“Honeymoon Bandits” by Nick Fuller Googins

THOSE OF US PRESENT at the first holdup in January couldn’t let the fact be forgotten. Over coffee and donuts, at the barber shop, the nail salon, while watching our children’s hockey games, we made tasteful mention of our good fortune. “Remember their jumpiness at the beginning? They seem much more relaxed now,” we told each other. And they did. The Honeymoon Bandits, after a half-dozen robberies, had come a long way. The boy’s voice no longer cracked when he addressed us. The girl, who had once lingered by each bank’s entrance, casting nervous glances at the street, now floated among us like the host of a holiday party. “Are you staying warm?” she’d ask. “The wind is biting. Any colder and it’d leave teeth marks.”

We tittered from our crouched positions.

The girl had become a delightful conversationalist. While the boy conducted his business with the tellers, she smiled and inquired as to what we were reading. She preferred nonfiction, she told us, but wished to expand her horizons. She jotted down our recommendations, offered suggestions of her own. She was an independent young woman, sure of herself without the need for swagger or airs. We could only hope our own daughters would one day possess such poise.

Admittedly, their first robbery, in Woods Hole, had given us a scare. The boy, wearing a Lone Ranger mask, had cleared his throat in the bank’s lobby. “Excuse me,” he said, his voice catching, then reasserting. “Ladies and gentlemen? We’ll only take a moment. But–I’m so sorry–this is a stickup.”

We dropped to the floor. Some of us pressed our cheeks against the cool lobby tiles. Others began emptying pockets or purses. The lobby echoed with the clatter of cosmetic cases, keys, phones. A few of us whimpered. If our actions weren’t heroic–none of us attempted to flee, capture video evidence, or call the police–it was because we wanted to get this over with as quickly as possible. We’d seen enough movies to know that defiance led to hostage negotiations and shootouts. Noncooperation might mean being stuck in the bank for hours. Most of us were on lunch break: thirty-odd minutes to run errands, scarf something down, and clock back in at work. We thought of the apothecary, the grocery store, the post office, the things that had to be done before the kids needed to be picked up from basketball practice and the casserole had to go into the oven. We wanted to live, but we also wanted to get on with our afternoons.

The boy glanced at the entrance, where the girl was shifting from foot to foot, rolling and unrolling her sleeves. Her mask was bedazzled with black sequins and feathers, as though she’d just jumped off a Mardi Gras float. She motioned for him to hurry things along. He cleared his throat. “Dear people, your bank is insured by the full faith of the federal government. Your savings will be unaffected.” He sounded like a child reciting lines in a school play. “We’re sorry to inconvenience you,” he said, “but we require these funds–not for ourselves, but for the environment.”

The environment? Our confusion must have been audible.

“Global warming is destroying our planet,” the boy stammered.

“Things may still seem fine for now, but the honeymoon’s almost over–for all of us.”

Timidly, we raised our hands. Were he and the girl going to buy a hybrid? Invest in solar energy?

The boy looked to the girl.

She mouthed the words: Baby, we gotta go.

”Apologies,” he said, “but we don’t have time to discuss details.” He went to the teller’s window and stuffed an empty plastic bag through the tray. Mrs. Mamont was on duty. “Sorry to bother you, ma’am–if you wouldn’t mind, please give us the money.”

The manager, crouched on the floor with us, sputtered. “Nancy, you will do no such thing.” A corporate transfer from New York City, he had not won our approval. He snapped at Mrs. Mamont: “They aren’t even armed.” He looked at the boy. “You aren’t, are you?”

The boy, wisely, didn’t answer.

We shushed the manager and begged Mrs. Mamont to hand over the money. “Get them on their way,” we said, “before the police arrive. Things could get dangerous.”

Mrs. Mamont began to weep. She’d worked as a teller since we were children, sneaking us lollipops when we got fidgety in line with our mothers. We reminded ourselves of her kindness, her advancing years. We tried to be patient.

The boy leaned closer to the window. “Ma’am, I didn’t mean to upset you.”

Mrs. Mamont sniffled. “I know,” she said. “I can see you’re a fine young man.”

“So what’s the problem?” we asked.

She fluttered her hands. “I’m a member of the Audubon Society and the Sierra Club. I contribute to Greenpeace.” We snuck glances at each other, wondering where she was going. “I have five grandchildren and two great-grandchildren, and another on the way. I want them to enjoy the dunes, the ocean, the piping plovers. We’re all on this earth together.”

We murmured in agreement, hoping our enthusiasm might en­courage her to wrap it up.

“Young man,” she continued, “what you two are doing is noble. But you’re too late.”

“I humbly disagree, ma’am. It’s not too late if we all act now.”

“I mean too late for you,” Mrs. Mamont said. “The moment you spoke, I tripped the alarm. The police are on the way.”

