The police sirens were back, louder this time. There was banging on the door. “POLICE! OPEN UP!”
SMASH. SMASH. They were trying to bust the door open. Hurry, hurry, I thought.
I don’t remember what happened with the other guys, with D’Angelo and Gabriel and the uncle, but a few of them must have tried to make a run for it through another exit. Toby was still going out at it, punching and kicking Connor like he was in a fever dream, screaming bloody murder, until I ran up and pushed him off him, feeling warm blood in my hands. I saw Connor’s closed eyes and limp body and realized that I was screaming too.
Then the police were inside, shouting, guns at the ready, barking at all of us to get on our knees and put our hands behind our heads. Toby was shoved to the ground and handcuffed, and there was more pain as my knees hit the concrete. This wasn’t real. This wasn’t happening.
An ambulance was called. Arrests were made of those they could find. The cops took me outside, practically dragging me, and there was Alvaro, his face a tight mask of pain and rage. He said something to the cops that made them unhand me. Something about me being a minor and a bystander.
As they took away Toby, our eyes met for just a moment. I looked away. I said nothing. I felt nothing.
I was nothing.
The cops questioned me. I remember that. It was like they questioned me for hours, as I stood there shaking in the front yard outside of the Miller Auto Repair shop as the sun began to set. I kept repeating myself, repeating all that I could say: “I don’t know. I just showed up. I’m seventeen. My friend said he needed help so I came. My other friend came with me. From school. I’m in high school. I don’t know what happened here. I don’t know these guys. I don’t know.”
They must have figured out I wasn’t enough of a threat, or at least they had bigger fish to fry, because this one woman cop with nice eyes and a gentle voice and her partner offered to give me a ride to the hospital. I sat in the back of their squad car, the police scanner crackling with voices that I couldn’t make any sense of, watching the dark blur of the trees giving way to street lamps and eventually the freeway. It was dark now. It had never been more serene, more beautiful, the houses and all of the lights and cars melting into one calm, steady stream.
The waiting room was a cold, florescent plastic. I sat in a plastic chair, listened to the beeps and buzzes and crying and loud complaining of all the plastic people. I had to move away from them. I sat by the window, watching the ambulances pull into the giant garages, one by one by one.
Someone brought me some water. The woman cop. I sipped it once, then set it aside. It tasted like chemicals. She sat next to me and asked me more questions, about my parents, where I lived, what I was studying in school. I don’t know what I said. I didn’t know how to form sentences, words. After a while, she left.
A nurse approached me at one point and asked me if I was sure I didn’t want to see a doctor.
“I want to talk to Connor,” I said, my voice breaking. The sound of it startled me. It was raw, throaty and barely there.
“Your friend? He’s in the ICU,” said the nurse. “His uncle is with him. You’ll have to wait a while. I’m sorry, honey.”
They were playing Wheel of Fortune on the waiting room TV screens. I wondered if Mom was watching it now. I closed my imagined that she was here with me, holding my hand.
After a while I felt someone else sit next to me, and then felt small, gentle hands holding my tightly closed fists. They loosened and welcomed the fingers. I turned and there was Jess. Her face was puffy from crying. She kissed my cheek and leaned her head on my shoulder.
“How did you know to come here?” I asked.
“It’s…all over the news, Jack. I thought you’d be here.”
The warmth of her body felt nice. I briefly wondered if maybe I was hallucinating her, but the thoughts faded back into nothingness.
“Oh, Jack,” Jess said. She started to cry, leaving streaks of mascara across her face like tire marks on hot pavement. I wanted to tell her it would be alright, but I didn’t know what was up or down, what it might mean or not mean. I rested my head on her shoulder and found it hard to open my eyes.
The smell of freshly mowed grass, the sound of birds, a silent, dead morning. His coffin being laid to rest into the earth, years of secrets and hidden pain buried with it, everyone stone-faced and stoic except for me. I was screaming silently inside, a hollow shell of myself. A lone flower was dropped into the grave, a white rose.
Someone touched me and I gasped like I was coming up for air. I was back in the hospital, the chemical atmosphere flooding my senses. Alvaro was kneeling down to my level.
“He’s okay, Jack, just banged up.” He cleared his throat. His voice was heavy, like he was trying to lift bricks with his tongue. “He got knocked out, and it took a while for him to wake up. They’ve got him on fluids and painkillers now. Might be some fractures.” He cleared his throat again, forcefully, his tone turning solid and stoic, like steel. “I do want to know what the hell you two were doing with those drug lords in possibly the worst part of town. I want to know everything, but for now, you don’t look so good. Do you want to see a doctor?”
I shook
