First time. Last time.

A young man was killed. Shot dead in the middle of the night. A woman watches tv. A bullet, stray, through her living room window, through her head. An abandoned baby, so sweet, and now adopted. Another man left to die in a cul de sac.
Just news stories.



I've been doing publicity on a feature film, a documentary about food. My friend who I'd been in Czech with, came to opening night. Connections are amazing; his best friend was also working on the film. And so he shows up (he, who I've had a crush on since the first night we drank under the stars in the courtyard of an impossibly picturesque little Eastern European town...it must have been the stars). He sits beside me. Be brings his friend. Who sits on my other side. Who's, whatever. Blond, a little bit obnoxious. But well enough.



The news. Another shooting. A young artist. In his prime. Not even. His prime is still on the horizon, just barely glimpsed. His future is golden. Dead, point blank in the early morning hours. Shot from behind as he ran, carefree down a city street. Blonde, a little bit obnoxious.

I stare at his face, pixilated on countless newspapers. Staring out from boxes, left on bus seats, mopping up coffee spills in the local restaurant. I'm drawn to it. Such promise. A painter about to leave for Paris. 23. I figure my attraction is because he's probably from my community. Openings, here and there. I've probably seen him.



It's breakfast on this day and I decide to treat myself. Sometimes the thing you want to do is the exact thing you should. My friend from Czech is there with others. He explains to me that the face staring out from all the papers, the new poster boy for national gun control, is his friend. His best friend. He was in the audience at the opening night of the movie.


It's only as I drive away from the restaurant that I realize that he was the blonde from the movie theatre, who sat beside me, I feel a little bit nauseous. Not well at all.

If only.
I join in the chorus murmured throughout the city.
If only.
What? What's mine? We had so little time together.
If only we had gone out for beer after the movie, everything would have shifted, maybe, just enough for that bullet to have missed by a hair. A blond hair.
If only.
His mother had hugged him just a second longer.
If only he'd choked on the sushi he'd eaten or gotten mild food poisoning and had to go home early that night.
If only he'd fallen in love with me, I'd be holding him safe in my arms in bed.
Or I'd be dead.


I didn't pay much attention to him that night. Our first and last meeting, hours from his final moments. If only I had. Who's to know. It may have been just enough.

My friend who I was in Czech with, was there that night. He's far more shattered than he lets on. And next time he sits beside me I'm going to relish him. His whole blond self. A little obnoxious. But well.