Not quite soon enough
The story is very simple, I suppose ... I was upstairs in the Central Teaching Building ... but just not quite soon enough. He was an oriental student from the neighbouring university and had failed his driver's test. It is difficult to explain just how the windows open. They are hinged at the bottom and tilt in from the top; into the room. The effect when they are open is that of a chute. He would have had to crawl into this “chute”, God ... it is only about eight inches by sixteen ... head first.
Five Stories
It was the secretary that I noticed.
She was kneeling on the ledge...
Pressing face against the pain.
The little school bag lay upon the floor.
We locked the door...
And left.
The janitor was sweeping off the cement.
He had hosed it
But the lumps of blood-soaked brain
Stuck to the porous concrete.
He flipped the bristled broom
Upon its back and pushed
The bloodied tissue... into the grass
He placed the broom against the pillar
And left
A blonde-haired woman, wearing white,
Walked through the sweepings...
And into the world...