I saw a man shot when I was a child. He fell like a dead body into the frozen slush, the soldiers pointed their guns at us but lowered them. They all had tiny black eyes and pale skin, like me. I didn't know the man, but he was thin and looked like a wall painter, a huge red puddle formed around him, he was young, but somehow he looked a hundred years old after they shot him, his face had a strange look of surprise on it, he seemed confused, his hat lay barely off of his head, and you could see the lightly auburn bristles of his hair. I didn't understand it, I don't understand anything, it was death, death for the first time in my life. The soldiers stood around him and lingered like tired and hungry hunters waiting on a warm meal. I heard a muffled scream and someone crying, I heard rasp voices and I couldn't understand what they were saying.
I liked the soldiers' boots and how they made black tracks in the snow, they eventually argued like angry police canines barking at each other and gnashing their teeth, then they just left. Another group marched through later, the road looked like a strip of hot tar by then, they looked like walking skeletons afraid to look at us, some of them were kids, their uniforms were way too big for them, I remember laughing at that, my mom popped my hand when I pointed at them and laughed.