Pupil AJ Martinez, harm in Robb Elementary bloodbath, goes again to highschool
AJ left college that day with another person’s blood on his face, probably from mendacity on the ground with the lifeless and the injured. Since then, he is been unhappy, he is been offended and he is been fearful. And he is carried out numerous bodily remedy.
“I slept good,” he instructed CNN, carrying a maroon T-shirt with photos of his slain lecturers, Eva Mireles and Irma Garcia, and the 19 misplaced youngsters with the phrases, “My lecturers and classmates eternally.”
“I am nervous as a result of I am not used to this college,” AJ conceded, his smile nonetheless sturdy.
It was his choice to return to in-person education, his mother Kassandra Chavez mentioned. She walked subsequent to him on the primary day and didn’t share her son’s buoyant outlook.
“I am simply nervous,” she mentioned. “I am simply attempting to be there supporting him. That is all I can (do).”
Chavez wore an “Uvalde Sturdy” T-shirt honoring the victims and all who had been left. Lots of the workers at AJ’s new college additionally had on the maroon and white of Robb Elementary.
AJ mentioned he wasn’t positive if there can be new buddies at his new college, Flores Elementary. His smile light for only a second when he was requested in regards to the youngsters on his shirt, those who do not get to return to highschool.
In July, his mom instructed CNN the recommendation she gave him when he grew to become offended that he would by no means see his lecturers and classmates once more.
“It’s important to be sturdy,” Chavez mentioned she would inform him, “As a result of that is what they’d need you to do. Bear in mind them, carry their legacy, like they’d need you to do.”
So, carrying their pictures proudly on his chest, AJ bought prepared for varsity.
And with the thrill and trepidation of any first day, he walked into fifth grade.
CNN’s Shimon Prokupecz and Matthew J. Friedman reported this story from Uvalde, Texas, and Rachel Clarke wrote in Atlanta.
