happiness is hard to find. some people search their whole lives, looking for it in other people, in things, in places. some find it, and others can only ever see the footprints as it sneaks away again and leaves them desperately out of reach. but i’ve found it, and i want to share it now. i know what happy really means.

somehow today is different. today is the day. the alarm clock wakes me with my hands entwined around a pistol like always, my fingers tight against the trigger, the barrel empty.

for now.

i brush my teeth and smile at the mirror, letting the blue foamy toothpaste dribble down my chin. they never thought it’d be you, i tell myself, but they’ll see. and they’ll be sorry.

i don’t bother to brush back my tangled, curly dark hair, because maybe it’ll hide my face, and i don’t want anyone to see me smiling all day, smiling in anticipation, smiling at the death i can smell blowing in on the breeze, smiling because all debts will be paid, revenge had, and yet they’ll still owe me it all. i’m making it better.

i guess my stomach doesn’t quite understand that it needs it’s strength for the day, because i let the honey nut cheerios get soggy in my bowl. i apologize to the bumbler depicted on the box, and promise that next time i’ll be sure to eat them all so i can bee happy and bee healthy. before i remember that there won’t be a next time.

somehow the cheerios in my bowl hadn’t ever made me happy. today will, i muse, today will make me very happy. and i stuff a mouthful of the soggy cereal in past my smile.

i hide the pistol in my backpack, snugly with my crayons and markers, and pull on my sneakers. mom hands me my lunchbox, and notices my smile.

“what are you so chipper about today?” her teeth smile back at me.

“today will be a good day at school,” i answer, and she kisses me on the forehead.

i skip out to the bus stop and wave at my shadow on the pavement by the bright red stop sign. my shadow looks as excited as i am, but she doesn’t know how fun today will be yet. she stays with me and gets on the bus too; she sits in the seat beside me. she promises to go with me, and we pinkie swear that we’ll be best friends forever.

the sign at the entrance to east carver high school stands sentinel as we drive by. it is asking to be burnt down, but i am the first one to notice, i guess.

my math teacher passes out a math packet for homework and gives us the class period to work on it, but i get my crayons out. i won’t have to turn any homework in after today, so i draw my friends dead, and me standing over them. they are smiling in red crayon and so am i. we are all happy.

the boy in the desk beside me looks up from his equations and recoils at my art. i smile at him, and he just looks back down at his page. i guess he doesn’t like my picture; my idea of a happy world. that’s why he’ll be so much better when he’s dead.

he shifts uncomfortably under my gaze, so i look back at my picture and draw him there too; dead and smiling crimson.

i plan the moment over and over in my head; biology class, which is next period. say i have early dismissal, give him the fake note. go to the bathroom. light the fire. go to the next bathroom, and the janitor’s closet down the hall, and meet the friendly flames there too. then make everyone happy.

classes change, and i skip down the hall to biology. my stomach goes light and weak, and it wishes that i’d eaten the cheerios this morning. i tell it to stop grumbling and fussing as i settle into my desk and wait.

the clock’s hands wink at me twenty long minutes into class, and i am smiling bigger when i walk to the front of the classroom and hand mr. emerson the note. he takes it, nods, and continues the boring presentation. i have to keep my feet from dancing me out of the room as i leave.

i know this part is important, so i stop in the empty hall and heave a deep breath. i take confident strides to the bathroom on the other side of the building. when the bad guys come for me, they’ll start looking by the biology room, but i won’t be there.

the door of the bathroom slides shut behind me and i lock it. the first match is so pretty i just watch it dance and twirl on the stick. it bites my fingers, and i drop it with a squeal. dangerous, pretty little flame goes out on the floor. i smile at it and pick it up between sore fingertips. it’s okay, you tried.

i pull another out of the box and it smiles at me too. we’ll do great things, little match.

nobody notices the smoke that clings to me when i skip into the hall outside the janitor’s closet, but that’s because no one is there except my shadow. she follows me and asks me if i really want to do this, and i smile at her-- my mouth is so happy i can’t help it.

“yes, i do.” i stop and say out loud to her in the hall. she hangs back uncertainly. “i want to make everyone happy.”

dead isn’t happy, she whispers to me.

“yes it is, it’s the happiest of happies.”  i skip down the hall again, my backpack full of killing things swinging as i step only on the blue tiles. “the white ones are ice,” i tell her, and leap to a blue diamond. “and you’ll slip if you step on those.”

i am on a long hallway now, and i stop at the first door. I sit criss-cross applesauce on the floor outside the doorway, and raffle through my backpack. I pull out the pistol, heavy in my hands with the weight of its ammunition. I raise it and pretend to aim at my shadow, who howls a wail only i can hear, and then stop to load it.

The classroom door opens, and the boy from math class comes out. He shuts the door and turns around, freezing when he sees me. His hand still on the knob, and his eyes flicker to the gun, and then to my face, where my smile is bigger than ever.

i can smell a hint of smoke in the air--my smoke.  it’s working.

He stares at me. My shadow whispers no, no no and starts to cry behind me. Time slows down as i slip my backpack on and stand up in front of him. i pull a small metal key out of my pocket and place my finger on my lips. i raise the gun.

