by Peter David
The Asian woman started moving toward her car, an ancient Toyota with rust spots on the roof. Hopper paced her, counting the money he had on him, hoping that it would be enough.
“Fifty. Fifty dollars for a chicken burrito.” He waved the money in her face. “That’s my spending money for the month and I’m going to give it to you.” He tried desperately to drive home the importance of his offering, not even mentioning that—for crying out loud—it was nearly twenty times the cost of the damned burrito. She managed a store. Her whole thing was about making money. With this kind of offer in front of her, there was simply no way that she would walk away from it.
She walked away.
He ran around her, interposing himself between her and the car. This finally stopped her and she glared fiercely up at him.
“Ma’am. Ma’am, please.” He spoke rapidly, the subsequent words tumbling over each other, and he had to fight not to slur them. “If it was for me, I’d go away. But it’s not. There’s this girl over there,” and he pointed in the general direction of the hotel. “She’s incredible.” Establish human contact. The way that waiters do right before they bring the bill, in order to get a bigger tip. Touch her. But not in a threatening way; do it in a socially acceptable way. He put a hand on her arm. “You don’t understand. She’s my future. And she’s hungry.” His voice was throbbing with emotion. “My future depends on a chicken burrito.”
Apparently he would have made a lousy waiter, because the woman lifted the small can of Mace dangling from her key chain and assumed a vicious karate stance. “Your future’s gonna be pepper spray.”
Immediately he removed his hand from her arm. Brushing him aside, she climbed into her car. He made no move to stop her because he had finally admitted to himself that this wasn’t going to get him anywhere. It was time for Plan B, and the first part of Plan B was having this obstructionist store manager get out of here as quickly as possible. In this action, at least, she accommodated him, because apparently she couldn’t wait to get away from him. The Toyota peeled out with a screeching of tires.
Time was ticking down for Hopper. He’d already wasted a minute pleading with the useless store manager. In his mind’s eye, he could see Stone sitting at the table, sipping another whiskey or maybe a beer, with that knowing smirk he always had during times when Hopper was embarking on some disastrous course of action. And then there was the girl, sitting at the bar, waiting for her future husband to get the job done.
All this and more went through Hopper’s mind even as he clambered up the side of the building. It wasn’t all that difficult. The windows may have had bars over them, but the bars themselves provided toeholds, and his natural athleticism—not to mention single-minded drive—enabled him to reach the flat roof in no time. It was unconscionably thin. “How the hell does this thing even keep water out?” he said as he stomped on it. He looked around and, to his dismay, didn’t see any sort of roof access door. Hopper moaned softly. “Now what the hell am I—?”
The roof answered the question before he could finish articulating it, giving way beneath his feet. Hopper crashed through.
Fortunately enough, since he was still pretty drunk, he was also very loose-limbed and didn’t tense up. As a result, he didn’t hurt himself too much when he slammed to the floor. Mostly it just knocked the wind out of him. Pieces of acoustical tile and insulation fell all around him and he threw his arms over his head to shield himself from it. Once the rain of debris had stopped, Hopper staggered to his feet and moved toward the stack of chicken burritos sitting in a refrigerated compartment. They were individually wrapped in red and white paper. Hopper selected one at random, tossed it in the microwave, and pushed “Start.” As the burrito cooked, he moved over toward the register and dropped a few bucks next to it. He briefly considered leaving the fifty he’d originally offered but then decided against it. She’d passed on it. In fact, she’d threatened to pepper spray him. Fine. Be that way, lady. You get the money for the burrito. Let your insurance company deal with the crappy ceiling. In fact, the whole roof was so shoddily made, I probably did you a favor. Take the insurance money and get a decent roof.
The microwave dinged and he snatched the burrito out of it. He let out a yelp and tossed it from one hand to the other as he waited for it to become cool enough to handle. As he did so, he glanced around, looking for a means of exit. There was a stepladder propped against the far wall that she probably used for mundane things like changing lightbulbs. He set it under the hole in the roof and quickly clambered up and out. He felt heady with excitement and triumph. I’m gonna make it, he thought deliriously, right before another section of the roof gave way. Seconds later he was back inside the store, lying atop a rack of condiments that had exploded all over him from the impact.
As he lay there, trying to shake off the pain, he noticed a back door with a hand-scrawled sign that read “Emergency Exit” on it.
