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 |  Fictitious and delicious! |
1. Jonathan reached to adjust his hat in order to not touch the fake mustache in place. While knowing it was secured with theater grade adhesive, he wanted to ensure his disguise was in place. He'd heard plenty about the school board meetings from board members, councilors, and others in regular attendance. To him, though, it was critical to be at one meeting to hear the pushback himself. He surveyed those in the room waiting for the meeting to begin. A smattering of skin tones greeted his eyes, although he noticed that lighter ones tended to dominate. One gentleman stood out in particular. Aside from a two thirds bald head and a beard halfway to his collarbone, he wore a bulky gold chain with a cross on it. The cross itself had some ornamentation of red crystals and some white spots that may have been bone. Jonathan couldn't tell from where he was sitting. Still, various aspects of this man's personal appearance made Jonathan take note to keep an eye on him during the meeting. He had a hunch this man was going to illustrate the pushback to an absurd degree. He hoped his hunch was wrong. 2. As she headed back to her silver sedan, Stephanie noticed her front left tire sagging a bit. This surprised her, given the relative newness of the car. She pushed down the scarf wrapped around her face as she got closer. The early May sun felt nice on her face, a rare treat given the calls to cover the nose and mouth when out and about. Once at her car, she didn't see any signs of straight up tire flatness. Still, it seemed out of place After setting her bags in the passenger seat, she checked the glove compartment. "Damn," she muttered. She closed the door and mulled her options. Sure, she could go back into Target and buy a tire gauge. On the other hand, she parked a bit of a ways from the entrance, thinking she's only do one round trip. She wasn't used to this Target on Lake Street, having been to the one in Northeast Minneapolis more often. Thus, the walking threw her off a bit. Looking around, she spotted an Auto Zone that appeared to be a little closer to her car. Shrugging to herself, Stephanie, adjusted her scarf and started the walk in that direction. At least she'd get a little variety in her day, if nothing else. 3. "Sugar cubes?" Walter looked up from assessing the grocery bags on the kitchen counter and found his housemate peering at one of the boxes in befuddlement. "Yeah," he said. "Why not?" "Why not use sugar like a normal person?" Walter shrugged. "Cubes are more useful in tea and for absinthe." The latter got his housemate's attention. "Ah. That makes sense for you. I'll be sure not to touch your stash, then." "Better not." With that, Walter allowed himself an amused eyeroll before going back to made heads or tails of his grocery delivery. He hoped they didn't forget his ginger ale this time. 4. It had been a close one. The Bills were presenting a challenge no other teams had brought to the table for the Chiefs, with one score or even half a score deciding the outcome. Who won or lost each time was almost always a toss up. Tonight the Bills reigned supreme by a field goal. Marlon and Coach Young could ruminate over the causes and effects in a couple days. For now, it was time to sit with the sting for a moment without letting it sink in too far. As usual, Marlon was the last to leave the locker room. He walked by all his teammates' stalls, utilitarian at first glance but a rather stealth way to better understand his teammates. Some stalls held family photos. Printed quotes and mantras were taped to the walls. Various good luck charms kept vigil from the shelves, like Travis' unexpected purple dinosaur figurine. Marlon was almost done when a label in one of the stalls cuaght is eye. "Is that...?" He stepped over and realized yes, it's exactly what he thought it was. A red and white label with "SHOWUp!" in large letter was wrapped around a blue jar. Looking closer, Marlon noticed this was a beet juice supplement put out by Brandt Showalter's company. This caught Marlon by surprise. He know most people on the team (including coaching staff) knew about Showalter's supplement line, but no one expressed open support of any of the products. For his part, Marlon felt popping a supplement without running it by both the team doctors and his personal medical team was a stupid move. He wondered if his teammates were of the same opinion. Taking a mental note of this discovery, he finished his walk and began getting ready to go home.  1A. It had been a particularly taxing day at City Hall even before the media requests began pouring in. Even so, Jonathan wanted nothing more than to sit down and watch Felicia's Congressional testimony. C-SPAN's on demand service paired well with takeout Chinese and wine. He searched for the appropriate link as he popped open the containers for his moo shu pork. The first twenty minutes or so were more perfunctory than anything, between the committee chair reading the agenda and establishing Felicia's role in the halt and ultimate delayed reporting by the Justice Department on the practices of the Minneapolis Police Department. Much of the early testimony Felicia provided was not news to him. He had read the reports that Felicia referenced with regards to carjacking prosecution and police influence on the Hennepin County attorney's office. Likewise, he understood the issues with police funds being routed away from cybersecurity for the MPD, in particular the record-keeping systems. Felicia did provide some revealing first person accounts of her somewhat undercover work in pen testing the systems. It took a half hour for things to get interesting. This is when Felicia began discussing conversations she had about the police department during last year's round of Open Streets. Since Felicia was a familiar face at the Broadway event, she heard from young people living in North Minneapolis on a regular basis. She mentioned how one of the young men approached her, and they discussing carjacking offers the boys in this part of the city received on a consistent basis. Felicia had gotten descriptions of two different people than had attempted to recruit the young man and the pushback he received when reporting this to the police department. However, when Felicia was doing her pen testing work, she found photos that matched both descriptions in the officer ID database. The C-SPAN stream showed a split screen of Felicia describing the scenario further along with photos of the men in question after they'd arrested and processed thanks to a tipoff to Internal Affairs. Jonathan blinked and paused the screen. One of the photos they showed was of a man wearing a red and white cross. His beard had been shaved, but the jewelry and (lack of) matched up with everything in Jonathan's mind's eye. He remembered this many pushing back on history teaching reform more than anyone at the meeting. His pushback was so extreme that even some more hesitant people on the fence began to voice support for the reforms because this insidious cop figure was so adamant. With a sigh, Jonathan realized that his gut feeling about the man at the school board meeting was right (and more right than he was comfortable with). 