I can’t tell if I’m alive or dead. All sense of reality has left my entire being. It’s as though I’m seeing everything that’s happening all around me but doing so from outside my body. Black police vehicles surround us, their bright, multi-colored flashers burning my eyes. Cops dressed in riot gear and helmets with dark visors run in every direction.
An EMT van pulls up not far from where I’m lying on my back on a torn up patch of roadway. Looking up at the sky, I see black helicopters circling from above like big black vampire bats. Peering over my shoulder, I see Tony laid out on his side, his eyes closed. A small trickle of blood is running across his forehead. I wonder if he ever made it off the road after the Jeep was torn to shreds by that tank round.
“Tony,” I say, my voice soundi