I don’t even hear the shot, but I hear several screams from inside the classroom, see his fingers slip off the knob, see him totter and stumble back a step, see the red start to drip from his shoulder--i aimed a little off--see him fall and hit the floor hard

he gasps and chokes on blood, and i walk to stand over him as he convulses. this time i hear the shot as the second bullet kisses him goodnight between the eyes. eyes that stare emptily at the ceiling, eyes that’re happy.

my shadow blubbers on the floor behind me, and i tell her to hush. light from windows that line the hall falls across him and illuminates the brilliant red that has seeped through his shirt and into a stain on the floor and pooled beneath his head.

i push open the classroom door and smile at everyone who screams and cowers in the corers, eyes on my pistol. i walk to the cabinet by the whiteboard, and open it up with that scoundrel of a key. the machine gun that i hid there yesterday begs itself into my hands, and i tuck the pistol into my belt quickly.

the gun stings pretty holes in the wall, red holes in the people on the floor, more holes until nothing moves. sirens begin to screech on the ceiling, and i know i have to move fast.

i step out the door again, and pause, pulling a red marker out of my pocket. i draw a red smile on the happy boy’s face, and then skip off to the next classroom.

they don’t seem to understand that i am making them happy, that i am helping them. they fight and hide and lock the doors, and i don’t get to make as many happy as i wanted.

the fire alarms intermix with the other sirens, wailing a panic-stricken tune i hum along to.

the holes in them are holes that happiness will find a way in through. i don’t know why they can’t understand this, but they will be happy all the same.

smoke is starting to hang in a murky fog along the ceilings, and so i hurry to the next classroom. I’m running out of time.

outside the door, a lady is stands. i almost don’t recognize her, but then i see that it is mrs. martinez, who was my english teacher in ninth grade. her hair is disheveled, her glasses askew. she coughs in the smoky air as i approach, but when she recognizes me, her eyes widen and she tries to speak through her hacking.

“m-m-morana?” she stammers weakly, “what--why--i don’t understand--”

i take a step forward and pat her shoulder. “it’s okay. i am here to make you happy.” i open the door to the classroom, and she, who had barricaded herself against it, slumps to the floor in shocked confusion.

i make holes in them and the holes make them happy. the hole in mrs. martinez is the last one i leave. i give her a smile in red marker too--she deserves extra.

out the windows along the hall, i see black smoke billowing into the sky from the southern end of the building. the building feels happy too.

my shadow moans along behind me, her face in her hands. why are we doing this, do you know what you’ve done, this is so wrong, please stop, please, please, please... 

“i’m making them happy. why doesn’t anyone understand?” i stand there silently, looking at the smoke through the window, not knowing what to say. all my happy feelings have blown away into the blackening sky.

her head snaps up and she wipes her eyes. they’re coming. they’re coming for you. my ears pick up the sound of distant sirens, and i smile again.

“we’re not done yet.”

no no no, wait, she begs, but i am already skipping down the hall.

but the classrooms here are all locked, to my disappointment. there’s no one else i can help before the bad men come. i slip into the media center.

i fire a couple times at the ceiling to make me feel better, but then the machine gun is out of ammunition. i thank it for it’s help and tuck it onto the shelf full of natural disaster picture books. it salutes me, and i climb the stairs to the top floor of the library.

when i check, there is only one more shot in my pistol, and i smile for the bajillionth time today. i will save this one.

shadow is muttering things about them coming, but i am not scared. i’ve waited a long time for this moment. this is my favorite part of the happiness i have given today. i just want the bad men to see me first, to see me, and know that it was my choice, that i can be happiest.

i hum ‘ring around the rosey’ and swing my legs as i sit on the railing to the balcony. “ashes, ashes--”

they don’t even bother to sneak into the media center. the bad men in their uniforms burst through the doors, and start to search the lower floor.

“--we all fall down.”

captain hook sees me, and stands still right inside the doorway. the others, seeing him there, one by one follow his eyes and find me.

i am on the railing, standing now, holding onto a pillar that branches from balcony to ceiling. i don’t point the gun at anyone, only smile as they point all of theirs at me. they want me to be happy too. smiles smiles smiles they are tumbling across my face flowing in currents through me vibrating into the atmosphere.

“i’m happy, you know,” i say, just above a whisper, “happy.”

“they are happy too,” my voice raises, and cracks with desperate need for them to know, to see, to understand, and to be happy with me.

“i made them happy!” i scream, and then a sad sort of grin creeps over me.

“i tried,” nothing more than a breath, sneaking out of my dry lips.

mr. gun says hello its nice to meet you how has your day been promises it’ll be okay i know this is scary but take my hand it’ll all be over in a minute hang on we’re almost done here we go

even from my height i can see how they tense as i lift the smirking metal friend of mine pointing at them pointing around going higher pointing at the ceiling pointing at me digging its teeth into my temple chewing whispering snarfing up everything taking stealing eating me bit by bit.

shadow whimpers quietly and bites her hand to keep silent.

one of the bad men reaches his hand out as if to implore me to wait, and something in his eyes almost scares mr. gun away, but i smile. it’s a weak one, but i pull it off all the same. my work is done here.

losing all restraints, shadow wails and clings to me and begs and cries. i ignore her.

“goodbye.” no one hears me. i don’t know that they’d care if they could. my finger tightens on the hard trigger.

shadow is gone. dead people don’t have shadows.