“That’s it! That is the last straw!” Laura yelled over the sound of the tremors.
Her husband Roger looked up from his meal and pleaded, “Honey, can we at least finish our meal before we run this time? It took me months to get these reservations!”
“No, Roger, no,” she answered angrily, “I’ve told you before if we get caught in the middle of another stupid catastrophe as a result of those so-called heroes, we’re moving.”
“Sweetie, come on. We’re New Yorkers! We’re used to disasters,” he attempted to reassure her, “I mean, we survived superstorm Sandy and the Battle of New York, after all!”
Laura shook her head and push the plate of succulent fettuccini pasta away. No matter how many times they had this argument, Roger always clung to the ‘we’re New Yorkers’ line for dear life. Not this time, she thought. She looked around the beautiful restaurant and saw other people calmly eating their food as well. What was wrong with these people?
“Laura, please, just finish your pasta and we’ll run,” he said, pointing at something on his phone, “Twitter says the fighting is mostly in the lower east side right now. Which means we have at least fifteen minutes before anything blows up in the upper west side!”
Roger smiled and kept stuffing his face with shrimp. Being born and raised in New York City, he had always told Laura, meant he got used to superheroes duking it out with the forces of evil. For a while it was mostly radioactive superheroes in tights they had to worry about, with their absurdly-named ‘villains.’ But when a supposed god from another planet brought down his ugly army on the city, things got a lot worse. Ever since then it seemed that anybody with a vendetta against these vigilantes just came to NYC to blow things up.
“I’m not even from the city,” Laura said, grudgingly picking at her pasta, “I’m from upstate. These things never happen upstate.”
Roger put down his fork and looked into his wife’s big, beautiful, angry eyes, “We’ve talked about this. We’re not moving upstate. I’ve got an incredible job here, and everyone we know is here. Besides, living in a small town didn’t protect those people in New Mexico.”
“Everyone you know,” Laura chided, “I left all my friends and family behind to move to the city with you.”
She regretted saying it as soon as it left her lips, but it was too late. That sentence, without fail, started a fight every time she said it. In all honesty, she was glad she had moved away from her tiny town to be with Roger. But sometimes she missed her old friends. Just as they were both about to open their mouths to start the argument, a Yellow Cab burst through the front window upside-down.
Roger grabbed Laura’s arm and tugged her away from the table as the cab slid through tables and decorations. She was glad they had been seated so far toward the back, now. They ran through the kitchen, which the chefs has already abandoned. Laura glanced behind them and saw the rest of the stubborn restaurant patrons and wait staff following. Into the back alley they burst, looking frantically in each direction.
“This way, to the road!” Laura said as she pulled Roger’s arm in that direction.
As they rounded the corner onto the street, they saw that Roger’s estimate had been a little off. Men in strange combat uniforms were firing guns up toward the tops of the buildings, trying to bring down somebody. Laura and Roger took off in the other direction, pushing around the tourists trying to catch a glimpse of a superhero or something. They rounded another street corner, putting as much distance between them and the battle as they could when they ran into a police barricade.
“…everyone needs to make their way down the designated streets,” an officer was saying through a megaphone, “This area is not safe, we have set up an evacuation route heading north, so everyone needs to…”
“Hurry, before the superhero spotters get in our way,” Roger said, pulling Laura towards the streets the police had sectioned off for the fleeing pedestrians.
They climbed over a cab as they made their way across the street, the driver honking angrily at them. Traffic was backed up for several blocks, but the drivers stubbornly kept trying to move forward. Typical, Laura thought. She and Roger were making a dead sprint down the sidewalk finally when something shot in front of them and broke through a shop window. Everyone on the sidewalk shrieked as broken glass burst around them. A man in a blue bodysuit walked out of the shop, brushing dust off his sleeves. He had a white uppercase letter stamped on the front of his helmet and a huge metal shield on his back.
“Sorry about the mess, folks,” he said charmingly, “We’ll have this mess cleaned up in no time.”
The stars-and-stripes-themed man rushed back toward the action, fangirls swooning in his wake. Superheroes, Laura shook her head, Think they’re such hot stuff.
“We’re moving, Roger,” Laura demanded.