Chapter 23: The Kash & Grab Shooting - Part 2
The police separated everyone immediately.
Ben, Ian, Mickey, Linda, and Kash—each isolated in different areas of the store while officers took preliminary statements. Ben sat on an overturned milk crate in the stockroom, hands still shaking, adrenaline making his thoughts race.
A detective entered fifteen minutes later. She was in her forties, tired eyes that had seen too much, moving with the efficient weariness of someone working their third double shift this week.
"Ben Fisher?" She consulted a notepad. "I'm Detective Morrison. Need to ask you some questions."
"Okay."
"Let's start simple. What were you doing here?"
Ben's Silver Tongue stirred, showing him approaches, optimal phrasing. He let it guide him without taking over completely.
"Walking past. Heard shouting, sounded wrong. Came to check."
"You ran toward shouting?" Morrison's eyebrow raised. "Most people run away."
"Ian works here. Ian Gallagher. I know his family. Thought he might be in trouble."
"So you know the Gallaghers." She wrote something. "How?"
"I'm a handyman. Fixed their washing machine a few weeks back. Know the kids, help out around the neighborhood."
Morrison flipped through her notes. "Multiple witnesses say you arrived exactly as the suspect pulled a weapon. Perfect timing. How?"
"Lucky."
"Lucky." Her tone was flat. "You were walking past, heard shouting, came inside at the exact second a robbery was happening. Then you shouted about police outside—which there weren't—and tackled an armed suspect. That's not lucky, Mr. Fisher. That's either prescient or planned."
Ben's Danger Intuition pulsed warnings. Morrison was smart, suspicious, building toward an accusation. He needed to redirect.
"I heard the shouting escalate. Recognized Ian's voice, panicked. The police thing was a bluff—hoped it would make the guy hesitate. It did. I took the shot." Ben met her eyes. "Stupid? Absolutely. But Ian's fifteen. Couldn't just walk away."
"How did you disarm him?"
"Tackled him. Gun went off, we fought, I got lucky with leverage." All true, if incomplete. The illusion that made the gun appear to jam stayed unmentioned.
Morrison studied him with the expression of someone solving a puzzle with missing pieces. "You have training? Military, security, anything?"
"No. Just grew up rough. You learn to handle yourself."
"Where'd you grow up?"
"Foster care. Moved around a lot. Chicago, mostly."
"Which agencies?"
Ben's Silver Tongue provided names he'd researched weeks ago, just in case. "DCFS placed me through Cook County. Aged out at eighteen. Been on my own since."
Morrison wrote this down, but her expression suggested she'd verify every detail. "The suspect—Mickey Milkovich—says you interfered in what was 'supposed to be easy.' Claims you knew something you shouldn't. Any idea what he means?"
"No. Kid was scared, desperate. Probably making excuses."
"He's also wondering how you knew to arrive exactly when you did."
"I didn't know. I heard trouble and reacted." Ben let frustration bleed into his voice—genuine emotion making the lie more convincing. "Look, I get how it looks. Suspicious timing, convenient heroics. But I was walking past, heard my friend might be in danger, and did something stupid. That's it."
Morrison's phone buzzed. She checked it, frowned, then looked back at Ben. "Your story checks with other witnesses. Ian confirms you're a family friend. Linda says you've done work at the store before—security improvements, actually. Kash says you warned him about keeping escape routes clear."
Ben's stomach tightened. His preparations at the store, meant to help, now looked like foreknowledge.
"I worry about convenience store safety," Ben said. "Lost someone to a robbery years ago. Makes me paranoid."
The lie hung in the air. Morrison weighed it, decided whether to push.
"We're going to keep investigating," she said finally. "Your timing's convenient enough to warrant scrutiny. But right now, you stopped a robbery and probably saved a kid's life. So I'm letting you go with a warning: don't play hero. You're not trained, not authorized. Next time, call police instead of tackling armed suspects."
"Understood."
"And stay available. If we have more questions, I expect cooperation."
"Of course."
Morrison left. Ben sat alone in the stockroom, surrounded by boxes of inventory, and felt the weight of a lie that had held but wouldn't survive serious investigation.
She knows something's off. She's letting it go for now because the outcome was good. But if she digs deeper, if she runs my foster care story and finds inconsistencies...
An officer appeared. "You're free to go. Exit through the front."
Fiona was waiting outside.
Ben stepped through the police tape to find her standing on the sidewalk, arms crossed, expression cycling through emotions too fast to track. She looked like she'd run the whole way—hair disheveled, coat thrown on wrong, breathing hard.
She walked up to Ben and slapped him across the face.
The impact snapped his head to the side. His cheek exploded with stinging pain. Before he could react, Fiona grabbed him and pulled him into a crushing hug.
"You fucking idiot," she said into his shoulder. Her voice was shaking. "You stupid, reckless, insane—"
She was crying. Ben could feel her trembling against him, adrenaline and terror and relief all mixed into something incoherent.
"Ian's okay," Ben managed.
"I know. Lip called me. Said there was a shooting, said Ian was there, said some guy stopped it." She pulled back to look at him, hands gripping his jacket. "How did you know to be there?"