We groaned. Mrs. Mamont’s crying again filled the lobby.

The girl abandoned her post by the entrance, skipped across the floor and squeezed her hands through the tray at the base of the teller window to grasp Mrs. Mamont’s fingertips.

“Ma’am, you were only doing your job,” she said. “If everyone cared as much as you, we wouldn’t need to rob banks. We’d all be outside, enjoying the world with those we love.”

Mrs. Mamont patted the girl’s fingers. “Aren’t you a dear.” She smoothed her blouse, took a deep breath, and moved quickly from till to till, filling the plastic bag, then tied it with a bow and slung it over the security divider.

Sirens wailed in the distance. The girl and boy, holding hands, ran for the exit. At the doorway, they stopped. The girl rolled and unrolled her sleeves. “We’re super sorry if we scared anyone.”

The boy bounced the bag of cash against his thigh. “Like we said, the money isn’t for us.”

“Not a penny,” the girl added.

The wail of the sirens grew sharper. We yelled for them to leave.

Then we stood, dusted ourselves off, and jockeyed for our former places in line.

 

THEY STRUCK AGAIN, later that week in Brewster, then again the day afterward, in Cotuit. We’d expected them to take the money and run. To Florida, most likely. Key West. Key Largo. One of the Keys. This was Cape Cod in late January, the heart of flu season, our days short and dark, holidays behind us, our registers empty of tourist dollars for many months to come. We dreamt of the Keys. Anything to help endure the Atlantic winds that raked our poor peninsula. The Honeymoon Bandits, bless them, had not abandoned us.

Once it became clear they weren’t leaving, we took stock of their character. We compared eyewitness accounts, noticing that they dressed sensibly. Heavy flannel shirts, wool caps, mittens, boots: signs that they respected both the winter and themselves. The girl had an athletic build, as though she’d once enjoyed competitive swimming. She did not display any unnecessary skin. Nor did she seem to apply makeup (perhaps her mask provided all the concealer she needed). She wore her dark hair in two braids that fell over her shoulders. She did have a tattoo that peeked out whenever she rolled up her sleeves, but it was modest enough: a sprig of Qyeen Anne’s lace tendriled around her forearm.

The boy, for his part, did not hang his trousers low, advertising his underpants to the world. He was lean, with lively blue eyes. Aside from his Lone Ranger mask and endearing manners, his chief accoutrement was his thickening facial hair. What had started as a roguish Clint Eastwood shadow became a Burt Reynolds mustache, then settled into a fisherman’s beard, which–we agreed–was most appropriate given the weather.

The couple wore no jewelry, only matching loops of purple thread on their ring fingers. Recently married–we suspected–saving up for proper rings. Then we laughed, for if anyone could afford genuine wedding bands, it was our Honeymoon Bandits. Yet they kept their word, or at least maintained the appearance of doing so: despite their withdrawals, they wore no glittering rings or fur coats or any such extravagances, a testament to their thrift. We examined how we ourselves might cut back. We urged our husbands to repair broken chairs rather than hauling them to the dump. We asked our wives to rig their sewing machines and mend our torn jackets. We brain­ stormed new ways to chip away at our credit card payments and took up the old habit of clipping coupons, unable to fathom why we’d ever stopped.

 

THE HONEYMOON BANDITS, by choosing to operate on the Cape, had gravely limited their options. They were all but surround­ed by ocean. Even with our secluded bogs and ponds, our wooded groves and empty summer cabins, they couldn’t hide forever. The ex­act date of their capture became a matter of speculation, leading to the creation of a betting pool. Just as we enjoyed staking a five on the season’s first snow, or the precise day the Bass River ice would break, we gambled on when exactly the Honeymoon Bandits’ luck would expire.

The only reason they hadn’t been caught already was because the federal authorities couldn’t cover our entire peninsula alone; the handful of agents assigned to the robberies had to work in tandem with local police. As is often the case, the ranks of our lawmen were comprised mostly of our former troublemakers, those youngsters who–had they not been given a badge and gun–would’ve joined the military or gone to jail. Their understanding of law enforcement included issuing speeding tickets to out-of-staters, shooting the occasional rabid raccoon, and finding dead-end roads on which to park their cruisers and nap. Whatever edge the federal government brought, our boys effectively dulled. And once our kids started dressing like the Honeymoon Bandits, the authorities didn’t stand a chance.

Bandits began popping up in our schools and sub shops, our pizza joints and cinemas. They could be seen purchasing chewing gum at the apothecary, skating on Bass River, waging snowball wars by the park gazebo. Our sons and daughters tore wanted posters from telephone poles and scotch taped them to their bedroom mirrors. None would leave the house without wearing a mask. We didn’t complain. By impersonating the Honeymoon Bandits, our children not only shielded their faces from the cold, but also provided a welcome respite to February. We were tired of waking to icy floorboards and shoveling out the car, stepping over petrified mounds of sooty sidewalk snow. Now, we still had slush and gray skies to contend with, but also young Bandits horsing around on the corner, giving one another piggyback rides and dragging sleds behind them. In these moments, the sleety dregs of the low season didn’t weigh as heavily.

