The sound is the loudest thing I’ve ever heard in my life.
The gunshot comes from inside the jacket. The guy’s hand is still in his pocket when the gun goes off. A concealed gun in a side pocket that his drunk, panicked hand went reaching for and found.
The cop’s body slams backward straight into mine. His heavy weight crashes into me and drives me flat against the floor. The back of his head hits my shoulder. His weight pins me and I can’t breathe.
I can’t move and there’s wet heat spreading across my stomach, soaking through my shirt, soaking through my jeans. Blood. His blood is pouring onto me and I’m pinned beneathhim on the dirty floor. His body is shuddering against mine with every breath he tries to take.
The giant moves so fast I barely see it. One step, one swing, and his fist connects with the younger guy’s jaw. The man’s head snaps sideways and he crumples to the floor. Out cold.
The giant drops to one knee, shoves the guy’s jacket open, and pulls the gun out of his pocket. The gun looks like a toy except for the smell of it, burnt metal and gunpowder, sharp enough to cut through everything else. He slides it hard across the floor, away from all of us. Then he turns, sees the cop on top of me and the blood.
The sound that comes out of him is a scream. Raw and broken, so loud it bounces off the walls and fills the space.
“MICKEY!”
He’s on the floor in a second, pulling the cop off of me, turning him over, and I see the wound for the first time. A dark, wet hole just above his hip, blood pulsing out of it in a rhythm that matches a heartbeat. His hands are on it immediately, pressing, and he’s saying the cop’s name,Mickey, over and over in a voice I will hear in my sleep for the rest of my life.
I’m lying in shock on the floor covered in his blood. My white jeans and torn shirt are soaked through. My hands and my stomach, all of it red. All of it his. And the blood keeps pouring.
The bartender, Sheila, is in the doorway. She drops to her knees beside the cop and her hands replace the giant’s on the wound.
“Stay with me, baby,” she says. “You stay with me, Mickey. Don’t you dare go out on us. You hear me? Stay with me. Mickey!”
Her voice cracks on “dare” and the giant flinches. He has his phone out, calling 911. His voice is controlled. The hand holding the phone is shaking while the voice coming out of his mouth is not. He gives the address. Officer down. Gunshot wound.
“What do I do?” I start yelling. I’m sitting up now, my hands shaking so hard I can barely control them. “What do I do? What do I do? Somebody tell me!”
“Press here,” Sheila says. She grabs my hands and puts them on his side, over the wound, next to hers. “Press hard right here and don’t stop. Don’t take your hands off, Benji.”
I press as hard as I can. His blood pushes through my fingers, hot and alive, and I press harder. His body shudders under my hands. His eyes are open but they’re not focused. His hand twitches on the floor, fingers opening and closing around nothing.
A young blonde guy drops down beside me. He’s holding a dish towel and he’s pale as he can be. He doesn’t say anything. He just kneels and presses the towel against the wound next to my hands, adding pressure, his jaw clenched so tight the muscles jump.
He glances over at me. Just for a second. Our eyes meet over the body of the man on the floor and he holds my gaze, unflinching.
He goes back to pressing the towel. His hands are steady. Mine are not.
There are sirens coming. Distant, then closer, then screaming into the parking lot. Red and blue light flashes through the bar’s front windows, casting pulsing shadows down the corridor.
The giant drops to his knees beside the cop when the paramedics arrive. “Mickey, hang on,” he yells. “The ambulance is almost here. Stay with me, Mickey.”
The cop’s eyes flutter open and find his. “Tex...” His voice is a whisper. “I can’t feel my legs.”
The giant goes dead still. Just for a fraction of a second. Then his massive hand comes up, bracing the side of the cop’s head, holding him in place like he can anchor him to the world of the living by sheer force.
“Don’t move, Mickey,” he says. “Don’t you move, you hear me? Stay still. Don’t try to move your head or your neck. I’ve got you.”
The paramedics rush into the bar and pour through to the back. “Step back, step back!” they yell.
Someone grabs my shoulder and hauls me away from him. My hands, slick with his blood, are pulled off his side and replaced instantly with gloved ones. Pressure never leaves the wound. It just quickly changes hands.
I sit on the slippery floor watching a cop bleed out while people who know what they’re doing work to keep him alive. They’re already cutting his clothes off. Shears through his uniform. Fabric peeling back. His back is torn, blood-slick, the wound dark and wet. Not a clean bullet hole. Just flesh and blood and the inside of a man who should never be opened.
“BP dropping!”
“Hold C-spine, don’t let him move!”
“He can’t feel his legs!” the giant yells at them. “Be careful. He said he can’t feel his legs!”
