Quarry

On Thursday, July 15, Michael Binsfeld found a condom in his back pasture. It had been years since he had more than one cow, so it was more of a very large backyard, but he still thought of it as the back pasture. He also found several of those little airplane-sized bottles of booze and four cigarette butts, all near an area of matted-down grass. The implications were clear: More kids had been on his property, fucking.

Fucking in a farmer’s field, or drinking, or loafing, were activities that dated back to the first farmer’s field, and that didn’t bother him, he had done his share. What bothered him was the callousness, the classlessness, these so-called young people had toward everything. Not too far away, just down the road and over the little hill, off his property, was what he considered to be the scene of the real crime – the quarry.

At one time granite was dug there, but that was so far back Michael had never seen it. When he was a young man in the late 60s it was already primarily a swimming hole and picnic spot, and it was where he took Monica on weekends and sometimes summer afternoons. Other couples might have been there sometimes, but mostly it felt like their own spot – their world away where they didn’t’ have to think about the pressures of school or oncoming adulthood, or whether Michael would be called up into service in Viet Nam.

And he did get called up. June 14, 1970, not long after graduation, Michael reported for basic training. That September he was on a flight to Viet Nam, where he served two tours and received the Distinguished Service award. While he was overseas, Monica sent him pictures of herself, but also of familiar things from home including the Dog n Suds drive-in, her family and their house, his family and their house, the movie theatre, the church where they planned to marry, and the quarry.

When Michael came home, on his second day back he and Monica went to the quarry. A month later they were married and moved into the farm house he continued to call home. They still visited the quarry now and then for picnics, mainly looking out at the water and sitting in the shade rather than swimming. It would always be their place of peace.

Monica was last there 3 days before she died of bone cancer in 2018. In 2019 Michael developed a cough. A subsequent x-ray found a spot on his lung. A more recent scan following persistent headaches found a spot on the left side of his brain. After watching Monica’s struggle, Michael opted to not get treatment.

“I’ve spent my life fighting,” he told his doctor, then later his daughter. “I figure I can fight this shit myself as good or better than with chemo and radiation. I don’t want to spend the rest of my life bald and puking.” Both the doctor and his daughter disagreed and said he was being foolish. Michael thanked the doctor for the input and never talked to him or set foot in a doctor’s office again. His daughter said she couldn’t watch him throw his life away. Six months ago, his last words to her, spoken after her birthday were, “Then don’t watch. I’ll be fine.”

He didn’t picnic at the quarry anymore. What he saw there disgusted him. The ring of old flat quarry rocks that had long served as a fire pit was typically strewn with bottles and beer cans now. One had even been tagged with graffiti, and over the past year he had started to find spray paint cans in bags and tiny CO2 cartridges laying around. This confused him until he saw a story on “20/20” about “huffing” and “whip-its”. This revelation appalled him even more. When he was a kid the idiot kids that are around for every generation would just sniff glue. He found putting your face in a bag full of spray paint so absurd it was pathetic. He lost all hope for anyone so stupid.

He fumed over the condom in his yard for most of the day, through morning coffee, then lunch. After dinner he heard the faint sounds of voices and the thump of music coming over the ridge, and he knew what he had to do. At 9 pm, just after dark, he turned out the lights in the house, locked the front door, and set out across the field with his rifle and two pistols. One was Monica’s Baretta semi-automatic tucked into a shoulder holster under his left arm, the other was his Colt Python in a holster on his right hip. Monica laughed when he brought it home, calling him “Quickdraw McGraw.” He saw her point and decided not to wear it to the range back then, but today he wanted his hands to be free and he didn’t want to go in under-gunned.

He knew something was unusual before he even crossed the ridge. The voices from the other side were more animated, and the music was louder, plus there was an odd glow, with two plumes of smoke rather than the one he was used to seeing from the camp fire. Topping the ridge he saw what it was.

There were 7 teens at the quarry. Four were sitting in the circle of rocks around the campfire, while 3 more were in the area above, dancing around a couch they had brought in and set on fire. A pickup truck was parked between with its doors open, music pounding out from within.

