Bullet In His Head

I've tried about six different openings for this story.
I just can't seems to find a better way to lead in,  than to cut to the chase.

I came home after sunset, it was raining out.
When I opened the door to our little beach house, my husband, Moose (a nickname) and one of his work buddies Carl (a pseudonym)  were talking.  They were sitting on the sofas around the warm living room fire.

Carl is 48 years old, single, and good looking.
He's got a business and a decent bank account despite the economy.

He recently moved to the Northwest. He is, by background, a California party animal.

I never had much of a conversation with Carl, just hellos, goodbyes and how-are-yous in my comings and going.
I'd only met him outside the house, where guys gather around the man-cave/garage and do their work on boats, engines, trailers... whatever Moose helps them with.

However, this was the first time Carl was in our home, just hanging out and talking.
The sun had set, our work was done, the fire and conversation pulled me in.
I 'd heard a story about Carl and figured I'd ask about it.

"Hey Carl," I said as I curled up by the fire.
"I'm gonna' ask you something and if you don't want to answer,  or I've crossed some kinda' line, just tell me know. "

"Go ahead, ask me anything" he said.

"Well... I was told you were shot in the head once."

"That's right," Carl said. He lifted his right arm, moved his hand to the base of his skull.
 "The bullet's still right here. Wanna feel it?"

"Sure," I said, as I moved my fingers lightly just above the hairline to the base of his skill. He put his hand on mine and guided me to the spot where the bullet lay... in the fat deposit in the between flesh and bone. It was a small, hard, round bump, floating in its own inner space.

"Wow" was all I could think of to say.

Professionally, as an Investigator, I have felt spots in skin where bullets have been.
Personally, my own dad  told me how he had been shot in the leg in the war. And I recall how, as a child... my fingers moved  across the saggy sinkhole spot on his calf with a morbid curiosity.

I'd even been shot at  once.  Fortunately, the closest the bullet got was to race by my ear. I still hear that whoosh in my head.

Carl,  however, was  a first for me. He'd been shot in the head and he was alive....miraculously...and the bullet was still in his head.  I wanted to climb inside that head... and he was kind enough to let me in,  as he unraveled his  tale for Moose and I by the firelight.

Carl  arrived home one day... 15 years ago... when he was 33 in his pickup truck.  Carl is a white guy. As soon as he pulled up to his house, two guys, also white, climbed into his truck, both squeezed into the front seat and pointed guns at his head. They told him if they didn't give him all his drugs and all his money they would kill him.

Carl said he knew what was up the minute they said this. It was case of mistaken identity.
Carl told me the same thing he told the guys in his pickup, "Hey man, you got the wrong guy. You want my next door neighbor. He's the dealer. I don't do that kind of shit"

Carl tried to explain this further, evidently the guys didn't believe him. He was hit in the head with the gun once. As he leaned to his left, he reached down to the floor of the pick-up for a tool he knew he had there.

He grabbed the tool and  smacked the guy sitting next to him in the head with it.
As the guy he hit slumped down, the guy with the gun... the guy next to the window, reached behind his friend and shot Carl in the head.

Carl said when the bullet hit, it was like a explosion... then a burning fire... like a hot iron rod being put in his head and twisted. He said all his adrenalin, testosterone, animal and survival instinct  kicked in at once as he kicked open the driver's side door, flew out of the car and ran  up the street, block after block, bleeding like a sonofabitch, full speed ahead... until he got to the fire station and banged at the door.

It was  like 2:30 in the morning.  Someone came to the door, groggy and suspicious.
"What do you want?" he was asked.
"I've been shot in the head." he said, "Open the door,"
The guy on the other side of the door said, "What'd you say?"
"I've been shot in the head," Carl said, "let me in."
The door opened and all the groggy firemen woke up to a blood-soaked Carl  who was surprisingly calm and coherent.
The astounded firemen said they never had anyone who was shot in the head walk up and knock at their door in the middle of the night.
They rushed him to Harborview, the place you go in the Northwest when you get shot in the head.

I asked how long he was in the hospital. He said just one night.
The doctors said it was more dangerous to take the bullet out, than to leave it in.
They said to take it easy for a while, then go about life and keep coming back for x-rays, cat scans, whatever, every now and then.
He was told his body would either absorb or repel the bullet.
He said he  checks it as often as doctors advise.
Right now, the bullet is wrapped tight like a pearl in an oytser he said. 

"And if your body rejects it?" I asked him.
"That'd suck, wouldn't it?" he replied with a laugh.

I  asked if they ever caught the guys.
Carl said that despite the fact he knows the two guys -- and the one who shot him -- he couldn't pick the guys out of the police line up because they changed their appearance.
After that, he decided to just drop it. He didn't want any more retribution.
So they got off.
For a while.

See, justice has a way of finding you even if you slip out from under the hangman's noose.
The streets serve up their own brand of justice and that's what happened in Carl's case.
Because one day Carl was invited by some biker buddy friends, who knew his story, to someone's house.
Inside the house, tied to a chair, was the very same guy who shot Carl in the head.
Evidently, this guy, a notorious drug dealer, had wronged the wrong people and was now getting the spit beat out of him. Big-time.
Carl was invited over because the group thought perhaps Carl would like to have at this guy as well.

I asked Carl what he did.
Carl said he looked at the guy, they locked eyes. He saw him suffering and that was enough for Carl. Carl  turned around and left the house. As far as he was concerned, surviving the gunshot was a miracle, he didn't want to strike a blow, he just wanted to step away. And so he did.

I told Carl I was totally impressed with his story.
I said I never met anyone with a bullet in his head who lived to tell about it with all his faculties in tact.
I told him he was walking miracle.
"Don't you know it?" he replied with a huge, engaging smile.

That story led to others, as the layers of the onion were peeled away and friendship was formed in the sharing of stories as it often is.

Before Carl left that night, I told him I have this  blog and asked if it would be okay to write about his story here.
He said, "Sure. Say anything you want."
For that, I am grateful. Because I think people need to know... no matter how bad it gets, it can get better.
Even after the fat lady sings... it's still not over.