A children’s story for adults
Kids Know How To Get Around
The Story
Ten-year-old Tommy bounced through the kitchen on a bright Saturday morning, sneakers squeaking on the tile, already halfway to the back door.
“Mom! Dad! Can I go play with Freddie? The new neighbor?”
His mother looked up from her coffee. His father lowered his newspaper.
“Sure,” his mom said. “What are you boys going to play?”
Tommy grinned. “Shoot the Burglar.”
The kitchen went quiet.
“I’m sorry — what?” his father said.
“Shoot the Burglar. Freddie made it up. He says his dad has a real gun and keeps it right by his bed so he can shoot a burglar if one ever comes in. Freddie knows exactly where it is.” Tommy was already reaching for the door handle. “It’s gonna be so cool. Freddie says it’s heavy. Like, really heavy. Not like a toy.”
Tommy’s mother set down her coffee cup very carefully, the way you set something down when your hands have started to shake.
“Tommy,” his father said. “Come sit down.”
“But Freddie’s waiting —”
“Sit. Down.”
Tommy sat. He looked at his parents’ faces and felt the fun drain slowly out of the morning.
Across the street, in the yellow house with the new swing set in the backyard, Freddie was not waiting.
Freddie was already in his parents’ bedroom.
His mom and dad had gone to the farmers market. They’d be back in an hour, maybe less. Freddie knew the rules — don’t touch — but he also knew something his parents didn’t fully understand: that when you are ten years old and you know exactly where something forbidden is kept, and you are alone in the house, and your new best friend is coming over any minute, the rules get quieter and the excitement gets louder.
He opened the nightstand drawer.
There it was. Black and heavy-looking, just like he remembered from the one time he’d accidentally seen his father put it away. It looked exactly like the ones in the video games. Exactly like the one in the movie they’d watched last weekend where the hero used it to save everyone.
Freddie picked it up.
It was heavier than he expected. Much heavier. That surprised him — he’d held it in his imagination a hundred times and it had never felt like this. This felt serious. This felt real.
He pointed it at the window, the way the hero did. Squinted one eye.
Pew, he whispered.
The doorbell rang.
Tommy.
Freddie carried the gun to the top of the stairs. He would show Tommy. Just show him — not do anything, just show him — and Tommy’s eyes would go wide and Freddie would be the coolest kid on the block, the kid with the real gun, the kid whose dad trusted him with the secret of where it was kept.
He took one step down.
Then another.
His finger, without him quite deciding to put it there, found the trigger.
He wasn’t going to pull it. He wasn’t even really thinking about pulling it. He was just holding it the way the hero held it, the way it felt right to hold it, which was with your finger right there, right in that curved little space that seemed made exactly for a ten-year-old finger.
He would just show Tommy.
He would just—
We will stop here.
Not because you don’t know what comes next.
But because you do.
You know that the gun was loaded. They almost always are. In 99% of reported deaths of children ages five to ten who were killed while playing with a firearm, the gun had been stored both loaded and unlocked. CBS News
You know where Freddie’s finger was.
You know that Tommy was on the other side of that door — a ten-year-old boy in squeaky sneakers who had eaten cereal for breakfast and had a loose tooth and had been so excited, just twenty minutes ago, that he was practically floating.
You know what his mother’s face looked like when the phone rang.
You know what the rest of that Saturday became.
Nearly two in three gun deaths of children in this age group happen while they are playing with a firearm or showing it off to others. CBS News From 2015 through 2024, at least 3,580 unintentional shootings by children took place in America, resulting in 1,382 people killed and 2,317 wounded. Everytown Research
On average, 114 children die this way every year in the United States. Ammo.com That is more than two every week. Most of them are playing. Most of them are in a home they know. Most of them are with someone they love.
None of them know it is the last Saturday of their life.
Freddie’s father was not a bad man.
He loved his son. He worked hard. He worried about his family’s safety the way any father does — especially at night, especially in a world that felt increasingly unpredictable. The gun by the bed was not negligence. In his mind, it was love. It was I will protect my family.
He just didn’t know — or couldn’t let himself know — that in a third of accidental gun deaths of young children, the gun had been stored on a nightstand or bed. CBS News
That the thing he kept to protect his family was the most dangerous thing in his house.
That his son knew exactly where it was.
That Freddie was ten years old, and curious, and brave, and loved video games, and had a new best friend named Tommy who was, at this very moment, standing on the front porch in squeaky sneakers, ringing the doorbell.
The moral doesn’t need to be stated.
But it does need to be acted on.
If you keep a firearm in your home — lock it. Unload it. Store the ammunition separately. States with secure storage laws have rates of unintentional child shootings 34 percent lower than states without them. Everytown A gun safe is not a barrier to protection. It is protection — from the threat that lives inside your own home.
And before your child goes to play at a neighbor’s house — any neighbor’s house — ask the question that feels awkward but takes ten seconds:
“Do you have a firearm in the home? How is it stored?”
Ask it the way you ask about allergies. The way you ask about the pool. Ask it because Tommy’s mother wishes, every day for the rest of her life, that she had asked it before she let him walk out the door in those squeaky sneakers on that bright Saturday morning.
Tommy and Freddie play “Shoot the Burglar” is part of a series of children’s stories for adults on gun violence prevention. To learn more about secure storage, visit BeSMARTforkids.org. For congregation-based advocacy and education, visit engageelca.org.
The Statistics
Children Killed Playing With Guns in America
The short answer is: roughly 114 children per year die in accidental shootings, and the defining circumstance — chillingly — is almost always a child who found a real gun and thought it was a toy, or simply didn’t know it was loaded.
Here are the key numbers:
The scale of unintentional shootings by children:
From 2015 through 2024, at least 3,580 unintentional shootings by children ages 17 and under took place in the U.S., resulting in 1,382 people killed and 2,317 wounded. Everytown Research That is nearly a decade of data — and those are only the incidents that made the news.
On average, nearly 360 children under the age of 18 unintentionally shoot themselves or someone else every year. Everytown
The “playing with a gun” deaths specifically:
Among the youngest children — ages 0 to 5 — around two in three gun deaths were from playing with the firearm or showing it off to others. In 99% of all reported deaths in this age group, the gun had been stored both loaded and unlocked. CBS News
The same pattern held for children ages 6 to 10 — nearly two in three deaths were also from playing with the firearm or showing it off. More than 8 in 10 deaths in this age group involved guns stored both loaded and unlocked. CBS News
In a third of accidental gun deaths of children ages 0 to 5, and more than a quarter of children ages 6 to 10, the guns had been stored on a nightstand or bed. CBS News
The toddler problem is getting worse, not better:
From 2015 to 2024, unintentional shootings by children ages five and under increased 35 percent. In 2021 alone, a record 150 children ages five and under unintentionally shot themselves or someone else — about three preschoolers and toddlers every week. Everytown Research
The CDC finding that frames it most starkly:
The CDC’s own authors wrote: “Parents’ reliance on children’s ability to distinguish between real and toy firearms and to not handle a firearm if they encountered one is insufficient to prevent unintentional firearm injury deaths of children.” CBS News
The preventability verdict:
On average, there are 114 accidental gun deaths among children and adolescents annually — and unintentional child and adolescent gun deaths have actually increased 42% from 2018 to 2024. Ammo.com
States with secure storage or child-access prevention laws had rates of unintentional child shootings 34 percent lower than states without such laws. Everytown
The haunting bottom line, Jon: these are not random tragedies. They are almost entirely predictable and preventable. A loaded, unlocked gun in a home with children is not a protection — it is a loaded trap. And nearly half of American households with children report storing firearms that way.
