"Yeah, shit happens. Get over it." Something broke inside Sandy at that moment, and the life she'd thought she had, the man she'd thought she married, the woman she'd thought she was, were no more. Sandy, the perfect wife, the perfect mother, the perfect law-abiding citizen who had never even jaywalked before in her life, felt something that neither she nor anyone else had had any idea was in her.

Sirens were approaching, but Sandy didn't hear a thing. Without blinking, she raised the gun and unloaded the rest of the clip. She missed Ice more than she hit him, but he lay bleeding, nevertheless. The sound of the gun brought Sandy back to her senses, because she now heard the sirens. That was when reality hit. "My daughter."

Sandy took off running like a gazelle as she tried to run back toward the McDonald's where she had left Isis with her brother. With any luck, her daughter would still be there. With any luck, Sandy would get to see her one last time before the inevitable took place. But the police caught her before she could get there. Sandy's daughter and brother heard the commotion from down the block. They followed the sound of sirens to the block where Isis had last been with her mother. When they saw the rig, their first thought was that Sandy had been in an accident. Isis was out of the car and right up in the midst of the rubble before anyone could stop her. Then she saw him. She saw her father laying on the ground.

"Daddy, what happened?" Isis asked hysterically. "Where's Ma?" Ice looked into his daughter's eyes and smiled. "Someone help! Someone, anybody, please!" Isis screamed after watching the blood spill from her father's wounds.

"Sweetie, we've called for an ambulance. Please, come with me," the first police officer on the scene said as he tried remove Isis from her father's side, but she remained glued there. "Daddy, tell me something." Isis waited to hear something, anything from her father. She had watched a lot of television
dramas, and it seemed like one was playing out before her very eyes.

"I love you," Ice managed to say as he looked off into space. "I love you too, Daddy. Please, please don't die," Isis begged in between sobs. "Please, Daddy. You're gonna be okay. Just tell me what to do. Tell me what to do, Daddy. I don't know what I'm going to do if you die, Daddy. Who's ever going to love me like you, Daddy? I'm never going to love anybody as much as I love you, Daddy." He gasped for air and tried to look at his little girl. "Baby, you gotta love the one that loves you, you hear me?" And he closed his eyes forever.