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New York City - Source: Reuters -
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When you hear gunfire, it never sounds like you imagine the sound should be.
The previous time I heard gunshots on my block, they made a pop-pop-pop report. Like a cap pistol. But the gun was real, and it was a sad occasion, as those shots took a teenager's life. He died near the telephone booth outside my front door. The next year, on the anniversary of that day, his relatives put flowers there. The cards were heartbreaking.
I heard gunfire again on Saturday night. This sounded much more solid. Three shots, the first of which was loud, and declarative. "I am a gunshot," it said, "beyond a shadow of a doubt"; or "Run!" It said all this in about a half a second.
From the thumping of steps above me, I guessed my neighbour had received the same message.
The time was 1.30am, and I was reading, but I raced out of bed, and hauled the window up and looked out onto the street.
Yellow cabs drifted by. A couple were embracing on the far corner by the shuttered Triple A Diner. Music from the nightclub two doors down swayed into the street. I couldn't see the nightclub from my perch, so I closed the window and went back to bed.
The nightclub used to be a bar/sushi bar. Given that this is Spanish Harlem, sushi was at best a quixotic economic model; rice and beans are the preferred staples here, not eel and tuna. The place had been a club up until when the teenager was murdered. The club lost its liquor licence, and its raison d'etre; it fell vacant for a few years, then the sushi guys came in, sushi waxed and waned, and suddenly it was a nightclub again.
Thee minutes later sirens converged outside. I put my book down. About six police cruisers, the blue and white Chevvys of the NYPD, were parked in the street.
"Why do I live here?" I asked myself. "The rent's cheap, but come on. You're too old for this." All the same, I watched.
Police officers walked about. They didn't move hastily. An ambulance showed up. Two bored, overweight EMS guys got out of the back, pulling a gurney out with them. They elevated it, and bumped it up over the footpath out of my line of sight.
The nightclub kept playing its music. People kept coming to the nightclub. Girls in high heels and short skirts walked by.
After about five minutes they wheeled the victim into view. He lay on his side on the gurney. His pants were down. He appeared to have been shot in the butt. He appeared to be biting his hand.
Gently, the EMS guys wheeled him up into the ambulance. It didn't leave. The back door remained open, with light shining out. Two girls came over accompanied by a doofus in a tracksuit top. They seemed to be debating with the EMS guys. One got in. The doofus in the tracksuit top sauntered down the road. Cops continued to walk around with no apparent aim.
"We don't have no yellow tape," said one, referring to the yellow crime scene tape that police use here. Fortunately, someone else did. They started winding it around the scene, including the telephone box where the teenager had died.
I took shots with my Blackberry camera. Because this was a night time scene, it flashed. I hoped the flash wouldn't be mistaken for muzzle flash. No one cared.
Eventually another cop climbed in the back of the ambulance. It left. Slowly. I was tired. I put the light out and went back to bed.
The papers the next day carried no mention of any shooting in Spanish Harlem. Nothing. Nothing to report.
Read more of Tim Wilson's blogs.
