Entry 66. A change of mind

She just reappeared at my door, still dressed in her guerilla apparel, still with the gun slung over her shoulder. There’s a steeliness about Buffalo Springsteen, a rock-solid something that stabilizes her even in her softness moments, so I should have known the change would not come with great heaving sobs. She just came home.

“I’m done,” she said, looking in my eyes after we finished the long, warm hug of greeting. “Done killing.”

“What happened?”

“Nothing.” A pause. “I just got to thinking.”

No, there were no close encounters with enemy combatants; a sniper’s nest, it seems, is a quiet and even lonely place – a place well suited for thinking.

We were right, her hunting skills served her well picking off the enemy from a distance. She was able to cut rather deeply into the ranks of the peacekeepers. But in between kills, she had plenty of time to think.

“I started to think about the lives I’d snuffed,” Buffalo said, keeping a steady gaze on my eyes, perhaps to make sure I was still with her. “I started to imagine them living normal lives. The family back home, the friends waiting for a reunion that’s not going to happen now, the big plans they had for their lives, maybe they were married, maybe they had kids who called them in their bunk every night. I thought about how you’d feel if they got me; I thought about how I felt when I heard about the guy with the gun, the guy Johnny tackled for you, the guy who wanted to take you out.

“And I started thinking you were right, that killing them wasn’t going to end it. So I quit.”

“You walked away from the sniper’s nest?”

Now she laughed. “Not that simple, but I let them know I was done, and soon as they could spare me I left. Didn’t need to kill anyone the last few days anyway.”

I held her close. I thought about saying she had taken a big step to stop the cycle of violence, but the moment didn’t call for theories and philosophical statements. At least I didn’t think so, until she took me by both arms.

“You’re right, Ray,” she said. “That’s how you beat them – not by killing as many as you can – just stop living their vision and start living yours. And our vision is about leaving each other alone to live out our natural lives.”

No, no heaving sobs, but a single tear did find its way down her cheek.

Entry 67