Dont Let My Classmates Deaths Be in Vain
Parkland, Fla. — I am a freshman at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla. In the days since the attack that killed 17 people here, I have continued replaying those terrifying moments in my head.
It began when a fire alarm went off just before school was supposed to end. We thought nothing of it. People in my finance class had already left, and I grabbed my backpack to evacuate. The next thing I knew I heard people running and shouting, and my teacher yelling at us to get back in the class.
I sprinted to her closet and crammed myself against shelves filled with papers and binders. The rest of the closet filled up with the other students. We thought it was an active shooter drill. It wasn’t.
My phone flooded with messages from friends and family, from other states and other countries, asking if I was O.K. The world knew what was happening even before we did. I texted my sister to make sure everything was all right with her. I checked in with my friends, and most of them were safe, or had evacuated. I texted my family and told them that I loved them.
My classmates scoured the internet, searching for news about what was happening. We found out the shooter was in the freshman building, 50 feet away from our classroom. I was busy shaking in the corner of my little bunker, trying to calm my panic, while rumors about the shooter and the victims arrived by text and Snapchat. We could hear loud noises outside. Were they gunshots? We weren’t sure.
[link:https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/18/opinion/florida-school-shooting-guns.html|
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