Billy turns back round, leans towards Ty between the two front seats. Blood’s all over the bench seat Ty’s curled up on, and Billy thinks he might hurl but swallows it back. He moves Tyron’s bloody hands from his stomach, then lifts his blood soaked hoodie real slow to see the damage. Tyron gasps, opens his eyes halfway, like he’s toasted, and moans.

“Sorry. Gotta check it out, Ty.” Billy’s never seen a bullet wound before, except in video games and movies. Looks pretty much like that— a sea of bright red surrounding a dark hole oozing thick red juice.

“It’s fuckin freezin.” Tyron mumbles then sorta laughs. “It’s true, just like on TV, when someone is dyin, ya get cold…” He drifts, thinking on what he’s just said.

“Ya ain’t dyin,” Billy deems, but compulsively shivers because he don’t believe it.

Ty seems like a little kid, curled up and holding his guts in like he is. Blood’s dripping off the bench onto the floor now. And it’s all over the back of the bench too. Billy was sure he’d only heard one shot. He pulls Ty’s hoodie up along his side carefully to check out his back. Tyron sucks in hard, like he’s hitting a bong, then groans loud.

“Sorry. Gotta see your back, hom. Lean towards me.”

Tyron does, but he practically screams as he rolls towards Billy.

Billy spots a hole oozing blood in Ty’s lower back, just inches from his spine, and he’s suddenly sure the grace of God is watching out for them. “The bullet went straight through, blud! You golden, Ty. Gotta guardian angel lookin out for ya, man. Now all we gotta do is get you stitched up and you’ll be smack, hom.” And Billy’s convinced it is now God’s will that Ty won’t die.

“I’m fadin, man. I think I’m dyin, Billy.” Tyron is crying again, his tears making long dark streaks across his face. He looks like a scared little kid after getting called out.

Billy takes off his hoodie and folds it up. “Press this gainst ya, man, and hold it there,” and he pushes his hoodie into Tyron’s bloody hands and presses them against his friend’s stomach. Tyron moans, and curls tighter, but keeps hold of Billy’s hoodie.

“Keep pressure on it! Slow the bleedin, man.” Billy turns back forward, shivers in his thin black t-shirt as he pops the glove box hoping to find some herb to calm their nerves. No Js, or even loose bud, but nestled among crumpled receipts and manuals is a small gray P99. His brother has crossed the line from dealer to thug, and a stupid one at that. If Chris gets tagged with a 9mm-semi, he’ll blow his parole and be facing hard time.

“If I die… ya gotta make some shit up to my mama… how I saved somebody… or some bullshit that’d make her proud,” Tyron says between deep quivering breaths. “Ya hear me, blud?”

“Bullet went straight through, hom. You ain’t gonna die, Ty! Just gotta get yo sorry ass sown back up.” Billy’s fingers are sticky with blood. He looks around, taxing his brain for a way to get help without getting them both snagged.

The hospital lot is packed with cars, but Billy don’t see no one. Then a cracka— no, darker, maybe a raghead—comes strutting through the glass doors at the back of the hospital and crosses the lot towards their Charger parked curbside. His doctor coat flares with the wind. He looks tall, at least as tall as Billy. And he’s thin, dressed in all black under his white coat. He moves smooth, almost like he’s gliding. Getting closer Billy can see the doc is a slumdog. Dark, wavy hair that’s all there. And this dude is pumped, especially at his age. Billy’s sure he’s too young to be talking to himself, then he notices the blue light blinking in the dude’s ear from his wireless earbud.

Fifty feet away, now forty, the doc is coming towards the last row of cars parked in the lot. Billy can tell he’s headed for the black Ferrari just the other side of the four foot high, ivy-covered fence separating the lot from the sidewalk, and their Charger parked on the street. He crouches low, hoping he’s invisible beyond the fence, in the dark, and to pedigree like a doctor.

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“—don’t care what the market price is, Marty.” Doc’s voice is deep, and as smooth as his groove, and gets louder the closer he gets. “The gold has been among my assets for generations. It’s only a trifle of my holdings, and I don’t need the capital.” He switches a small, bulging black bag from one hand to the other, then reaches in his pants pocket. Doc’s probably got all Ty needs in that black bag of his.

