Sort of. I heard it, didn’t actually see it.
It was a few years ago when we were living in Seattle. Daniel and I went down to the Ave in the U-District to check out some used cd stores. It’d been awhile since I’d been down there and I wasn’t sure where the stores were located anymore. We went down to 2nd Time Around, and then I wanted to walk up the Ave a bit to see if there was anything up past the McDonald’s. We were standing on the corner of 45th and the Ave waiting for the light to change so we could cross the street, and I heard this loud bang. I’ve heard gunfire on a city street before, and that’s about what it sounded like—a really loud CRACK. I immediately started looking around to see if someone had a gun, but Daniel and some other people standing on the corner with us started saying something about a skateboard, and pointing across the street.
I looked over and could see a man was lying on the sidewalk, he was partially obscured because he was lying in a storefront doorway area. I could only see his legs. I grabbed Daniel’s arm and asked if he had his cell phone. He ran over across the street (the light still hadn’t changed), whipping it out, but a woman was already on her phone with 911 when he got over there. She was the victim’s girlfriend.
Daniel saw it happen. A man had hit this guy with his skateboard on the head—the metal truck of the skateboard. Then he and his two other skater buddies had skated off around the corner. An ambulance and a cop just happened to be driving by and people on the street waved them down. Daniel tried telling the cop that the guys who’d done it had just gone off around the corner, and he could probably still catch them, but the cop didn’t seem interested in chasing them, he just started asking questions about the incident. Daniel got disgusted and walked back over to where I was, still across the street.
I didn’t go over there because I figured I’d just be in the way, plus I didn’t want to see what kind of shape the victim was in. Daniel said there was a big pool of blood around his head on the concrete.
As we walked back to where we’d parked the car, we both felt really shaken. I kept looking around, wondering if we were safe.
The next couple days I kept an eye on the local news websites to follow the story. At first they had details wrong about what actually happened. But eventually they got it right—the skaters had been skating in the street, blocking traffic, and the guy they attacked had honked or yelled at them. They yelled back, he got out of the car to confront them, and next thing you know, he’s in a coma.
He was in a coma for a couple days. From initial reports it sounded like he was going to be ok—he actually came to in the ambulance and said a few words. But then he slipped into a coma for a couple days. Then he died.
I sent his family a card with my condolences and mentioned that I’d been there when it’d happened, although I hadn’t seen anything. His mother called me to thank me for the card. She became very emotional, crying, ranting and raving, telling me about the man who’d done it and how he’d plea bargained for a very small charge and hardly any jailtime. She wanted me to go to his sentencing and testify, but because I hadn’t actually seen it, only heard it, I didn’t think it’d do any good. She asked if Daniel would, and I told her I’d talk to him about it. But when I got off the phone he just said, “No way.”
It was one of the most difficult conversations I’ve ever had in my life. I still don’t like thinking about it. She was so raw in her grief.
What I remember most is how loud the sound of a cracking skull can be.
