Each Christmas, he rides his Harley with a motorcycle group from the church that delivers toys to poor kids across the county. Some of the elder members of the congregation knew his great-grandparents. Willeford and his family know almost everyone who attends the church. She told her father she had seen a man wearing black tactical gear at the Baptist church just down the street, about 150 yards away. The town itself is tiny, about six hundred people, a blue-collar agricultural community. Willeford’s neighborhood, in central Sutherland Springs, consists of modest ranch-style homes and trailers.
Meanwhile, Stephanie had jumped in her car to drive around the block to investigate.
He loaded a handful of rounds into the magazine. It wasn’t as accurate as some of his other rifles but good enough to hit the bowling pins he and his friends used for targets. It was light, good for mobility, and could shoot quickly. He’d put the rifle together himself, swapping out parts and upgrading here and there over the years. Without hesitation, he snatched one of his AR-15s. He rushed into a back room and opened his steel gun safe, where he stows his collection of pistols, rifles, and shotguns. It was definitely gunfire, he realized, but he couldn’t tell where it was coming from. He pulled on a pair of jeans and went to the living room, where the walls were less insulated. He did hear something, but to Willeford it sounded like someone was tapping on the window. “My name is Stephen,” he said, his voice gentle and slow. His life barely resembles the one he had before. But these days-ever since last November, when media crews from around the world descended on his tiny hometown, the latest ground zero in a mind-numbing string of mass shootings across the country-he knows all the quietest corners of his favorite restaurants. His kids used to tease him because he seems to know someone everywhere he goes, and even when he doesn’t, he makes fast friends with strangers. He is gregarious by nature, almost jolly, which is apt, because he sports a scruffy white Santa Claus beard.
At 56, he’s balding, a little stocky, and moderate in height, about five feet, seven inches. Willeford is the sort of guy who blends into most crowds.
“I just have to say, you look really familiar, and I can’t figure out how I know you. He looked to be in his late thirties and was wearing a faded U.S. When the man spotted Willeford, he lingered for a few seconds, staring. He was in a dark corner of the restaurant, out of sight of other patrons in the main dining room, but the stranger and his wife happened to pass by on their way to the restroom. It was a warm evening in August, and Willeford was eating at Baldy’s American Diner, just a few miles from his home in Sutherland Springs. Stephen Willeford had just taken a bite of chocolate cake when the stranger approached.
0 kommentar(er)