Bandit fever made for quite a scene at a robbery in Chatham, when the Honeymoon Bandits barged in and found three small­er, fidgety versions of themselves in line, holding hands with their mothers. There was a tick of silence, then someone snickered and we erupted in laughter. The Honeymoon Bandits blushed beyond the edges of their masks. As the boy made his withdrawals, the girl tou­sled the hair of the nearest little Bandit. She high-fived another, and we noticed for the first time hashes of white scar tissue on her inner wrists. We tried not to stare. She wagged a finger at our children and, smiling, said, “Don’t do anything except out of love.”

“Absolutely!” we agreed. It might’ve been something off a refrigerator magnet, but coming from her, it didn’t sound so tacky. It sounded like good advice.

Our teenage daughters began dying their hair dark and wearing Pocahontas braids. They stopped caking their faces in quite so much makeup, and, for the most part, ceased starving themselves. They asked permission to get Queen Anne’s lace tattooed on their fore­ arms. When we said absolutely not, some resigned themselves to daily applications of the design in permanent marker, while others came home with arms red and swollen beneath layers of gauze. We were furious but anxious to prevent infection. We reminded them to wash frequently with antibacterial soap, to apply Vaseline and fresh bandages. Our sons could not resort to such extremes. The most they could do was grow their beards with vigor. Razors were left in bathroom vanities to rust.

Then came the rings of purple thread. Exasperated and embarrassed, our adolescent children shoved their hands in their pockets and answered us that no, the threads didn’t mean they’d eloped with their boyfriends and girlfriends.

“Then what?”

They shrugged, staring into the reaches of our family dens. “Just means you, like, like each other and care about stuff or whatever.”

“Oh!” we said. “You’re going steady!”

“Sure,” they said. They bundled up in couples and headed into the snowy woods to “search for the Honeymoon Bandits.” We were nervous, but happy. Our children were growing up. They’d gotten off their phones and computers at last; they were experiencing life be­yond the screen, making memories. The kind of memories the Honeymoon Bandits had begun awakening in us.

It had to do with the playful glances they flashed each other in our bank lobbies. The way they held hands at every quick escape. Their glow. They reminded us of being young, each new day rolling out with more anticipation than the last–the joy of working together toward something new and exciting. We tingled with that old hunger. Some of us discreetly acquired masks, his and hers. Our husbands and wives were pleasantly surprised; they’d been stirring with memories of similar intensity and breadth.

BANDIT FEVER PEAKED in mid-February when they struck in Hyannis and then three days later in Wellfleet. The Honeymoon Bandits–we realized–were robbing only the branches of the national chains, leaving our community-owned banks and credit unions untouched. We saw the pattern and cheered, for whom among us did not have a cousin who’d lost a home to foreclosure? An elderly neighbor whose meager retirement income had been halved? These gigantic financial institutions had wormed their way into our towns, earned our trust, then pulled out the rug and turned a tidy profit. As we limped through another low season, waiting until the summer tourists needed us to take them fishing, cater their garden parties, serve them lobster rolls, those bankers were in the Caribbean, yachting from St. Something to St. Something Else. Talk about criminal. Why weren’t the authorities chasing them? We were not a spiteful people. We wouldn’t publicly judge, or jeer, or cast stones. At the same time, if someone else was going to cast the stones, we could find it in us to look the other way.

Some of us felt the itch to do more. Ken Dorsett hung a banner in the apothecary window: 10% off throat lozenges if you “Like” the Honeymoon Bandits. Sully’s garage sold bumper stickers: I Brake for Bandits. Mrs. Mamont abruptly retired, ordered a pallet of custom-made T-shirts (I’d Rather be Banking with Bandits) and distributed them freely. Purple ribbons appeared around telephone poles and street signs. We called off the betting pool, donated the money to the local food pantry. We wondered what more we could do to show our ap­preciation. Some of us offered to bake casseroles. Casseroles or cake.

“Casseroles,” the Bandits decided, after consulting briefly in the corner of a bank in Mashpee. “We’re not big on sweets.”

Of course they weren’t. We were on the lobby floor, assuming our usual prone positions.

“But–” The boy glanced at the girl.

“What?” we said. “You’d prefer lasagna? We can do lasagna.”

He waved us off.” Casserole sounds delicious.”

The girl shifted the sack of money from hip to hip. “Baby, tell them,” she said.

“Tell us what?”

“It’s nothing,” he said.

The girl smiled wickedly. “Oh, it’s something.”

“What?” We were dying to know.