2A. "The first fire appears to have started at the Auto Zone on Lake Street-" Stephanie looked up from her laptop. "Auto Zone? Lake Street?" she murmured. Setting aside her work for a moment, she got up and looked for her purse. Once she had her purse in hand, she began pulling out items one by one. Soon, she had it in hand: the receipt for the tire gauge she'd bought just a few weeks prior. A squeaky gasp just got out of her mouth as she double checked the address at the top of said receipt. "Holy shit," she whispered before slinking back to the couch. It took her almost two hours to even look at her work again. 3A. Parking in Alexandria sucked ass all seven days a week. Walter thanked any potentially listening deity that Felicia asked to meet up in the middle of the week when the parking was a bit less terrible. What had surprised him, though, was her request: to find a bar that wasn't chock full of tourists so she could recover from and/or commiserate about her Congressional testimony. Well, she'd called it an ordeal, which in Walter's mind was more accurate. After finding a parking spot, he walked over to the plaza near the Metro station. He knew Felicia would be taking the train over from Crystal City. Sure enough, she showed up a few minutes after his arrival. She donned a hat and sunglasses, but Walter recognized her "Yay, Brutalism!" shirt from a mile away. "I bet you get all sorts of comments on that shirt when you're on the Metro," he remarked as she approached. Felicia stuck out her tongue. "Good to see you, too. Should we eat first, or should we skip straight to the part where we're drowning our sorrows in whatever's available? Walter chuckled. "I could go for a bite to eat." "Sounds good. So long as it's not a seafood only joint, I'm in." After grabbing pasta at an Italian place, Walter and Felicia meandered through Old Town for a bit. They took their time enjoying the sun and making commentary on the wackier signs and bumper stickers they spotted. The lunch crowds soon drifted from the various establishments, leading them to decide to grab some drinks. Walter lead the way to a bar a block or so from the waterfront, one he had visited a couple times before. He knew it flew under most tourists' radar, as it was on the edge of the high rent areas. To him, it would be perfect for some afternoon commiseration. He also knew it was the city's best well-stocked secret. While sending Felicia to find a table, he sauntered up to the bar. The lone bartender gave him a nod as he approached. "Two absinthes," Walter said, "sugar cubes and water on the side." The bartender arched an eyebrow but said, "Can do. I'll have someone bring it over to you." "Thanks." To Walter's relief, he didn't have to wait long. He had just joined Felicia when a young lady brought over their drinks. Felicia shot Walter a nonplussed look when she realized what the server had brought over." "Absinthe?" she asked. "Really? At this hour?" "You gave Congressional testimony," he fired back. "You need something strong after that." "I mean, that's not wrong, but if I'm tripping balls on the Metro and wind up overshooting my ride so far I end up in L'Enfant Plaza, I'm blaming your ass." "Totally fair. If needed, I can drive you back to the hotel." "I'll take that under consideration. So what the hell am I doing here?" At that, Walter picked up first one of the slotted spoons then a sugar cube. "Allow me to demonstrate." 4A. "So that's why you're here." Marlon twirled his empty champagne flute in his hand. "Yeah. I'm here downing orange spritzers and talking to frankly the most interesting person at this dinner because I had doubts about Brandt Showalter's beet juice supplement." Felicia nodded her head in approval. "As you should have. Say what you will about religion or politics, but at least you understand the need to think twice when anyone says that they can put all the benefits of a food in a pill." "Indeed. I have learned that the digestive system doesn't handle that stuff quite like we think it does." "No, it does not." For a moment, the two of them stood in the grove outside the estate. They looked one as their fellow gala attendees frolicked under the starlit skies. Jazzy bells provided an unexpected, almost surreal soundtrack to the evening. Marlon glanced around and found few people were wandering into the groves as far as they had. He found himself rather grateful to have ended up befriending the relative local in the crowd that knew these grounds almost as well as the staff did. He for one appreciated the seclusion. "Do you ever regret decided to learn more?" Felicia asked. Marlon cocked his head at her question. "No," he told her after a moment. "Do you regret bringing the sparring activists together?" Felicia sipped the last of her spritzer. "Sometimes I do. Sometimes I don't. There are days when I find myself feeling guilty because it means less time at home taking care of my personal stuff. And then there are the days I come home shaking because I've spent the last two hours trying not to cry in public and my husband says, 'You are doing the right thing. Keep going.' It's stuff like that that keeps me going." Marlon frowned. "I wish I had that." "What? Surely your wife offers you encouragement for all the work you put into both football and bringing science to your teammates." Marlon shook his head. "She does, sometimes. No, I was referring to the husband part. That's the part I wish I had." The only thing he heard for a solid two minutes was the soft brush of Felicia's glass hitting the grass beneath their feet. https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ChekhovsGun |
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