Johnnie's Diner

          With the distinct smell of roasted coffee and light cigarettes in the air, Willis constantly taps his finger on the wooden table next to his now-empty plate. The classic “Running Scared” by Roy Orbison is playing and yet only few people can be found in Johnnie’s Diner on a Tuesday morning. The clock strikes 11:15 as Willis looks out the window to his right. The light of the sun reflects off the windows of a sky scrapper and bounce directly onto the smooth flow of traffic. Nothing but blue takes up all of the sky with not a single trace of white. Even the insanely nervous Willis admits it’s a beautiful day by definition. And of course, his foot starts to counter the movement of his finger without his direct notice. It’s been an hour of him looking out the window, the front door, the man in the Hawaiian shirt located in the back, and the window as a repeat. Occasionally he glances at Sara, the waitress who’s as equally as nervous.

            Finally, after two over easy eggs, hash brown, and bacon, he walks in. Willis is almost certain it’s him. The man wearing a dark gray jacket with khaki pants and a silver watch on his wrist matching his aviators, who happens to be alone, makes it almost too obvious to be identified. Even though Willis has never seen this man before, they have been destined to meet since they were born. They weren’t simply two ships passing by. The man walks up to the hostess to ask for a menu and reveals his limp. Willis now has a purpose to his life.

            Slowly, Willis looks at Sara and signals out the hooded man. She nods in response. But when Willis looks back at the man, he finds a pair of sunglasses staring right back at him. The seconds that pass before them feel like a lifetime, specifically both of theirs as they pass right before their eyes. Sara notices the tension between the two of them and her heart drops all at once. The pair of sunglasses then slowly walks to Willis, who has now pulled out his glock nine from his pants and holds it underneath the table, and tells him to relax using his hands. The man takes a seat right in front of Willis.

            “I have a gun, too. But I won’t take it out. At least not yet,” The man finally says.

            “There are two cops sitting behind me. How about we keep your gun where it is?” Willis said.

            The man looks at the pair of blue uniforms drinking coffee. “It won’t matter in a bit. None of us are walking out of here alive,” he sighs, “I tend to always finish my personal matters. That’s one thing my abusive brother always taught me. In fact, I was just thinking that you remind me of him. All these weeks of us online chatting, threatening each other in this twisted game, I’d never thought about you having the same face my brother had.”

            “Don’t try to open up to me. You’ve been nothing but hell for my life.”

            “Oh, don’t blame what happened to your mother on me. You put us in this situation.” the man scratches his head, “We’re similar. The first kill is always an accident. The second is much easier because you have a reason to do it.”

            “Yours is pleasure. Mine is justice, punishment,” Willis calls for a waitress.

            “Killing is still killing. The news headline of this will sound like a joke. A serial killer and a vigilante engage in a shootout within a diner.” The man looks at Sara come and poor coffee into Willis’s cup. The smoke trail leads to Sara’s eyes that glare back at him. She leaves. “I’m still kind of surprised she managed to get that shot on me,” he pats his leg, “I guess it was luck.”

            “Trust me,” Willis closes in on him, “it wasn’t.”

            “I guess not. After all, I haven’t slept for the pass few days,” the man sips Willis’s coffee, “I need rest.

            Willis smiles, “You shouldn’t have told me that…”

            “What?”

            The next moments happen all too fast. Willis punches both the coffee and the aviators from the man’s face and pulls out the gun. Both men struggle in the fight for the weapon as it’s found in their hands. Pulling and grunting, the gun ends up pointing to Willis’s face and the man is about to pull the trigger when Sara shoots him in the neck. The cops rush towards the three from their corner table. The man now has the gun and shoots several times near Willis’s head but misses. Instead the bullets travel to the police officer in the middle of calling for dispatch. Willis hits the floor and starts to crawl away from his booth. Sara continues to shoot but never lands a hit. The man then clips her arm, and she ducks for cover behind the counter in pain.

            Making his way toward the last cop, Willis feels two sharp injuries on his right leg. He’s been shot. The cop tells Willis to stop, but Willis continues to crawl. People around are ducking for cover, screaming. The man switches to his gun. The police officer spots Sara is about to shoot the man when the cop engages and strikes her head. Her body falls causing her last shot to hit the Hawaiian shirt man’s head, who seemingly happens to be pulling out a gun. Willis grabs the gun of the fallen police officer and kills the remaining one in anger.

            Willis goes out the side exit and heads across the street with a limp. The man has other plans for him. He shoots Willis in the back and he falls in the middle of the road. The man, holding his neck to stop excessive bleeding, walks to the now dead Willis lying underneath sunlight. As a smile appears on the man’s face, a car hits him directly, on accident, killing him instantly. The driver steps out and looks at the two dead bodies on the street. She starts to tap her foot.