I just stood there wondering which one of Kevin’s goofball friends was playing a joke on us with the paintball gun. I couldn’t see Kevin, though he was lying in the shadows next to where the man was standing-or Tricia, who must have been right by my feet. The light from the front porch illuminated a ski-masked figure about eight feet away, standing next to the stairs. I stepped forward and for the first time saw inside the house. I still didn’t understand what was happening. A moment of silence, and then Tricia exclaimed, “Oh, no!” as another shot was fired. I heard a huge noise, but I didn’t immediately recognize it as a gunshot. He stepped inside, with Tricia right behind him. How strange that those would be the last photos we would ever have together.Īs we got out of the car, our younger son, Kevin, a sophomore in college, led the way to our front door. I snapped a few pictures, and then we took the short drive home. We had enjoyed a great seafood dinner, including a dessert with “Congratulations!” written with chocolate syrup on the plate’s edge. He had called that afternoon, telling Tricia that he was through with exams and was coming home for the evening. Just seconds earlier we had been a happy family of four returning from a surprise dinner celebrating our older son Bart’s anticipated college graduation. The silence coming from the dark house was horrible.
Though I had never heard that kind of cough before, I instinctively knew it was the sound of a person trying to clear lungs filling with blood. Although I couldn’t see her from where I had fallen, I knew that it was her because when I had first tried to get up, I saw her blond hair splayed out on the threshold of our home’s front door.
I called to each of them but got no response except for a few quiet, wet coughs from my wife, Tricia. I told God that if it was my time, I was ready to die, but I prayed that he would spare my wife and two sons. There had been four shots, one for each of us. Instead, I found myself praying for my family.
But that’s not what happened as I lay on the cold concrete that December night, watching the blood from a gunshot wound cover my white shirt. I had always heard that your life flashed before your eyes.
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