Cannibals in Love by Mike Roberts

have to shoot out our tires if he wanted to stop us now. I gripped the armrest as my brother floored it through a yellow light and back up the on-ramp. I turned and looked over my shoulder and saw the young cop running into the darkness again. Still chasing the white van.
    *   *   *
    In the morning, my brother was gone. He had taken the Camry with him, of course. I knew this even before I went outside to look. He was on his way back to my parents’ house. This had been his plan all along.
    I shouldered my bicycle back down the stairs to the street. Exhaling before I swung my leg over the top bar. I could already feel the heat coming up off the blacktop. Mid-October, and the humidity still hadn’t broken. I was miserable; I was hungover; I was aggrieved. I didn’t want to do this anymore.
    Mike just nodded and climbed up his ladder when I told him I was quitting. I couldn’t care less, honestly. Let him be pissed off all he wanted. Let my brother be pissed off, too, for all I cared. That motherfucker stole my car.
    It was time for me to go back to school now anyway, to get on with it. This was supposed to be my senior year in college, for fuck’s sake. Mike and I both knew that he was perfectly capable of finishing the orange apartment by himself.
    At lunchtime, we got into the truck and drove down Georgia Avenue in silence. We were headed downtown to a hardware store where Mike kept a standing account. We made our turn, and cut across the avenues, where we found ourselves suddenly, and unaccountably, stopped. Traffic had come to a dead halt at Fourteenth Street.
    â€œHoly shit,” Mike said softly, and I felt my stomach drop.
    I knew immediately that I did not want to see this. But when Mike opened his door, I followed him. Everyone was leaving their vehicles now, as the sidewalks filled with people. I walked behind them, feeling anxious. Feeling vulnerable.
    There were two motorcycle cops holding traffic in the street as people lined up on the sidewalks, standing shoulder-to-shoulder. Mike and I moved through the crowd, stepping down off the curb, where we were confronted, inexplicably, by nothing . We looked across to the other side, where people craned their necks the same way. Looking dumbfounded; looking disappointed. There had been no shooting after all. No white van. No bodies lying bloodied in the street. There wasn’t even a car crash to gawk at.
    â€œWhat’s going on?” Mike asked one of the motorcycle cops.
    â€œQueen of England is coming through,” the cop said flatly.
    â€œThe Queen of England?” Mike asked indignantly. The words didn’t seem to fit in his mouth. Mike turned away and looked at the gathered crowd.
    â€œWe have to get through here. You’re blocking us in.”
    â€œEverybody has to wait,” the cop answered.
    â€œThe Queen of England ,” Mike said again with disgust. “Look at all these people on the street! You’re putting all these people in danger! You realize that, don’t you?” But the cop wasn’t listening.
    The crowd began to titter as the Queen’s cavalcade breached the hill. This opulent and imposing show of force; a motorcade running more than a dozen vehicles deep. Motorcycles and police cars and unmarked SUVs formed a pocket of protection around Her Royal Highness. Look at all of these resources on display , I thought. Imagine all of this Sturm und Drang for a doddering old woman. The Queen of England, no less!
    But Mike began to boo. Pushing up to the front and booing lustily at the passing cars. “Boooooooooo!” Mike bellowed through his dirty hands. “Boooooooooo!” He was a single voice cutting through the din of our collective bewilderment.
    I didn’t know what to make of this. The veins were bulging in his neck as he shook his arms and taunted. I was afraid I was going to have to pull him out of the street now. But, almost as suddenly, people