Opposites Attract: A Short Story

Every night was the same in every house on the block, and Justin knew it. He knew every person, not by name, but by their mailboxes. (If he knew their names the way he knew everything else about their personal lives, that would be stalking, and Justin was no stalker, or at least, he refused to think of himself as one).

The man who always wore the brown bowler hat was Red Mailbox, a fiery figure who drove to work angrily in a red pickup truck with two scratches on the back left tire rim. 

The lady in the pink fur shawl was Green Mailbox, a woman who never sounded like she was alone in her own house, and everyone knew it. She walked around the block like she owned it, wearing pearls and diamonds she most likely conned from an unsuspecting suitor. 

The newlywed Edisons were Mr. and Mrs. White Mailbox, with a dog who always liked to familiarize himself with the same fire hydrant daily (to his more unnecessary entertainment), and his next-door neighbor had the Manatee Mailbox. Justin knew almost nothing about him, but on his street with towering torrent homes, a ranch house like his was not even close to being a backup target.

Simple. It worked out perfectly.

He knew their salaries, the time they left for work, the time they got home, and even their meal schedules. Justin was intrigued by their day-to-day life. He found it hard to resist the desire to become part of the community as if for a minute, just a minute, he forgot what he really was and what he was doing there after all. 

Introverted Justin was always very observant, ever since his youth. His mother said he would be a great detective, but he usually found himself on the other side of the iron bars, though they could never contain him for too long. He thought of it as a game: a game he would always win, even if he tried not to.

“Where is the fun in playing by the rules?" he would wonder. 

"If no one ever cheats, no one will ever win!” 

That seemed to be perfect logic in his mind, but no one ever contradicted his beliefs, or maybe that was because he just never mentioned them. Justin was rather good at laying low: he liked being invisible.

But one rather large detail reigned true, no person should make blueprints of a shopping outlet and attempt digging hidden roadway systems underground just for amusement, which just so happened to be Justin’s favorite thing to do. He just never acknowledged it. He lived a double life.

Several times, when Justin still lived under his mother’s roof, he would visit a psychiatrist with the hopes of getting drugged away from his issues. But, of course, none of the test results were consistent. One even said he shared the same DNA as a rhinoceros, but Justin usually preferred not to follow up with most doctors anyway (it only made more people hate the unknown and complex inner workings of his mind). It prevailed only as a headache to Justin and the man labeled by his doctorate like it was an excuse for him to be correct every time.

“You will never get better if you never try," his mother would say, almost reflecting his malevolent nature her way, like the perfect good cop, bad cop routine all in one. She preferred to use loving words with a harsh tone: the exact way she got Justin through high school.

“Do you know what your brother would say?” she poked, knowing that this same question always got under Justin's skin, like a leech from a picture-perfect river: and it did.

Justin always looked up to his older brother until he realized that he was slowly becoming his brother. Peter was always the best at everything. He set the bar so high there was no way Justin could ever compete at all, so Justin decided that the only way to play the game was to run a whole new race altogether.

When Peter became a state trooper, Justin became a shoplifter. It made perfect sense to Justin, but Peter had his doubts. These brothers never saw eye to eye, like there was always a scab to pick.

That night, while looking out of his snow-covered window the way he always did, Justin caught a glimpse inside of every house on his block: Red Mailbox, Purple Mailbox, Square Mailbox, even No Mailbox. He watched as the happy families gathered with friends to ring in the New Year, something Justin had not done since his brother got his new job in the office: no party, no people, no liquor, what a night!

It was his fault, that Peter. His brother was in for it. Peter ruined Justin’s life, but it was time he got even. Justin decided that it was finally his time to shine: he would no longer be in the shadow of his ‘beloved’ brother. No one, not even Peter, was going to get in his way. That much he could promise, that much he could resolutely do.

Peter was alone again for the third New Year in a row. He would never admit it to anyone else, but he was lonely: lonely, tired, and about to hit the unemployment line. And what a cold, dark place that was, especially for pride, let alone his. He had a reputation of being rather dramatic, with his big head and all, and he loved to show it.