“Yeah … that would have been easier,” he said with a low moan.
He got slowly to his feet, looking in disgust at the condiments that were all over him, and that was when he heard the police sirens in the distance.
“Oh, that’s not good.”
He banged through the door and hoped he would be well clear of the convenience store before the cops were close enough to get a bead on him. This hope was quickly dashed when he saw two police cars pulling up, their lights flashing, illuminating the darkened street like a Christmas tree. There were two cops in one and a single cop in the other. The doors were flung open and they spilled out, shouting over one another such useless orders as “Stop!” “Halt!” “Don’t move!”
Hopper had never been much when it came to following orders.
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.
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 appétit.”
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 quieter?”
If there was one thing that Stone had no patience for at that moment, it was his brother’s hangover. He fought to keep his voice steady. “That girl you were trying to impress—her father runs the whole damned fleet. Rear Admiral Shane. So now you’re messing with my job.”
Instantly all his aches and pains were forgotten. Hopper looked up at Stone with renewed interest. “The burrito girl?” He could not have sounded more excited if Stone had told him that the secrets of the universe had been revealed to him. Actually he probably would have been less excited over that prospect. “You know the burrito girl?”
“Y’know, Hopper, you can be so freaking single-minded …” He shook his head. “If you could just, for once, devote that single-mindedness to something worthwhile … God, you could go anywhere. Do anything. Instead …”
“Sorry to be such a disappointment,” said Hopper. Which would have annoyed the hell out of his older brother except, somewhat to Stone’s surprise, Hopper really did sound somewhat contrite. More so than he ever had before, at any rate.
Something has to change …
Naked and bruised, Hopper pulled himself out of the ice bath. He moaned softly as he reached for a large towel and wrapped it around his middle. Every step he took was an exercise in agony, his body screaming at him over the way he’d abused it in the past twenty-four hours.
Hopper stumbled into the living room and then flopped onto the couch that doubled as his bed. “Pants,” he said groggily.
Stone ignored the request. If Hopper put on pants, there was nothing to impede his departing, and he needed to hear what Stone had to say. He stood over his younger brother, his arms folded across his chest. “Here’s the deal, Hopper. I’ve stayed out of your business for the last five years. I’ve watched you throw away every opportunity, every job, every break. You’ve got sixty-five dollars to your name, a car that does not start, you’re living on my couch …”
Hopper pulled a pillow over his head. From beneath it, his muffled voice said, “You know where I can find that girl? That admiral’s daughter?”
This was a typical Hopper approach to situa
tions that he didn’t want to deal with. He would try to change the subject, or send Stone completely off track. Not this time. Stone summoned his best impression of their father, adopting the tone with which he would speak to his sons when he’d become completely fed up with whatever stupidity they’d gotten themselves into. Something has to change. “As of now,” he said sharply, “as of right this second, there’s a new dynamic at play. This dynamic is the following.” He held up his hand and started ticking off the points on his fingers. “From here on out, until I state otherwise, there is no more debate. No more discussion. No more compromise. There is, from here on out, me speaking and you listening. Me saying and you doing. It’s time for a new course of action. A new direction. A game change.”
Slowly Hopper emerged from under the pillow. He looked wearily at his brother. “What did you have in mind?”
Without a word Stone pointed at the tattoo on his arm.
“You’re kidding,” said Hopper.
“Do I look like I’m kidding? First we get you a proper haircut because, as much as enlistments may be down, I’m not entirely sure they’d take you looking like the slob that you are.”
“Thanks, bro.”
“Second, we get you inked up.”
Hopper looked uncertainly at his brother’s anchor. “Navy requires tattoos these days?”
“No, I’m requiring it. Think of it as a promissory note. Or a reaffirmation of brotherhood. Or proof that you’re serious about making changes.”
“Who said I’m serious about it?”
“I did. Because this is it, Hopps. This is the bottom line for you. One way or the other, you’re out of here. And it’s either into the arms of the Navy or it’s out into the street.”
“You’d do that to your own brother?”
“That’s nothing compared to what you’ve done to yourself.”
Hopper seemed as if he was about to fire off a response, but then he gave it a moment’s thought. “Touché,” he said reluctantly. Slowly he sat up and stared wearily at Stone. It was as if the fight had been knocked out of him.