The officer lunges out on us, pushing Ivy back onto the floor. He grabs me by my collar and squeezes, his grip feeling like a nylon rope around my neck.

G-mo tries to pry the cop’s hands away from my neck. “You comply when I command you to do something. You hear?” the officer barks as he tightens the grip on my collar, and I feel a bone in my neck crack.

“Holy shit, what the fuck is going on?!” Ivy shouts.

“Get the hell off him, yo,” G-mo says, still trying to pry away the cop’s hands.

“Somebody, help! Lady, help!” Ivy shouts back to the cashier.

She does nothing. Just stares. Just fucking stares.

And I’m left peering into this man’s eyes, somewhere between cobalt and iceberg, ’cause his glare is the coldest thing I’ve ever felt. I see all the hate trapped inside them.

He yanks harder at my shirt and then his hands go to my pants and pockets, in search of something.

“He ain’t got nothing in there,” Ivy shouts, helping G-mo try to wrestle the cop’s hands from me, his arms flexing, the veins in his biceps looking thick. His weight is just too much for them.

The officer shoves me back, pinning me against a rack of something that I can’t see, and it pierces my back hard. Then, in a moment, there is a fist punching my gut repeatedly, a knee to my crotch, and I’m tossed to the floor, hitting my face hard, and I feel the impact all over.

He’s trying to put me in handcuffs, but I wiggle, trying to break free. I tell myself to win this power struggle because that’s what this is: the ultimate power struggle. G-mo and Ivy are screaming for me, still trying to get this cop off me.

“You trying to resist, boy. You wanna resist, huh?” the cop keeps saying on a loop.

He squeezes my hands hard behind my back, and my skin is on fire. My heart is pounding in my chest, beads of sweat falling into my eyes.

“That’s enough, Joe,” the cashier woman finally says. “I think he’s learned his lesson today.”

And feeling nothing but pain all over and hands on top of my head and moving down my back, all I’m feeling is like I’m seriously going to die without having really lived, and all I am left thinking is: What lesson did I have to be taught?

Not to be a concerned individual?

Not to care about someone else’s innocent life, the boy lying unconscious across from me?

Not to care about my own life?

Not to be a member of my own race?

I don’t know what, but I know that in this very moment I’m starting to really hate myself, really feel sorry for myself, because I’ve been black for too long, because I’ve been such a menace to society because of this skin, because of the words that come to mind when some people see me.

“Get the hell out of here and don’t come back, or else,” the officer says into my neck, releasing me at once. He scowls. The hatred in his voice is scarier than anything I could’ve ever imagined.

Ivy and G-mo help me up off the floor, and, keeping eyes on the poor boy, we haul ass out of there, seeing cop cars and ambulances flying down the street toward the food mart.

We ride all the way back to the park in my neighborhood, our brains scattered and exploding into a million thoughts.

“You okay?” Ivy asks.

I nod at her, not actually feeling okay in the slightest. I’m replaying what happened at the store in my mind, my throat tightening. That could’ve been my brother, easily. How do I know he isn’t already lying somewhere, beaten unconscious, or worse—dead—because he’s black and looked at as a threat before actually being seen?

“Yo. What the fuck is going on with the goddamn cops, man?” G-mo goes.

“My mama say this world’s going to shit,” Ivy adds. “That’s just all there is to it.”

I have to catch my breath. I’m unable to say anything, horrified, still thinking about what just went down, still flinching from this nasty twinge all over me. I feel like my bones are legit on fire. Like someone ran a cheese grater over every single muscle in my body. But I’m reminding myself that I can’t allow pain to reign over me. I can’t handle another oppressor.

“That was some fucked-up-ass shit. He only had CDs and a dime bag. No one deserves to be beaten like that. He could’ve died. That isn’t punishable by death. What’s worse is that that could’ve been any of us,” Ivy says.

“Word,” G-mo sighs.

“And we just stood there and ran like pussy-ass bitches,” she moans, her chest heaving.

“Ivy, goddamn, how many times do I gotta tell you that I’m a pussy-ass nigga and I like being one?” G-mo shouts. “That’s how I keep my life.”

“That’s ’cause you literally got nine functioning brain cells. You keep being a pussy-ass nigga, and that’s what they gon’ keep treating us like.”

“Whatever, I guess,” G-mo says. “When’s the damn rapture? Because that was so fucked up.”

“Who do you even call when the cops are the ones being the bad guys? Who do you even beg to protect you?” Ivy asks, putting her hands on my sore shoulders.

I shrug. And I have no answer—not a good one, at least. But I know not all cops are bad. Auntie Nicola was one, and I know she’s a good person. In her time as an officer, she did a ton for the community: got people the help they needed and made them feel whole and safe—what good cops are supposed to do. I remember Auntie Nicola telling me stories about catching bad guys and how she’d seen some of her colleagues use their power to do some pretty messed-up things to people, but she always made it known that there’d be cops like her on my side.

My mind flashes back to when Tyler and I used to spend our middle school spring breaks with Auntie Nicola in Indiana. She’d take us to the skating rink on the east side of Indianapolis on the weekend. There was something about picking each other up off the floor when we fell, laughing, that made those times mean everything to me. Tyler’s laugh slips into my head. I never thought I’d miss it, as loud and gut-busting as it is, but I do. It’s been a while since I’ve heard him laugh and actually mean it. All the happy, funny, quiet little moments between the two of us growing up get stuck in my head, like me and Tyler just sitting on the ground, putting together thousand-piece puzzles, and making peanut butter sandwiches, saying nothing, just watching each other eat. It’s the thought of not getting any of this back that has my chest constricting. Tyler may have strayed away, but I need to find him.

I don’t know how long I blank or how long I just sit there not saying anything, staring at a single point, a crack in the street, my thoughts splitting into a million fragments. But, somehow, I snap back together, and I’m on my bike, pedaling fast.

The whole time, I feel like I’m just drifting with no real sense of direction. In the air, the pigeons fly in salute to the pale, rubber sky, and this is what comes to life, like a giant machine built against me, paining me, all the way until I get home to face Mama. I’m going to tell her the truth about everything. About the party. About Tyler. I have to.