But Mr. Big Talk had his downsides: Peter had the highest error count of every other investigator in his wing. He hadn’t seen a thief in several weeks, and his boss was starting to lose patience (of course, it is hard to lose what you never really had to begin with). 

Peter had two choices: catch some criminals or kiss some booty. He didn’t like being stifled by forks in the road, he liked open options: lots of them, too. He was the golden boy, right? He thought that he was the grand standard of white-collar workers in the whole tri-state area! For heaven's sake, his brother was a shoplifter and not even a good one! Peter was the last hope to bring honor to his family, to make up for Justin's ignominious behavior! The last time Peter heard, the thief of his blood robbed a donut shop and only took three glazed donuts, with the cash register open just above his nose, almost like he wanted to get caught, but Peter still couldn’t catch him. All that remained at the scene was a broken window and a rock. Justin was dangling in front of his brother like bait on a hook, just waiting for Peter to try and grab it right as he pulled it away.

His brother set the bar ridiculously low: it was easy to jump over, easy to outdo, which was something Peter claimed he could do in his sleep. But could he?

Unlike Justin, Peter felt that he was born brilliant, like a diamond in the rough. He did what he could for attention. He bathed in the limelight like a moth at the window, begging for some light to shine through. It was just his nature: it was who he was, after all. 

“Burning the midnight oil, Peter,”  the sheriff joked, hoping to lighten his coworker's dim mood. 

“No oil to burn. Just empty interrogation rooms and rusty cuffs,” Peter replied, in the most nonchalant way possible, to him at least, but, even he could read between his lines. 

He was terrible at keeping secrets, which may be another piece of the puzzle as to why he was not a cop of the month ever, not that that is a thing, but even Peter knew that if it were, he wouldn’t even choose himself. He was too oblivious to try and be oblivious about his failure. He hated losing, but he could never admit that he had lost. It seemed simply impossible to him, even as a child. The words could never make off of the tip of his tongue, the poor sport.

But for one thing, he wasn’t wrong: there were no criminals he could catch, and he knew it. He pushed for a supervising job in a dead-end department all these years, with his colleagues anxious to watch him crash and burn. The only ‘beautiful mind’ in such a small town was his brother’s, and Peter never caught him. It was only a matter of time until he, too, became a donut shop thief like Justin, scouring each street corner for food. Anything would do, as long as he had his ego and his reputation: he saw himself only through the eyes of others.

The lights grew dark, and his eyelids sank to his cheeks, like pebbles in a puddle each night at the same time. Sleeping on the job was regular for him, especially since there was hardly a job to sleep through, until Peter noticed a sudden movement on his computer screen, just under his stubbled chin. As he opened his eyes through the haze of his dark lashes, he immediately recognized the man’s sharp-edged face with rounded almond eyes: Justin. 

The thoughts flooded Peter’s mind, “This is my chance! I have to go! But what is Justin doing?”

A circus of chaos seemed to enter the room but left just as quickly. This was no time to talk: it was time to walk. Peter was ready: his brother wouldn’t humiliate him again.

It was a quarter to two in the morning, well into peak criminal hours as Peter pulled into the driveway of a fancy house across the street from Justin’s, while all of the neighbors stood around a crying lady in an ugly peach sweater. When he finally broke through the door, there was no one: no sign of Justin or anyone else, just a broken window, a rock, and a note. After a further investigation that night, he found that nothing was gone, it was just a scare.

Peter pressed his warm fingers to the pale, pink parchment of the almost frozen letter attached to the stone as if he was reading a snowflake. Just as his eyes slipped to the bottom of the page, the detective smiled. It had been so long since he had been happy: or even relieved. His fate remained safe while his pride strengthened. Perhaps Justin could say the same thing.

As long as there were brothers like Justin, there would always be jobs for brothers like Peter, and both men knew it. It was the circle of love, hate, crime, and justice: the way of the world. As long as Justin ran, Peter would pursue. And as long as Peter pursued, Justin would run. Just as opposites attract, these two hopeless men needed the other's persistence, the way the stars need the darkness to shine.