shoot him and he'll sue your ass

11/7/10.  park chili, northside.  two police cruisers parked on a side street.  cpd cops patrol alone -- every call draws two cruisers, the first responder often idling in his car waiting for backup.  no disturbance here, just brunch.  one cop dismounts by himself, the other accompanied by a nervous-looking woman (civilian) with darting eyes.  after huddling at the counter for a while they snag a booth across the way.  the nervous woman is crowded into the corner by the jagged tangle of her companion's winter uniform jacket, sidearm, taser, walkie-talkie, bat-utility belt, towering-jaunty hat, and long splayed legs under the table.  this looks very much like her customary position.  when this odd group first met up on the street I assumed she was there in some sort of official capacity -- informant?  witness?  suspect?  instead it looks like she's at least loosely affiliated with the alpha cop, though he doesn't acknowledge her much or ever look in her direction.  she's in a medium-puffy quilted brown jacket and jeans.  hair pulled back tightly, lightly freckled coffee-with-three-creams skin.  has a look that defies snap-judgment -- hollow cheeks and more-than-a-couple missing molars suggest a life on the edge, but respectable clothes and general well-kept appearances say something else.  I want to imagine vic mackey's ('the shield') girlfriend on a good day, but that's just misplaced fantasy.  dark dark eyes that fix briefly on something before immediately darting down to her busy hands...again and again.  laughs but rarely speaks, and then so quietly that I can't hear from ten feet away.

next to her on the booth bench is the alpha cop.  both cops are wearing three stripes, but this one is doing all the talking and outranks the other in charisma.  lanky tall and takes up as much room as a fat man because his limbs sprawl and his soaring buttresses white hat has a statue of liberty effect.  (cpd:  white cars, white hats, white shirts, black reputations.)  'the hat stays on,' when his opposite offers to stash it on the bench beside him.  resonant voice, casual almost bullying confidence: apparently nonchalant on every score but suddenly flashed confrontation on important matters like when it's okay to shoot a suspect and which midtown frisch's big boy is the best lunch spot.  early 50s, eyes that stare intently into insouciance most of the time only to narrow and swivel when the topic engages him.  laughing the false laugh of the supervisor sometimes and cackling freely sometimes.  alternating studied inscrutability and open sincerity.  I couldn't hear much of this conversation without staring, and staring at cops makes me nervous...but I caught bits.  at one point the conversation improbably turned to lethal force...the sort of thing you'd love to hear cops talk about but assume they never do, right?  the snippets I caught concerned a fellow officer who let two fly at a group of perps but missed all four with both shots, and then a hypothetical about when to fire.  man exits a bank with a shotgun under his arm -- do you shoot?  beta cop is all for it, but alpha says 'shoot him and he'll sue your ass' since you're not directly threatened.  if the shotgun is aimed at you, fire away.  but not before.  this seems to be the sort of thing that cop training would have covered in detail, esp for the trigger-happy cpd.  or a conversation that a cop would have with a civilian buddy at the bar...not something between two sergeants.  more pressing, however, was the restaurant review.  two frisch's big boys -- one on central parkway, one on spring grove.  which is better?  'I used to go to the one on spring grove,' says alpha.  'I hate the one on central,' says beta.  'why?'  'just don't like it.'  that answer is suddenly not enough for alpha, who demands more.  'you have to be more specific,' almost menacingly, eyes burning casually.  beta retreats and is noncommittal.  I'm sensing racial undercurrents...or is that fantasy again?  alpha is a black veteran of a force that has a vocal black patrolman's fraternity, the sentinels.  a likely browner central parkway diner vs appalachia north on spring grove...plus the perp-shooting discussion (cpd shoots black men almost exclusively, a fact that hasn't escaped the sentinels)?  who knows.

beta cop is also in his 50s.  irish flushed face, his hat doffed to reveal white grey swept up hair, semi-designer glasses with metallic blue stems and square wire rims jangling against a working class accent.  smile dances on and off nervously, flashing jumbled teeth.  he's angled away from me far enough that his mumbled responses are almost completely lost.  indelibly cincinnati.  west hi most likely, though elder is possible.  but for all that the alpha cop is busy lecturing him on the ins and outs of northside.  northside, you see, is 'ek...klectic,' with that pause for effect.  have to be prepared for anything.  alpha passing off command to beta on his way up the ladder?