“Diego,” you said. It sounded like a question, a warning, a prayer. I felt your fingers tighten around mine and I squeezed back.
“Unnnnnghhhhhhh,” Liv groaned. What did the officer expect me to do, throw her on the pavement? I carefully shifted my weight, balancing Liv between my neck and the crook of my elbow so I could show him my palms without dropping her. It meant letting go of you. I didn’t want to, but I had to.
“This is my friend!” I shouted. “She’s sick! She can’t walk!”
“SHUT UP AND PUT HER ON THE GROUND!”
“She’s having an overdose!” you screamed.
“GET ON THE GROUND!” The flashlight darted over to you, then back to me. The beam shook, and I caught a glimpse of his face in the dark. All I could tell was he was scared, young, and white. I tried to swallow, but there was nothing in my throat.
“We didn’t do anything! She needs to go to the hospital!” Your voice was even louder, full of rage, so hoarse it cracked.
“Joy,” I said as calmly as I could manage. We’d never talked about it, but I figured you knew the rules. If a cop stopped, you didn’t run, you didn’t talk back, and you didn’t ever, ever get angry. White people could do that—hell, they could shoot up a church and then ask for Burger King—but not us. We got killed at traffic stops for speeding, for having broken taillights, for knowing our rights. We were running from a drug bust. True, we hadn’t done anything, but the cops didn’t know that. To them, we were runners. We were criminals. We had no chance. It was already over.
“Everybody on the ground, NOW!” the cop shouted. I knelt down slowly and put Liv, still shaking, on the cool cement. Then I lay on my stomach and folded my hands behind my head.
“She could die!”
I turned my head, scraping my nose against the jagged sidewalk, to see your sneakers still upright. You were standing your ground like always, only this time you were looking down the barrel of a gun.
“Joy!” I hissed.
“Don’t worry about her,” the office yelled. “I told you to get DOWN!” He fumbled for his walkie-talkie and dropped his flashlight; it crashed to the ground and rolled toward my head. “Requesting backup!” he barked. Then, to you: “I’m not asking again. DOWN ON THE GROUND WITH YOUR HANDS BEHIND YOUR HEAD.”
“She’s not armed, man!” I cried. “Joy, show him your hands!”
“Shut up!” he screamed. “I wasn’t talking to you.”
I heard retching sounds. Liv had rolled over onto her side and was throwing up.
Don’t move, I thought.
“DON’T MOVE!” the cop shouted. But I knew you well enough to know they were wasted words. You took a step and crouched next to Liv, reaching for her face, and the next thing I knew the cop was on top of you, grabbing your hair as you cried out in fear, barrel rolling you into a ditch.
I bared my teeth and squeezed my eyes shut, a silent scream down into the earth. How had I ended up in this place? How had I let it happen? I hadn’t dropped you onstage, but I didn’t know then there was a worse way to fall.
“You’re hurting me!” you sobbed.
“I’m not hurting you,” the officer snapped. My limbs started to twitch.
Don’t run.
“My ankle!” you screamed.
I tensed the muscles in my upper back and lifted my head with my hands still cupping my skull, twisting enough to see the cop—who must have been six feet, two hundred pounds—sitting on your legs, pulling your wrists back as he grabbed at his belt for handcuffs. Your face was a mask of pain.
“Looks like you were running just fine to me,” he said, and then, with one wide palm, took the back of your head and shoved your face roughly into the dirt.
“GET OFF HER!”
My body moved before my brain could tell it to stop. My fingers found pavement and pushed, the muscles in my legs, conditioned by years of training to leap, sprung into action. I was on my feet, reaching for you. I didn’t touch him, I swear.
I didn’t touch him.
I heard it before I saw it.
Pop.
It felt like getting knocked down by someone sprinting, like a punch to the gut with a stick on fire.
“DIEGO!” That scream ripped through my bones. How had I gotten here? What had I done?
I saw you in flashes, a fouetté turn that wouldn’t end, my eyes focusing for a split second, grounding me in between spins: your smile, your laugh, the way you looked so mad when you got nervous. The curve of your waist in your leotard. Your silhouette on the train that night, looking out the window with the whole city stretched out behind you like some crazy constellation. The weight of you in my arms. The weight of you.
You.
You.
It’s always been you.
You know that, right?
Finale
Joy