Jake, age 30, an EMT (Emergency Medical Technician), is struggling mightily several weeks after he responded to a shooting at the Anderson County AME (African Methodist Episcopal) Church\u2019s Wednesday night Bible study, where a White Supremacist murdered nine people and injured three before the police were able to take him down.
\nThe citizens were left reeling; they had no idea that such hatred existed in their midst, or at least they didn\u2019t allow themselves to know it. In the aftermath, what has sadly come to be the \u201cthe usual\u201d response to mass shootings took place: candlelight vigils, revelations about the gunman\u2019s motives, and declarations of a newfound awareness of the need for all in the community to come together to combat racism. Eventually, in order to move on, citizens retreated into everyday routine. It\u2019s back to business as usual. The news cycle changed. Life went on.<\/p>\n
But not for Jake.<\/p>\n
The Bible Study Massacre<\/em>, as the newspapers call it, took place three months ago, but for him, the nightmare does not end. Negotiations ended when the shooter exited the building, waving his gun and hoping for suicide-by-cop. He was shot in the abdomen but still managed to mutter racial slurs at Jake\u2019s partner, Roger. The shooter also implied that the building would explode. Thus, more time was lost to help victims, because the church was swept for bombs. Of the three victims still living when help arrived, only one survived: a sixty-five-year-old man who was shot in the spine and played dead. Members of his church hailed him as a hero, which sickened him. The first month after the shooting, Jake occupied his usual space on the third pew from the front\u2014his every-Sunday-seat since boyhood\u2014but the lightness and joy of worship had vanished, replaced with the coldness of copper. Within weeks, he resigned as a sponsor of the youth group and adjusted his work schedule so that he was unable to attend church. Bill only prayed louder, and Jake threw himself face down on the hood of his truck. Thinking that Jake was weeping, Bill gently touched his shoulder. \u201cThat\u2019s it, son; let it out.\u201d Even though Jake seemed to have lost his faith, he still had a habit of reading his Bible at bedtime. However, even if he could slow his mind enough to comprehend the words on the page, the unforgettable sight of ripped-apart, blood-soaked Bibles invaded his thoughts. Jake remembered the way one victim still sat upright, apparently poised to read aloud, but the man would have had to reassemble his head to do so. Holly hadn\u2019t slept in their bed for weeks because Jake hit her when she startled him one night by placing her hand on his shoulder. \u201cTerrified\u201d is not too strong a word to describe the way this new version of her husband made her feel; his outbursts reminded her of her violent father. That final night, she cradled the dazed cat in her arms as she packed a bag to stay with a friend.<\/p>\n In spite of Jake\u2019s determination to accept the trauma he experienced as \u201cpart of the job,\u201d cracks appeared in the wall he\u2019d erected between that Wednesday and his life going forward. The cracks coalesced at once, and he burst open at the scene of a fatal car accident. When asked later to recount what happened before he \u201cburst open,\u201d Jake could not recall.<\/p>\n In that moment, when he saw the pooling blood and the unforgettable smell of copper slammed, tsunami-like, into his face, he forgot where he was.<\/p>\n In that moment, with his right-hand index and third fingers resting on the driver\u2019s neck and his left hand holding a death grip on the door handle, he had no awareness that he was standing, knees locked, in the street, surrounded by flashing lights and the sound of sirens. Jake, age 30, an EMT (Emergency Medical Technician), is struggling mightily several weeks after he responded to a shooting at the Anderson County AME (African Methodist Episcopal) Church\u2019s Wednesday night Bible study, where a White Supremacist murdered nine people and injured three before the police were able to take him down. The citizens were left … Continue reading
\nThe son of a minister, people who have known him since boyhood revered Jake as the model of a \u201cgodly\u201d man. It was not unusual for him to lead others in prayer, and that\u2019s just what he did from the moment he arrived on-scene. He prayed ceaselessly from behind police barricades for the people inside the church, imploring God to provide a quick ending to the negotiations with the gunman so that he and his team could get in and save lives\u2014but it took what felt like hours.<\/p>\n
\nWhen Jake and other rescuers were finally allowed to go into the meeting room just off the pastor\u2019s office, he didn\u2019t even know where to start. Three victims were clinging to life, but it was hard to focus on assessing their injuries because he was surrounded by the bodies of the dead, and all that blood:<\/em> the smell\u2014like copper pennies filling his nose and mouth\u2014imprinted on his senses permanently.<\/p>\n
\nThe shooter lived, thanks to Roger\u2019s life-saving measures.
\nJake never took time off following the shooting. \u201cPart of the job,\u201d he told himself.
