That dull grey object

At first it was hard for me to tell where the light reflecting against the snow began and her body ended. She was wearing white and running—not the jaunt of a human being in a hurry, but a lumbering gait that quickly gave way to staggering. Her tracks looked at first like a child's experiment in movement. Large impressions in the snow gave way to smaller ones or messy ones with trail lines. There were no clean cuts from her boots. Her feet must have been heavy.

The second figure, also wearing the morning sun, trailed her into the square. He walked with intent and knowing. She might have fallen, perhaps, but in falling there was no sound. Windows are funny that way. It was like a muted television program, in fact. The worst of it occurred in those last four and a half steps of his. They cut, leaving no imperfections in the sheen below. Fumbling was unnecessary, and the woman was already there, assumedly waiting, her hands held like a cross in front of her.

One step, then another, he must have been grinning. The third step expected just one more. He made eye contact with her. At four, he brought it above his head. Granite, maybe, but it could have been anything from a cinder block to a wrench. There was an auto shop a block away. She had stopped protesting. He pushed her arms to the side, and brought it down, the impact pushing her head into the snow. And then he was upon her.

His arm lost all self-control, flailing up and down then up again. That dull grey object against her skull against the snow. And there was nothing. No sound again. Nobody to verify that there was once a woman in the square and then there wasn't. He rose to his feet, and wiped at his brow with the hand steeped in innocence. The other, at his side, held the dull grey object, a little less dull and a little less grey. Bent over then, he might have kissed the pale of her lips, or rooted through the contents of her parka; it was too bright to tell. He was saturated with light. I watched as he left unchanged, with intent and knowing.