A dessert.
All I wanted a dessert made with Biscoff cookies and to go back to the wine garden.
But the line we found for that particular booth may have saved our lives.
It sounds dramatic, I know.
But the truth is we had only walked out of the building at the State Fair long enough to find the line before I heard a few pops and people started screaming and running.
My mother looked me straight in the eye, told me to turn around and keep going.
I didn't believe what I'd heard. How could it be gunshots?
We all walked through security.
It seems I've trained myself to believe I'm overreacting because I usually am... but this time it was real.
We found a games trailer on the midway and somehow got behind it.
I was already crying. At this particular point, my mind has caught up and realized that yes, I did hear gunshots.
I had crouched down, trying to calm down when two little girls were suddenly in front of me, crying and asking why everyone was running. I immediately tried to pull myself together because the last thing I wanted to do was make it worse and upset them.
My dad had ducked around to see what was happening, so my mom and I pulled the girls closer to us.
It seems their parents had gotten separated, but only for a minute or two.
Before I realized it, their mom was sitting in front of us on the phone, and their dad was handing me their infant sister so he could go look for his own brother.
Today, my mom told me that being handed that baby was the best thing that could have happened to me. She says I was going into shock, but everything changed once I was holding that baby. She looked at me with the widest eyes, and I knew I had to calm down because babies always know. Eventually I was able to hand her back to her mom.
There are definitely moments that I don't remember.
I don't remember the girls getting under the trailer, but I remember asking the little one her name.
She was crying so hard that I couldn't understand her.
I remember she asked me my name, and I remember my mom and I holding hands with the two little girls as my mom prayed.
I don't remember the girls getting out from under the trailer.
But I remember my mom helping me up when an employee told me we could go because my legs felt like Jello. Later, I realized I had dirt all over my leggings from basically crawling on the ground so those little girls never felt alone in the chaos.
My parents and I were walking away from the midway, and it was so calm... as if nothing happened.
It wasn't until we made it around the Cotton Bowl and closer to the rodeo arena that an announcement was made. All I understood was "shelter in place" and people started running again.
We went into the arena, where the announcer told everyone there was a confirmed active shooter.
I kept trying to let work know what was happening, but the networks were definitely struggling.
It felt like forever before we were able to leave... I think it may have been about 20 or 30 minutes. I really don't know, my sense of time last night was terrible. I was in a daze, because of course, all I could think about was how any of this was possible.
How my best friend could be killed in a shooting a month after she walked out of a food court and missed a shooting... and how I walked out of a food court seconds before a shooting.
How I happened to be in the same spot where I had a panic attack on the midway years ago because the sound of the shooting games made me think someone was actually shooting.
How someone would bring a gun into a place like the State Fair and then use it in a room of crowded people, only to scare all of us, including small children.
How those poor little girls didn't deserve to go through those terrifying moments, how I hope we were able to help them, and how I hope they forget everything that happened.
I wish I could.
No one died. And I am incredibly grateful.
But the feeling of hearing gunshots, running for cover, and having to tell those sweet girls everything was fine when I didn't know that for sure... when I didn't know if I even believed it.
Just over 24 hours later, I can't stop thinking about how terrified I was. How angry I am.
So here I am, writing this because I have to get it out of my head and off my chest.
I am okay.
But that doesn't mean this is easy.
I will be thinking about this one for a while.
I never got that dessert, but thank God for that line.
It really may have saved our lives.
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