the building, some stained with blood. Law enforcement officials later corralled