//Hey guys, I just had the idea last tonight to post some of the short stories I had to write back in college, since they do nothing but sit on my hard drive anyway. This was written about 3 years ago and is in no way a fanfiction. I just felt like tossing it out there for someone to enjoy other than an old college prof.\\

Scribbling hearts mindlessly in the margins of her paper, Moriah’s mind wandered far from her Anthropology 205 class. She wished she had a name to write, a boy to day dream of, even  if it were one she’d never spoken to, just, someone.  

“What has happened…” she thought. After four years of college, here she was, weeks from graduation, and single. She had always imagined she would meet her husband in college, and be planning a wedding by now. Instead, she searched hopelessly for a boy she could even be interested in. She had dreams; dreams of a happy marriage, a family to be proud of, and a career doing God’s work. At least she still had that, she had her education. She even had a few job offers, though all were out of state and she was a bit nervous about making a decision. In fact, if she didn’t make a decision soon, she may just lose the opportunity offered to her.

Uneasiness settled in the pit of her stomach as she reconciled this thought. Filled with apprehension she turned her attention back to the lecture.

“You will be expected to prepare a gospel presentation plan to share the word with the indigenousness people of Sudan. Keep in mind the language barrier and the native beliefs of the region.”

Just as Moriah raised her hand to ask about the gender biased of the country, the classroom door swung wide open, banging against the inside wall with such force that it began its return back to the closed position just as quickly.

Her heart leaped inches in her chest at the unexpected noise. As her pulse settled and she looked up to inspect the source of the startling commotion, she met eyes with a boy she had never seen before?

His dull brown hair scattered unkempt across his too pale forehead. His deep russet eyes sank back into his face with shallow bellows of sleepless nights rolling beneath them. His small pointed nose and thin lips completed his sketchy mug, that was still scarred by the reminisce of adolescent skin problems. His shoulders pushed forward away from his body as an involuntary sign of his physical insecurities. Draped across them, an olive green shirt faded by years of over usage, and accompanied by equally outdated stone-washed high-waters.

In the time that it took for Moriah to dissect his appearance, she missed what the boy had been yelling.

“I said stand up! All of you! NOW!” The boy repeated.

Immediately Moriah jumped up from her seat and looked around the room to her classmates, trying to decide from their faces whether she should feel scared, annoyed, or amused. Noticing the looks of utter terror on some of their faces, and even tears falling from others, she looks back to the boy. Realizing now what she missed upon her first examination of the stranger, she too begins to panic. In his left hand the boy held a simple, sleek black gun.

“They’re lies! All lies! Accept it now! There is no God!”

Again Moriah looked around, unsure how to react. “Was this for real?” She wondered.

“They lie!” He shouted again. “They want to control you! There is no God, denounce Him now! Or.. or…” he paused “Or die!!!!” He finally declared, with more confidence in his voice than his body showed.

But still nobody spoke. No body moved. This was a Christian school after all. Did the boy really expect…

But then someone stepped forward. It was Chase, the schools starting tail back. Moriah was shocked, her heart sunk in disappointment and fluttered in relief. She was so overwhelmed with various, contradicting emotions, she just watched, frozen, unable to think.

Chase stepped forward with his hands up “I denounce, I give in, I have too much going for me… please, just..just let me go…” He said as he walked toward the gunman. The boy lowered his weapon to allow Chase to pass. His pride in being able to so easily win a soul to his side, was all Chase needed to act. Chase leaped forward in an attempt to tackle the stranger at his knees and knock him to the side, but the gunman was quicker.

“BANG!!! Bang! Bang-Bang!”

Screams filled the air! Shrieks loud enough that someone, elsewhere, must hear them. Right? Two girls at the front of the class started towards Chase’s body.

            “STOP!” “Don’t move!” “Get away, get back! No one else move!” you could here the fear in his voice. The shock of what he had just done. The boy clearly had not expected to do this. To kill a man.

  The fear in the heart of each student emanated throughout the room. Moriah knew that her thoughts were echoed in the minds of each of the other students. “Am I next?” “Is there a way out?” “Will I die?”

The boy backed his way toward the door. Knees bent and arms outstretched swiveling side to side, aiming the gun at each of her friends as if daring them to move. Back against the wall, he slid down to the floor and sat in a pathetic heap.

“He is dead.” The boy said, as if clarifying this fact to himself.

“He is dead. And that is the end. His heart has stopped, His brain has stopped. He is dead” the killer repeats over to himself, sounding a little more cynical with each statement. “He is dead and he will go no where! No where but the ground! Because that is all that happens when you die! You just die. Because there is no God and there is no Heaven and every body dies!” he sings manically, now trying to convince himself.

“Silent!” He shouted, looking at the two girls in the front who were now sobbing as quietly as their bodies would allow. This only caused them to whimper louder.

In one, swift-quick motion, the boy lifted his gun and shot both girls.

This time though, there were no shrieks. No screams of terror or cries of protest. Everyone was too scared to move, too scared to even breathe too loud. Moriah had switched to survival mode. Her mind had shut off, no thoughts flowed, no worries, no plans. Just pure human instinct to stay alive.

The boy had pulled himself together again, though, now more manic than before. He went down the rows of desks, quietly singing to himself “Jesus loves the little Children, all the children of the world…. Red and..”

 “BANG!” He had shot a red-head girl in the middle of the third row, Kaitlynn was her name.

“Yellow!”

Another shot sounded as a bullet grazed the shoulder of a young asian man beside Moriah.

“Black and White..” He continued to sing, sounding off too more shots at a boy in a black Tshirt that read “Jesus loves this guy”

Moriah shook. Anger consumed her body. Her mind was shut off to the death and violence, and the pure despair deep within.  Her numbness surprised her though, “Maybe” she thought, “Maybe my subconscious knows that I can’t spend energy on emotions right now?”

Anger, anger was alright though. Anger would get her out of this! Jesus DOES love the children! Jesus loves us all! Why then…? But she stopped herself. She couldn’t have any doubts. Not now! Not before this!

“Jesus loves you too Duncan!!!” she shouted out, finally remembering the boy from orientation last summer.  “And Jesus will forgive you for this, He doesn’t want you too…”

But it was too late, she didn’t finish. With another loud “BANG!”  Moriah fell to the floor, grasping her collar bone.

“I’m sorry God!” She thought. “I’m sorry for not keeping you first, I’m sorry for not waiting your arrival, for constantly thinking of my own future rather than yours. I’m sorry for not sharing with others and living my life for you! Please Lord, please forgive me and await me with open arms. I need you. I need your comfort… It hurts!

Please, please be with my parents, please don’t let them suffer. Don’t let them hate you either, I don’t want them to blame you for this! And my sissy too Lord, please help my sister to find you, so we can all be together again one day. ..”

She opened her eyes one last time to see her classmates on the floor, the gun shots still ringing in her ears and blood flooding the tiles beside her. She had no idea who was still alive or if help were on it’s way….

With her last breath she whispered aloud, “And please Lord, forgive him, for he knows not what he has done…”