“listen, man,” homer says, “i dunno what you want me to tell you. like, i wasn’t even there.”
the cop who smells like bear claw donuts and watering hose plastic slaps his hands flat on the table, toying with the corner of something papery; maybe a folder, or a photo. the cop whose uniform swishes like lycra when he walks–and, though this is just a guess, is probably wearing knock-off ray ban pilot sunglasses that he hasn’t taken off once in his life–leans against the two-way mirror so hard that the buttons on the shoulder of his uniform click against the glass.
“kid, i admire your desire to keep your friends out of trouble,” Donut Mouth says. “but a real house really burned down. people could have died.”
“look at it from our point of view,” Ray Ban suggests. “because from our point of view, it looks like a prank war got out of control and ended in arson. you don’t want arson on your record.”
homer, who has been in this police station since three-thirty in the goddamn morning and is more hungover than he has ever been in his entire fucking life, leans back in his chair and folds his arms over his chest.
“oh, you want me to look at it from your point of view,” he drawls. “nice. real fucking nice.”
the embarrassed pause is enough for homer to gather his wits a little: if he pushes past the pounding in his head he can kind of remember how he got here. he knows that the cops were right; there was definitely a fire, and it was almost definitely the greek alpha sig’s fault, although if you really go all the way back it’s not like they were unprovoked.
he sips at the coffee they’d given him a little while ago. it’s almost cold, but it helps quiet the pounding in his brain. pancakes would have helped more, but he doesn’t think the police station have those on the menu, and even if they do, it isn’t like they’re going to be any good if the quality of their coffee is any indication.
he tries to figure out how long he’s been here, in realtime not drunk time. probably an hour at least. so–that’s one down, and they can only keep him for twenty-four, right?
yeah. he’s pretty sure. so all he has to do is make it twenty-four hours without telling them who actually started the fire but also without being, like, a hostile witness, or whatever. he doesn’t actually know that much about the law, but he remembers that one brooklyn nine nine episode where jake arrested someone too early and they had to find something to charge him with in one day
homer is fairly confident that he can’t get charged with anything he’s done lately, but he does definitely smell like weed, so.
love, justice, and homer all are blind, but none of them are stupid, so he rubs at his eyes and says, “okay. fine. i’ll tell you what i know, but like, most of this is just what i heard. it’s not gonna hold up in court. i mean, i didn’t see anything.”
“obviously,” says Ray Ban.
“what do you mean, ‘obviously’? that’s fucking ableist, man.”
“roy,” Donut Mouth interrupts, tone a warning. “go on, son.”
“okay,” homer says. he takes a deep breath. “so like–okay, what you have to understand is we’re deep in this war, right? i mean, this has been going on since like, the first toga party of the year, when this transfer kid, paris, hooked up with helen during rush.”
“manny atreus’ girlfriend. or–ex-girlfriend, i guess. she’s alpha delta chi.”
“so manny atreus burned down the trojan house because … his girlfriend cheated on him in paris?”
“what? no. i never said he burned it down, i said the prank war started because his girlfriend cheated on him, and not in paris, with paris.”
“someone’s parents named them paris?”
“i don’t fucking know, man, i didn’t name him. that’s just what he’s called. maybe it’s a family name.”
“my dude, i’m called homer. you think i’m judging people on the weird shit their parents named them?”
Donut Mouth coughs into his hand. “fair point.”
“okay. so: manny said we had to go to war, for like, honor or something, and honestly at first it sounded kind of fun, so we just kind of went with it. but …”
he trails off. august seems like such a long time ago. a whole lifetime. maybe more than one.
homer’s head hurts. he’s so hungover he thinks he can smell beer in his sweat. he can definitely smell weed. it’s going to be a long, long, long day.
“i dunno,” he admits. “i guess things just got–a little out of hand.”
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