It’d take that sand monkey like ten fucking minutes to sew up Ty’s two small holes, then Billy’d let him go, even drop him back to his car for the owe. No reports. No one gets snagged. No one dies. All good. Like none of this ever happened. Billy looks back at Tyron. He’s out, eyes closed but surrounded by dark like hollow black holes. Makes Billy shiver, like a ghost passing through him.

Ferrari alarm chirps. “I get it,” the dude says. “I do. But I’ll ride it out, Marty. Don’t worry. I have the time.”

Now or never. Billy pops the glove, grabs the gun, gets out of the Dodge and shuts the door quietly. He’ll jack the slumdog before he makes the gate.

And the sand monkey opens the Ferrari’s door and gets in.

Nowhere to pocket the gun, and his jeans hanging too loose to hold it in his waistband. Billy grips the gun tightly as he moves around the back of the Charger, then onto the curb and across the sidewalk in a few quick steps. His heart hammers in his chest and ears. He tries pretending he’s a shooter in Halo but it ain’t really working to pull him from the reality slam. MOVE! MOVE! MOVE! is yelling in his head. He’s waiting to hear the Ferrari ignite, and rushing to get in front of it before it leaves the lot. But that fine machine just sits there, silent.

Slide jumping the fence—way easier than the hurdles in track. He lands silent as a puma behind the Ferrari, then moves to the driver’s door, yanks it open and points the gun at the doc he saw get behind the wheel a minute ago.

“Freeze mothefucka—” Billy growls into the milky void inside the Ferrari.

Glowing smoke swirls in greenish mist, then suddenly gathers like a coiling snake and rushes towards him. And as it surfaces Billy sees a face, the face of the Indian doctor, and then the doc’s sitting behind the wheel of his Ferrari, the blue light from his cell earpiece mixing with his door light making him look blue/green, almost like water.

The doctor looks at him casually, and laughs, bringing Billy back from one fucked up flashback. “Get out!” he grips the gun with both hands now and points it at the doc’s head. “Get your black bag and get out.”

“Bizarre as it seems, I believe I’m being car-jacked, Marty.” He talks to his earpiece but stares up at Billy, beyond the gun two feet from his face, looking right into Billy’s eyes. “No. No,” he chuckles. “I’m fine. It’s just a kid, no more than a teen.”

“Lose it or I blow it off.” Billy points the gun at the slumdog’s ear.

“Marty, I’ll have to get back to you.” He smiles, indulgent like as he takes the wireless from his ear, closes it in his weirdly long fingers then like a magician opens his hand at Billy and the earpiece is gone.

Billy almost shoots the prick, except the safety is still on. “Get out! Get the fuck out of the car.” Prickling rush when the doc just sits there, like Billy’s some sorta joke or something. He pushes the safety forward so the gun can fire. “I said get your black bag and get out. Don’t make me pop ya.”

Doc grabs his black bag sitting on the passenger seat and gets out. Billy keeps the gun on him as he backs up, suddenly filled with a massive dose of chill since there’s no way in hell Billy could’ve forced this jacked dude out of his car.

“I’ve had many strange experiences in all my years, to be sure. But I don’t believe I have ever been carjacked. Isn’t that remarkable?” Doc stands by his open door, towering over the low Ferrari, eye-to-eye with Billy, not three feet between them. “If it’s my car you desire, I’m afraid it only responds to my commands. I’ve had it customized to my—”

“I don’t want yo flash treads. Ya think I’m a moron? It’s a goddamn billboard screamin, Look at me!” Billy shoves the doc forward. “I need some doctorin. Move!”

“Where are we going?” the sand monkey asks, like he’s excited or something being shoved along by Billy.

“Black Dodge on the street.” Billy resets the safety, holds the gun at his side but keeps his finger on the trigger, and his thumb on the safety. They come round the fence at the lot’s entrance and onto the sidewalk. He shoves the gun harder in between the doc’s shoulder blades pushing him towards the Charger, which looks empty parked at the curb.

“Get in. Do it now!” Billy commands as he opens the passenger door, glancing at Ty, curled like a suckling baby on the bloody back seat, dead maybe. And with this thought comes a choking, suffocating weight, as if Billy’s being buried alive.