Zoe sat with her back to the brick wall, in the alley behind the motel where she used to stay, trying to talk herself out of getting high. She wanted to, and if she’d had any money on her she probably would have. Every time she closed her eyes for a week, she relived that horrible night. Every time she closed her eyes she saw that poor girl’s face and she heard her plea for help.

Almost a week before, Zoe had been walking the streets, looking for a place to sleep. She hadn’t used any drugs in two weeks at that time. The withdrawal had been horrible and she’d thought more than once that she would die. But she had made it through alive, if not any worse for wear. The manager of the motel kicked her out when the other tenants began complaining about the screaming coming from her room, and she’d spent the rest of the money she had to rent it. So she’d left there and gone to the women’s shelter. She stayed one night there but when they saw how bad off she was, they had wanted to send her to the hospital. If that happened, they would call her grandparents, and she didn’t want that. She wanted to have something, anything to show for herself before she faced them. So, she’d toughed it out and she was even on the verge of believing she could really do it, before that night.

She had eventually found an alcove in front of an old bakery that had closed years ago. She was exhausted and she hadn’t eaten in over twenty-four hours. She knew that she wouldn’t be able to go much further before she passed out, so she stepped into the alcove and slid down into one of the dark corners, to close her eyes for just a few hours before the sun came up. She was drifting off to sleep, when she heard the rumble of a motorcycle…and then the revving of a motor—it sounded like a fast one. Then suddenly she heard the almost deafening sounds of tires screeching and metal crunching…and then she heard a scream. That sound hit harder than any of the others, and it was what brought her to her feet and made her look out into the street. It was quiet once again, eerily so. The streetlight was dim, but it was bright enough for her to see that the sounds she heard that night were mild compared to the scene that lay before her.

A small, silver, sporty-looking car sat sideways in the middle of the road. The front end was smashed, the windshield shattered, and the roof of it looked like something had sat down on top of it. Smoke poured from the engine and what was left of the rubber on the tires was still smoking. Beyond the car, in the dim light of the overhead streetlight, she could see more metal. It looked like what was left of a motorcycle, one that had been crushed and lost a lot of parts. Zoe wished that she had a phone so that she could call 911, but she’d long since hocked that to pay for the drugs. She looked around, desperate to find a payphone, but like dinosaurs, those were practically extinct. The street was deserted. It was three a.m., and they were in a part of town where they might lie there all night before anyone came along and noticed them. It was the part of town she’d picked so no one would bother her, but now she wished desperately that she hadn’t. She wanted to walk away. She almost wished that she was high so she could. But she was sober and her sober brain knew that she had to at least try to help.

With her body shaking all over, she made her way to the car first. When she looked into the shattered windshield she felt her stomach turn and bile race up into her throat. The airbag had deployed, but the roof had crushed the skull of whoever had been driving. With her hand over her mouth, she stumbled backwards and almost ran. But her eyes were drawn once more to the motorcycle. What if someone was alive? How could she live with herself if she just walked away? She breathed in and out, deeply and slowly, the way they’d taught her to fight the panic attacks when she was at the rehab facility, and she started toward where the motorcycle lay on its side. She was almost there when she tripped over something on the dark street. A little cry of surprise escaped her mouth and she stumbled again, this time falling down onto her knees. She didn’t even feel the bits of pavement and glass as they cut into her flesh because her entire being was focused on what lay in front of her. It was a man lying face down in a pool of blood. His hair was long and gray and matted with blood and debris. He was wearing a leather vest that said “Defenders” on the patch and one of his legs was splayed out in an unnatural angle with a bone sticking through his thigh. Zoe used her hands to push herself away from him and when one of her hands connected with soft flesh, she screamed again.

Zoe was scrambling to her feet when she heard a faint female voice. “Help.” When she turned toward the sound and looked down, she’d sealed her nightmares for the rest of her life. It was a girl, about her age, lying on her back. Her hair was stuck to her face in places, sealed there with the blood that seemed to be coming from the back of her skull. Her small body was cut, scraped, and bleeding all over. “Please.”

“I…I don’t have a phone,” Zoe blubbered out. She was surprised to feel tears streaming down her face. She hadn’t cried in a very long time. “Do you have a phone?” The girl on the ground tried to say something, but Zoe couldn’t make it out. Knowing that she was wasting precious minutes, she dropped back down to her sore knees and said, “I’m going to put my hand in your pocket. I’m just looking for your phone, okay?” The girl was staring at her with wide, green eyes, but she didn’t respond. Nervously, Zoe slipped her hand down into the pocket of the girl’s jeans. She could feel money, or at least something paper there, but no phone. She did the same with the other pocket, and the feeling of something hard and rectangular sent relief rushing through her body. She pulled out the phone and looked back at the girl. Her eyes were fluttering like she was trying hard not to close them. “Hang on, okay? I’m calling for help.”

As Zoe pressed in 911, the girl on the ground said, “Levi…,” sending blood rushing out through her lips with the word.

“Don’t try to talk, okay?” The 911 operator came on and asked what her emergency was. Zoe told the operator where she was and what had happened, but when the operator asked for her name, she ended the call. “They’re coming,” she said, taking the girl’s limp hand in her own. The soft flesh was as cold as ice and what Zoe could see beneath the blood on the girl’s lips was blue. She wasn’t getting enough oxygen, but Zoe had no idea what to do to help her. “Just hang on. I won’t leave you.” For a second Zoe felt the girl’s hand tighten on her wrist. Once again, she said:

“Levi.” And then her eyes closed as she sucked in a shaky, ragged breath. Zoe felt a tingle like an electric current racing up the arm the girl was holding onto, landing in her heart. Then the girl went limp and her chest stopped moving and Zoe knew that she was gone. The tears on Zoe’s face were so thick that it was hard for her to see. Her eyes were stinging and when she heard the sounds of the approaching sirens, she knew that she had to move. Dealing with the police wasn’t an option, for more than one reason. The biggest reason was that her grandfather was an important man in Memphis and the police would want to call him as soon as she gave them her name. She didn’t want him to see her the way she was…not yet. But knowing all that didn’t make it any easier for her to let go of the girl’s hand. The sound of her using her last breath to say Levi kept reverberating in her head.

Zoe looked down at the phone in her right hand. Letting go of the girl, she pressed the screen and when it lit back up, she pulled up the girl’s contacts. It wasn’t hard to find Levi, since she had him named “Levi, my love.” Zoe grimaced as she pulled up the messages and typed in the address of where they were and simply said, “Come quick.” She dropped the phone down next to the girl then and with one last look at her pretty, now peaceful-looking face, she scurried back to her hiding spot and huddled in the corner until the noise out in front finally died down and the sun came up.

The first thing Zoe did that morning was to find her dealer. She had one thing of value left that she’d been hanging onto and promising herself that she’d never sell for drugs. But she had to get that girl’s face out of her mind, and the sound of her voice asking for the man she loved out of her head. When the dealer held out the baggie, Zoe dug in her back pocket, only to realize there was a hole there and the silver pendant that her mother had bought her when she was just five years old was gone.