A Family and a Smiling Man at Suicide Point

He stood near the edge of Suicide Point, a popular tourist spot. He leaned forward cautiously, holding the barricade tightly, studying the crags and the vast expanse below and ahead. He felt like a king viewing his dominion. Forty-five, successful, a father, a husband, it seemed to him that he had achieved nearly all. He took a few steps away from the edge and twirled on his toes trying to dance to some forgotten song. When he looked up, he recognized the man standing ten feet away from him. He tensed, reached for his daughter’s hand. He wondered why the man was smiling.


His pretty wife was looking through the telescope when he was at the edge. With a brief sideways glance, she had taken in her husband’s pleasure. On most days, she shared his content. At that moment, she tried to find some other source. Later, she would wonder whether it was a mother’s instinct which made her turn her head. She saw her husband staring at a man, tense and pulling her daughter towards and in front of him. She reached for her daughter’s other hand, pulling her kid towards her. Was that man smiling at her, she wondered.


His cute daughter was bored with the place. She wanted to get back to her new friends at the resort. While her parents looked at space, she studied the other tourists there. Like her parents, they seemed odd, she felt. In front of her, she saw a man watching her father. She smiled at him. Though odd, he looked nice when he smiled back at her. She felt her parents tugging at her hands. Over-protection, she thought.


The man smiled at the daughter. She looked like a nice kid. He waited for her father to turn and recognize him. He watched the father pull his daughter towards him as if to explain or to plead. He also noticed the pretty mother trying to pull the daughter away. Instinct of a mother or a wife, he wondered. He smiled at the thought.


The man brought out a gun from within his coat and shot the father and the husband, twice, dead and not smiling.