\nTelling oneself that trauma is no big deal is much different than making that wish a reality. For weeks after the church was attacked, Jake\u2019s emotions ping-ponged from absolute numbness to overwhelming anger. He blamed Roger for helping the gunman survive and was so repelled by his presence that he quit the Second Saturday poker game at his partner\u2019s home. Jake knew that if he had to listen even one more time<\/em> to Roger\u2019s account of the conversation he had with the gunman, he\u2019d lose his shit. Roger\u2019s morbid sense of humor, which Jake used to like about him, now got on his last nerve. Roger\u2019s attempts to make Jake laugh were met with a stony gaze, and once, he lunged for Roger and tried to choke him. Jake would have done it, too, if two firemen hadn\u2019t held him back.
\nWhile Jake\u2019s temper was an unpredictable geyser at work, his wife, Holly, lived with a stoic, silently seething version of him. Prior to that fateful Wednesday night, they communicated well. Married just nine months, they rarely fought, and when they did, the \u201cfights\u201d quickly resolved, mostly because of Jake\u2019s ability to stay calm in spite of Holly\u2019s tendency to blow up when confronted: the way she witnessed her parents\u2019 arguments as a child.
\nJake\u2019s willingness to talk out problems was one of the things Holly loved most about him, but in spite of her efforts to get him to open up about what was bothering him, he would not speak at all. In fact, he accused Holly of seeing problems that were not there: of manufacturing drama. It\u2019s not an act: <\/em>Jake\u2019s feelings were so overwhelming that when Holly pressured him to let down his guard and confide in her, he added another brick to the wall.
\nIt\u2019s possible that he does not even have the words to talk about what he experienced. Jake is bewildered: he wonders what happened to the self <\/em>he knew before the shooting. He\u2019s never been the type to get angry and stay that way. Holly\u2019s refusal to drop the subject of the shooting feels unreasonable. He digs in his heels, and rage masked as stubbornness takes over where stability once was.<\/p>\n
\nJake avoided his minister father, Bill, until the man surprised his son at the end of a shift. Bill put his hand on Jake\u2019s shoulder and narrowly avoided getting decked when Jake did a 180, led by his fist.
\nBill gasped, \u201cWho are <\/em>you, son? I barely recognize my boy anymore. Talk to me, please. We\u2019re all so worried about you. Come sit with me; we can pray together and seek God\u2019s healing hands upon your heart. He has a plan for you.\u201d
\nJake slammed his locker door and stomped to the parking lot. Bill followed him, praying aloud for his middle son, but Jake stopped abruptly and whipped around, his face contorted in rage. \u201cShut up! Stop it! I don\u2019t want to hear it!\u201d<\/p>\n
\nJake sprang up and away from his father. \u201cWhat sort of\u2026 of plan<\/em> could a mighty loving God have for me? Did He plan<\/em> for those people to die?\u201d
\nBill pulled his tiny New Testament from his back pocket and paged through it, seeking an answer. Jake stepped forward, knocked it from his dad\u2019s hands, and blasted, \u201cWhat sort of fucked-up deity allows a crazy person to enter a church and murder everybody?\u201d He crossed his arms and leaned against his truck. \u201cWhat\u2019s to keep the same sort of person from entering our\u2014I mean your<\/em>\u2014church and killing everyone?\u201d
\n\u201cIt\u2019s about faith, Ja\u2014\u201d
\n\u201cBye, Dad.\u201d Jake got into his truck and left his father gaping in a cloud of dust.<\/p>\n
\nThen there was the cat: every night, that damned cat at the end of his bed, grooming herself, producing a sound similar to the squish <\/em>his shoes made as he tracked through puddles of sticky blood. Jake curled his pillow tightly over his head, but his mind echoed squish<\/em>, sounds of dying bodies, and his own voice: \u201cWe\u2019ve got another one over here.\u201d
\nThe images streaming through his mind were merciless. He let go a gut-wrenching scream and lunged forward, grabbed the cat, and hurled her into the wall, nearly killing her.<\/p>\n
\nJake thought he could keep it together as he approached the driver\u2019s side. Although the teenager appeared deceased, the EMT knew that he had to assess the vital signs to be sure.<\/p>\n
\nIn that moment, Jake encountered a killer\u2019s carnage before him, and he was battered and repelled by the sights, sounds, and smells of the wounded, dying, and already dead.
\nThat afternoon, Jake fell to his knees in the street beside the body in the mangled car and sobbed like a broken-hearted child. His supervisor suggested that he get counseling but didn\u2019t give him a choice about taking time off. Jake didn\u2019t take seriously the nudge toward therapy until Holly told him flat-out that if he did not get help, she was divorcing him.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"