The three by the couch were all males, streaked with mud or makeup on their faces and shirtless chests, whooping and hollering, clearly high out of their minds. The ones at the campfire were all girls. Some were watching them, while one girl, a blonde, sat in the middle, merely drinking from a Thermos and smoking. Michael recognized her immediately – Tamara Debionne, the youngest of the Debionne girls who lived less than a mile away. The oldest of the Debionne girls was already in jail with a baby being raised by her parents. The middle two Debionne girls were already trouble to different degrees. Tamara was the only one who ever showed any promise in life. Michael felt sad but not surprised that she was with this group at all

He came in a bit closer, staying low, though with the clouds there wasn’t much light to see him by and the kids were all busy getting high or otherwise distracted. One girl, a big girl with pink hair, had filled what looked to be an apple with something and lit it and was passing it around. Michael took a position, attached his scope to the rifle, and dropped to one knee. He sighted in on one of the idiots dancing around the burning couch. He wasn’t sure, but he though the boy’s name was Brad Taylor. It didn’t matter. As far as Michael was concerned all the kids were named Idiot. He waited for the kid to slow down, following his movement through the lens of the scope. The moment came when the kid stopped dancing and arched his back to take a long drink from a flask. Michael sighted in on his temple, waited between heartbeats, and squeezed the trigger.

Brad’s head jerked slightly as blood jetted out from a small hole in is left temple, and the bullet and a portion of his brains blew out from a much bigger hole on what had been the right side of his head. He dropped to the ground like a rag doll.

One of the girls by the campfire screamed, but the thumping music was too loud for most of them to hear that, or the rifle shot. Michael had already sighted in on one of the other boys dancing around the couch before any of the others could notice the first one, or have time to react. A bullet went through the back of the boy’s neck and out of his larynx and the boy was on the ground, choking on his own blood, clutching at his throat.

Most of the kids now knew something was up and were either gaping or starting to flee. The last kid by the couch had the instinct to run, but in his dance was left facing the worst possible direction. He broke into a run that took him into the light of the fire by the sitting rocks, not into the safety of dark. Michael followed him in the scope and aimed for his center of mass. The bullet caught the boy above his right hip and he was sent pinwheeling over the rocks, landing splayed and ugly, bleeding. One of the girls went to him just as another cleared the edge of the quarry and scrambled to her feet.

Michael stood and walked calmly toward the area. The girl who made it out was running right at him, literally running in a blind panic, not yet seeing him in front of her in the dark. Michael brought the rifle up and shot her dead center in the chest, knocking her off her feet just as her eyes widened upon seeing him. Michael didn’t check to see if she was dead. The placement of the wound and the sucking sound as he passed told him all he needed to know.

The girl who was crouching by the boy with the hip injury was wailing and stroking the boy’s head. The boy was still alive, but pale and quickly bleeding out. Michael left them and aimed at the big girl with pink hair as she scrambled up the rocks on the right. He put a bullet through the back of her knee and she slipped, then fell down, slid, and fell to the floor of the floor of the quarry, clutching at her knee and screaming.

At the center of the rocks by the fire, Tamara moved back and forth, frantically trying to decide whether to run to help her friends or save herself. Every time a shot rang out she screamed and changed direction. Reaching the edge of the quarry, Michael shouldered the rifle and drew the Colt Python from its holster on his hip. He aimed it at Tamara and waited for her to see him.

“Get the hell out of here. Go home. You’re better than this,” he said. He fired a round to the right of her head, then fired another that blew out the back of the big girl’s head. He swung his arm around and aimed at the face of the girl crouched by her boyfriend. He walked in closer and holstered the Colt while drawing the Baretta.

He had thought it was a girl, but it may have been a boy. Short hair, styled and gelled, dyed jet black with purple tips glowing in the light of the fire. Too skinny, with torn jeans and a baggy hoodie. A barbell piercing was through her nose and silver studs in the upper lip and cheek, plus a tear drop tattoo by the left eye. Real tears poured from her eyes and snot from her nose. Michael looked in those ayes and saw fear and pain. Nothing but fear and pain that had been there longer than today. He aimed the Baretta at her forehead pulled the trigger. It fired with a much quieter report than the Colt, more of a snap, and a clean hole appeared in the front of the teen’s forehead with a pop of brains out the back.

Michael looked out at the scene. The boy shot through the side was still moaning. Michael shot him in the ear with the Baretta, then walked over and put another in the boy with the neck wound. He holstered the Baretta, walked over to the truck, turned off the radio and started the walk back home.

It had been a long time since he had seen fear in someone’s eyes like that. Fear upon seeing the end. Monica looked like that briefly when she had the cancer, and every once in a while he would catch a glimpse, but mostly she was strong. The last thing he saw in her eyes was love.

He got home and leaned the rifle against the wall by the door. He took off the holster with the Baretta and put it on the kitchen table. He did the same with the Colt. He drew the Baretta and put it on the left side of his head, as close to the tumor as he could. He thought of that last look Monica had, the look for him, filled with love.

He pulled the trigger.