The Ringing

The Ringing

I never thought I would be standing there. The police station smelled like Clorox Wipes, and I was about to be interrogated. My baby brother was asleep in my lap, and my daddy was being questioned. My stepmommy was not here...she had died in the previous month from an accidental overdose on pills. I was here because I knew how Grandma Jayne had died. I would tell them just how it happened.

A high and staged voice awakened me from my thoughts, “Sweetiepie! It’s time for you to answer just a few of our questions!,” she motioned for me to follow.

I hoisted my brother into a cradling position in my arms, and followed. We entered the room and the smell of burgers hit my nose; there were two men sitting down. They were setting up two different recording devices.

They noticed my presence and one of them said, “Hello, your father just left. What’s your name?” he said, then switched on one of the recorders.

I cleared my throat, “My name is Alura. I will be 8 years old in August.” The other man jotted my words down on a yellow notepad.

“Who is the boy?,” the man asked.

“He is my little brother, and his name is Rebel. He is two.” I answered. I sat down and rocked Rebel back to sleep.

“Do you know why you are here, honey?” he asked.

“Yes, yes I do. Grandma died, and you want to know what I know. Right?” I questioned.

“Right. So, please if you will, tell Tom and I how your Grandmother died.” he said quietly.

“Okay. So, I woke up because I heard loud voices. Then I heard crying, so I walked down the hall. Grandma was crying in the bathroom, and I heard a couple clicks. I peeked around the corner and saw my scared daddy shaking in the living room. Grandma got out of the bathroom and slammed the door. She started yelling at daddy. One loud bang...like a gun, and daddy screamed. Then I heard another one and Grandma made scary noises. After that bang I heard another one and the noise stopped. I ran back to Daddy's room. Daddy came into the room and dialed 911 and I heard him say ‘She tried to shoot me, she shot herself twice. I think she’s dead’ and from what I heard on the phone they told him to move the gun away from her, he came back and told them that he moved it. They told him that he actually shouldn’t have touched the gun and now his fingerprints were on it. Then your people came to our house. Daddy carried Rebel and I out of the house, crying, b-but G-Grandma was in blood on the floor.” I started crying.

They looked at me with uncomfortable stares, but didn’t try to comfort me. They asked me to repeat what I said. They switched on the other recorder and I repeated, this time crying hard. They tried to wake Rebel up but he started crying and saying “no” repeatedly, so they came to a conclusion that he didn’t know anything.

We stayed there a bit longer. The blonde police officer bought us McDonald’s. I don’t know what ended up happening. All I know is that Grandma died. I heard the shots. I did what I could not to cry.

Daddy got depressed, he made bad decisions. He robbed places and did drugs. So daddy went to prison and he wouldn’t be out ‘til I was 15. I went to go live with my biological mommy. I started a new life without my brother, who went to live with my Aunt.

Now here I am, 15 years old. I’m awaiting dad’s release. I need to start preparing for when he gets out of prison on April 11, 2014. More importantly, I have to get the ringing of the shots out of my head.