Indignation

It is a Saturday afternoon in September, and something’s gone wrong somewhere.

A police car stops at the beginning of the little peninsula. Two policemen get out and quickly walk up to the apartment complex at the end. They pass the inner garden. Seconds later an ambulance follows and two men carrying a stretcher hurry along the same path and enter the building as well. When a second police car stops next to his colleagues’, the first children have appeared. What has happened? They press their faces against the bars not to miss anything. A door opens. ‘Esmee, please come inside.’ ‘Mom, mom, can I go play out in front of the house? Please, there’s an ambulance!’

Within a few minutes the children stand around the big yellow car. More and more neighbours come outside as well. They walk up to each other, their faces one big question. No one knows what has happened. They all look at the building, there at the end of the inner garden.

Two police cars, indeed.

It does seem to take a long time.

It is 5 o’clock and the shops in the little old town are closing their doors. The people want to go home, but the last police car is somewhat hurriedly parked, and is now blocking the public road. Because of this, a bus is unable to make the turn around the narrow old bridge. And so the traffic comes to a stand still at the beginning of the peninsula. Impatient car drivers start to honk, and after a few more polite minutes of waiting, someone gets out of his car and walks up the path towards the group of neighbours. They watch him as he hurries up to them, visibly agitated.

‘Where is the police,’ the man asks, ‘their car is blocking all the traffic.’ The neighbours point to the complex. There, at number 33, that’s where the police went inside. The man goes inside and comes out after just a few minutes. He nervously starts waving his arms to the cars in the distance. Big gestures. Yes: he has located the police officers. No: they are not coming just yet. Everyone has to wait some more.

One neighbour pulls out a bottle of wine and some glasses. It is Saturday, after all. And a fine warm afternoon. Wine sparkles in the golden light of the late summer sun. This is all very exciting, don’t you think. Good to see each other again, too. With the cancellation of the planned street party, due to the unfortunate quarrel between neighbour A and B, who knows when they’ve would have had the chance for a get-together. Then a sharp ping. A text message from one neighbour’s daughter: she heard there has been an armed robbery on the peninsula, and someone got injured. Are he and mom okay?

No one says a word.

Nearby, waving at a lazy wasp, buzzing around his head, the nervous man is still waiting. His eyes are constantly going back and forth. From the front door of the complex to the traffic in the distance. Back and forth.

‘They’re four of them in there,’ he grumbles aloud.

‘You’d think one of them would have the decency to come out and put that car away.’