The question he'd been dreading. The one he couldn't answer honestly.
"I was walking past. Heard shouting. Went to check."
"Bullshit." Fiona's eyes searched his face. "You warned Ian yesterday. Told him to leave if anything felt dangerous. You knew something was coming."
"I worry about convenience store safety—"
"Don't." Her voice was sharp. "Don't give me that line you gave the cops. I'm not Detective Morrison. I'm asking you directly: how did you know?"
Ben's Silver Tongue offered smooth lies, convincing explanations. He forced it down. Fiona deserved better than supernatural manipulation, even if the truth was impossible.
"I didn't know," he said quietly. "I worried. That's all. Worried something might happen because Ian works there, because it's South Side, because bad things happen to people I care about. So I warned him, and I happened to be nearby when my paranoia proved right."
Fiona stared at him. Weighing his words against her instincts, his timing against probability, the impossible convenience against her desperate need to believe him.
"You're either the luckiest person I've ever met or you're lying," she said finally. "And I can't decide which scares me more."
Then she kissed him.
Brief, fierce, grateful. Her lips against his for three seconds that felt eternal. Then she pulled away, breathing hard.
"Thank you," she said. "For being there. For saving him. For—" Her voice broke. "Thank you."
"Where is he?"
"Inside. Giving his statement." Fiona wiped her eyes. "Come on. He'll want to see you."
Ian sat in the police station lobby, staring at nothing.
He looked smaller somehow, diminished. The shock hadn't worn off—Ben could see it in the vacant expression, the tremor in his hands, the way Ian held himself like he might shatter if he moved wrong.
Fiona approached first, pulling Ian into a fierce hug. Ian let himself be held but didn't respond, just stayed frozen. His eyes tracked to Ben over Fiona's shoulder.
The question was there, unspoken but present: How did you know?
"Let's go home," Fiona said. "Come on. Everyone's waiting."
They walked in silence. February cold bit through clothes no one had remembered to wear properly. Fiona kept one arm around Ian's shoulders. Ben walked slightly behind, giving them space.
Three blocks from the station, Ian spoke.
"You told me to leave if anything felt dangerous."
"Yeah."
"Yesterday. You specifically warned me about convenience store robberies." Ian's voice was flat, emotionless. "How did you know?"
Ben's Danger Intuition pulsed softly. This was a threshold—he could lie again, maintain the coincidence story, or he could acknowledge the impossibility and watch Ian's trust break.
"I didn't know," Ben said. "I worried. Sometimes my worry is right."
"That's not an answer."
"It's the only one I have."
Ian stopped walking. Turned to face Ben directly. "You arrived exactly when Mickey pulled the gun. Perfect timing. Like you knew the exact second it would happen."
"I heard shouting. Ran toward it. Got lucky with timing."
"Lucky." Ian's laugh was bitter. "That's what everyone keeps saying. Lucky Ben. But luck doesn't work like that. Luck doesn't put you in the right place at the right second every single time."
"Ian—" Fiona started.
"No, it's fine." Ian looked at Ben with an expression that mixed gratitude and suspicion in equal measure. "I don't know how you knew. Don't know if you're psychic or just insanely perceptive or something else entirely. But thank you. For being there. For stopping it before—" His voice cracked. "Before I got shot."
The acknowledgment hit Ben like a punch. Ian understood how close he'd come to dying. Understood that Ben's intervention was the difference between this conversation and a hospital room or worse.
"You're welcome," Ben said quietly.
They resumed walking. Fiona held Ian tighter. Ben followed, feeling the weight of unspoken questions and impossible answers.
He'll never believe the coincidence story. He's too smart, saw too much. But he's accepting it anyway because what's the alternative? Accusing me of precognition? Demanding explanations I can't give?
The Gallagher house appeared ahead—lights on in every window, shapes moving behind curtains. The family was waiting, probably frantic with worry and relief in equal measure.
"One more thing," Ian said at the door. "You said if treatment and support work, bipolar gets better. That was true, right? You weren't just telling me what I wanted to hear about Mom?"
The question was about Monica, but it was really about trust. Could Ian trust anything Ben said if his timing was impossible?
"It was true," Ben said. "With proper treatment and support, people with bipolar disorder can manage it. Live full lives. I wasn't lying about that."
Ian nodded. Seemed to accept this. "Okay. Good."
They went inside to chaos—Debbie crying in relief, Carl demanding details with morbid enthusiasm, Lip assessing Ben with complicated expression, Frank already spinning the story for maximum drama.
Ben stayed for twenty minutes, accepted thanks and questions and Debbie's fierce hug. But the attention felt suffocating, the gratitude like weights. He excused himself as soon as possible, citing exhaustion.
Walking back to his garage, Ben felt the neighborhood watching him differently. Word had spread already—the shooting, the intervention, Lucky Ben who'd saved Ian Gallagher through impossible timing.
His reputation had shifted from helpful handyman to something else entirely. Something more dangerous and less believable.
The nickname would stick now. Lucky Ben. The guy who showed up at exactly the right moments. Who knew things he shouldn't know. Who performed minor miracles disguised as coincidence.
And everyone would be watching to see what impossible thing he did next.
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