When The Leaves Begin To Change Preview

JACKSON

The first time I ever held a loaded gun I was six years old. My father, a bulky man in a tight wool shirt that showed he had muscles to spare, put it in my shaking hands on his eighth annual hunting trip, pointed to a proud elk, and with no practice or instruction, simply told me to shoot. "I can't," I cried, a young boy with a heart unscarred by the world. "I don't want him to hurt," I whimpered, my head drooping low, ashamed of myself, knowing he was ashamed of me. My father's dark eyes seemed darker in that moment, now a piercing, brooding black.

“Jack-son,” he seethed between gritted teeth, my one name suddenly sounding like two. He pushed me roughly to the side and jerked the gun from my clumsy hands, not seeing the need to handle it with care, not thinking how easily it could go off and kill his only son. I watched it swing madly through the air as he caught his footing, a real accomplishment considering the empty flask in his jacket pocket.

 “You never think,” he said, straightening his arm, extending it, turning off the safety, pulling hard on the trigger. The sound went off like a gunshot in the night, abruptly shaking me to my core. The elk lost step and began to trip over itself, the right foot flailing behind the left until he hit the ground. The blood fell freely from the bullet hole, one that had hit him right between the eyes. My father grunted, and I smelled the bourbon. “You just shoot.”