'Goodbye': US 12yo pens heart-wrenching letter to mum during school lockdown

  • 18/11/2018

A US boy said goodbye to his mother and yearned for a "soft warm hug" in a chilling letter as he waited for a gunman to carry out a shooting at his school.

Ajani Daeriguenave, 12, penned the letter while on lockdown in his classroom last Friday (local time). The lockdown was enforced after his North Carolina school received an anonymous threat of violence.

"Right now I am scared to death… I need a warm soft hug," he wrote, according to CBS News.

"Mom, I hope that you're going to be OK with me gone… Goodbye."

Ajani's mother, Claudia Charles, said she was "really upset and heartbroken" when he returned home that night and read the letter out to her.

She told CBS News her son had been affected by a spate of school shootings over recent years - particularly one just 45 minutes' drive from Ajani's own school.

"It wasn't until this incident happened that it was close enough to home that I realised he was actually affected by what was going on at a neighbouring school and that he had concerns."

There have been 36 school shootings in the US so far in 2018 alone.

Newshub.