Battleship

The remaining haze of near drunkenness burned away as he sprinted toward the hotel. He figured they weren’t going to shoot if he didn’t draw a weapon or in some way threaten them. That was his theory, at any rate. If nothing else, he knew that there was a whole lot of extra paperwork cops had to go through if they discharged their weapons and took down a fleeing felon, and he hoped they’d figure he wasn’t worth the time.

Felon? Is that what I am? Screw that. I’m not a felon. I’m just a guy who’s fighting for his future.

That’s what she was. His future. He sprinted toward where he’d left her, picking up speed with every second.

If he were of a fanciful mind, he would have felt love was lending wings to his feet.

He dashed around the back of the hotel, where the bar was situated out on the broad patio. Stone had gotten up from the table and was heading right toward him, probably in response to the police sirens and the shouting. He had a quick glimpse of Stone’s face, and his thought process was right there, writ large upon his expression: Please don’t let it be Alex, please don’t let it be Alex, please don’t… oh, crap, it’s Alex, I knew it, I knew it.

But Stone was only a momentary diversion. Hopper’s real interest was the girl. No, not just the girl. The Girl. She was The Girl, capitalized, and over time she would become The Girl and then THE GIRL and then THE WIFE and eventually The Wife and then the wife…

Maybe this wasn’t such a great idea after all…

Instantly he dismissed the doubts. There was no room for doubts. All that mattered was they were meant to be. Except none of it was going to mean a damned thing if she had already left. He’d taken longer than two minutes, and if she had gone…

No! There she was! She had been sitting on a bar stool but now she was half off it, her purse in her hand, and she was gaping at him. She looked as if she had no idea how to react. That was hardly surprising. He must have looked insane, his face and clothes covered with mustard, ketchup, mayonnaise, and whatever the hell else had splattered all over him. Not to mention plaster and random bits of debris from the roof he’d fallen through.

He ran right up to her and extended the burrito. She wasn’t even looking at it. Instead she was staring straight at him, a dozen different emotions warring on her face.

He tried to catch his breath so he could form words. He was giving no more thought to the cops; as far as he was concerned, the chase was over.

Unfortunately no one had bothered to tell the police. Hopper had just enough time to feel something jammed into his back before his body was jolted by electricity. He tried to say, I give up but the only thing to come out of his mouth was “Urkh.” As he fell, he flipped the burrito to The Girl. It wasn’t so much a toss as it was a spasm, but it was enough to send the burrito angling toward her in an arc. She caught it on the fly, but did so more out of reflex than anything else. If she was still hungry, the feeling was very likely forgotten in the wake of the insanity she was witnessing.

Hopper fell to his knees. The cops had his hands pinned behind his back and were busily applying cuffs to them. All right. Old school. Not those stupid twist ties, like I’m a plastic garbage bag. Real-life handcuffs. Makes me proud to be an American.

He managed sufficient breath to get out two words, directed to The Girl: “Bon appetit.”

One of the cops was busy rattling out Hopper’s “right to an attorney,” and Stone was shouting that this wasn’t necessary, certainly it was just some big misunderstanding, and one of the cops was telling him to step back, this wasn’t his business, and Stone was saying, like hell, this was his kid brother, so it sure as hell was his business…

And none of it mattered to Hopper. None of it. Only one thing mattered, and that was the reaction of The Girl as she stared down at him being hog-tied like a bull at a rodeo.

A long moment hung there, stretching out into eternity, and one of the cops was saying with increasing irritation, “Do you understand these rights as I have just read them to you?”

Then The Girl said two words. Two magic words.

“Thank you.”

And she smiled.

It wasn’t just with her mouth. When she smiled, her whole face lit up. And not merely her face either. She lit up the night, like a beam from a lighthouse showing the way to safety and salvation.

Totally worth it.

“Oh yeah,” he said, which was all the cops needed to hear before they dragged him away. The last thing he saw was her waving to him, still smiling, as she bit into the burrito.

I can’t wait to tell our kids this story…

It helped that Stone knew everyone.

He knew Stan, the desk sergeant. He knew Tony, the local sheriff. He hadn’t known the three arresting officers, but they were new, and within a few hours of encountering him, Howie, Bob, and Mike were pals of his, too. He also knew the cranky Asian woman, whose named turned out to be Maxine, rather than what Hopper’s best guess had been: Medusa.

Now, sitting in front of the television in the living room of his apartment, sunlight filtering through the blinds, Stone watched a copy of the surveillance tape that had caught every moment of his brother’s stupidity in the convenience store. It was hot as hell, what with the air-conditioning having broken, so he was wearing only his boxer shorts and an undershirt. Sweat dripped off the Navy anchor he had on his right bicep, the one he’d had tattooed when his carrier had been stationed for a week off San Diego. The way the perspiration was rolling off it, the tattoo was doing a nice impression of having just been weighed.

He winced as he witnessed Hopper crashing through the ceiling a second time. Sometimes he couldn’t determine whether the gods protected Hopper from his own stupidity or just enjoyed using his life as a Hacky Sack for their personal amusement. Hopper had been given not one, but two opportunities to break his neck and all he’d wound up with were bumps and bruises.

Slowly Stone looked around the apartment, surveying the visual record of his and Hopper’s life together. The living room was lined with photographs that sent such a distinct message to what their futures would be that it was hard to believe the current situation was anything other than inevitable. There were the young Hoppers, ready to go trick-or-treating. Stone was dressed as a cop; Alex was a burglar. There they were as teens, standing on either side of their father, who was dressed in his crisp Navy whites. Stone Hopper was standing at proud attention; Alex Hopper was standing with his shoulders slumped, looking vaguely bored. There was Stone, having just graduated Annapolis, his arm around Hopper. Alex was smiling, but not into the camera. Instead he was looking off to the side and Stone remembered that a gorgeous redhead had been walking past.

It was literally the story of their lives, ever since they were kids.

What was it that Einstein said? The definition of “insanity” was doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.

Something had to change. And it had to change immediately.

Stone heard the sloshing of water in the bathroom. Hopper was soaking in an ice bath, trying to prevent swelling and numb the pain.

He called to Hopper, “I told Tony that you’re gonna pay Maxine double for all the damage. Double.”

“The little witch,” Hopper’s muttered response came back to him. “Mean… nasty…”

“Hey!” Stone bounded up from the couch and headed toward the bathroom.

Hopper gazed at him through bleary eyes. His lips were starting to turn blue. If he stayed in there another ten minutes, he’d look like a Smurf. “It was her fault in the first place,” he said defensively. “I was a paying customer. She threatened to pepper spray me. What kind of business model is that? If she’d just—”

“She was within her rights to go home! You were not within your rights to break into her store! Let me say that again: You broke into her store!” Stone was amazed at his brother’s attitude. “She presses charges and you’re in jail for at least six months! I talked her out of it, and all you can do is blame her? Are you kidding me?”

“I’m sorry.” Hopper winced in response to Stone’s escalating volume. “But could you please talk a little