Shooting

A man haunches over his tripod, aiming his camera where he thinks it would appear. He stares hard, neck collapsing, not daring to take his eyes off. Sprinter, ready for action. Along the entire length where we stood, there are several people like him, expensive camera craning over water. That seems risky.

After a swift check of the time, the man relaxes, sits back a little and licks his lips. The tension of waiting slides itself down his face. Then, deciding against the short breather, he guards over his camera once more.

A startled cry, and the onlookers jolted. “Shit. Shit! Shit shit shit shit what the…” the man muttered under his breath as he scrambled to retrieve his camera that had toppled into the water. It almost felt like this was what everyone had been waiting for.

The tripod still had a leg stuck between the railings and he hoisted it up. A few empathetic onlookers. A general sense of flabby feelings reaching out to him, fingers bent, hollow rubber. “Oh no, poor guy.”

“Shit. Hold this for me.” The man passed his bags to the person next to him, then scrabbled to check his water-lodged camera. Peoples watched on, mildly curious about what he would do.

Another startled cry. And when we looked up again, the night sky was suddenly streaked with green. There was a collective gasp of delight and a thousand sunflowers in the night cocked back to face the light again.

New exploding missiles tore through the sky so that the darkness shrieked and a thousand sparks fluttered down towards us. I worry about it landing on top of our heads, glowing and scathing flakes of snow, determined to reach the ground unobstructed. The remains of the sudden bright fireworks either fell harmlessly into the water, or it burnt on the underside of our lids like dizzying stars.

Elsewhere, the booms echoed back to us on a membrane of atmosphere. The call and response of thunder did not match up to the lightning such that there was always a lag, where sparks fell gently, soundlessly. This was a display that held all of us captive. The sparks danced angrily at us like a mad eye, bellowing some command like a foreign God’s tongue.