“He’s vegan,” she said. “He’s vegan and he’s embarrassed to–“

The boy interrupted. “It’s not a judgment on anyone. It’s just what I do. I can pick around the dairy.”

The girl winked at us and mouthed the words: No he can’t.

We went home, searched for recipes online. Seitan? Arrowroot? Nutritional yeast? These vegan casseroles, we realized, were going to be a headache. Then we remembered what must’ve been a big­ger headache: running about as fugitives in the brutal winter. Where were the Honeymoon Bandits sleeping? How did they get around, stay fed, keep warm? Nobody knew. But did the Bandits complain? They did not complain, at least not on the job. On the job they acted as though they were enjoying themselves. And if they could do that, we could learn our way around a vegan casserole.

The casseroles emerged from our ovens looking better than expected. Then the obvious problem arose: not only would we have to guess where the Honeymoon Bandits would strike next, we would have to be there with our casseroles, which–ideally–would be warm. It was ludicrous. We set our tables and fed our families. The casseroles were a hit. Our children dug in, served themselves seconds, and elicited promises that we’d soon bake these dishes again.

 

SENTIMENTS SHIFTED in late February after the first of the “eco-attacks” up north, beginning with a string of SUV dealerships in Vermont. The cable networks broadcasted footage of burning vehicles. No one had claimed responsibility. Pundits spouted theories ranging from disgruntled employees to renegade environmentalists, the most absurd of which involved the Honeymoon Bandits. We scoffed. The Honeymoon Bandits cracked jokes and high-fived our kids. They said “Ma’am,” held hands, apologized for every conceivable slight. They bundled up responsibly for the winter and kicked the snow off their boots before entering our banks. They did nothing except out of love; they’d said those very words! Plus, they worked here on Cape Cod. How could they be in two places at once?

Next went an oil pipeline in Maine, a bigger job, requiring know­ how. Know-how and funding. The pundits wouldn’t give up. They suggested the Honeymoon Bandits were financing the attacks. This time we weren’t so quick to scoff. The allegation, although still preposterous, did reintroduce an awkward question: what were the Honeymoon Bandits doing with the thousands they’d robbed from our banks? Combating global warming, they claimed, but they’d offered no proof, no details, no receipts.

To be sure, nobody was saying they were involved. At the same time, our car bumpers began sporting gummy patches of adhesive where they’d once expressed an enthusiasm to Brake for Bandits. Purple ribbons weren’t replaced quite so quickly when the wind tore them from telephone poles. Forgotten scraps of color fluttered down our streets.

The following week, a dozen hydraulic fracking rigs went down across eastern Pennsylvania. With them went Ken Dorsett’s banner from the apothecary window, and–at our insistence–the wanted posters from our children’s bedroom mirrors. Mrs. Mamont alone continued wearing her Bandits T-shirt. Our young children no longer played outside in masks. We forbade it. Our adolescent sons and daughters were more difficult. Despite our warnings, they persisted in wandering into the woods with their purple threads and vegan casserole leftovers. They were past the age where we could force them to obey us. When begging failed, we offered our car keys, suggested they go to the movies. They declined.

Some of us attempted to lighten the mood by poking fun at how easily we allowed the media to scare us, the eight million ways we would inevitably find to overreact. After all, not a shred of evidence existed that the Honeymoon Bandits were involved. The problem, of course, was that not a shred of evidence existed that they weren’t.

All that connected the Bandits to the eco-attacks were their impassioned pleas regarding the environment, which we’d taken to heart. We hadn’t needed convincing; anyone could tell things were changing. We saw it in our dwindling dunes. The nor’easters, worse each year. The Atlantic cod that no longer swelled our nets. Overfishing, they told us, but after decades of regulation had grounded our trawlers, why hadn’t our cod returned? Where were the stripers? The littlenecks? Something needed to be done. We did what we could: we recycled; we turned off the lights; we didn’t leave our engines idling. The Honeymoon Bandits cared for the environment; so did we. But caring for the environment did not include the violent destruction of property. If there was a chance the Honeymoon Bandits were indeed funding the eco-attacks, we could no longer extend our hands or vegan casseroles in support. Could we?

Our adolescent sons and daughters thought we could, and absolutely should. The eco-attacks weren’t harming anyone, they pointed out, only striking back against the machinery devastating the planet­–not so different from robbing the banks that had swindled us and ruined the economy.

We shook our heads. “It’s different.”

“How is it different?”

“It just is. What kind of world would this be if everyone ran around blowing things up? Disagreements must be worked out, discussed–“

Our children cut us off. Tears formed in their eyes. “You don’t understand–we’re running out of time!”

What we understood was that our sons and daughters had adopt­ed not only the fashions and tastes of the Honeymoon Bandits, but their convictions and anxieties as well.

We tried to remain calm. Over emergency cups of coffee at the Variety Store, frantic fly-by chats in line at the post office, we reminded one another that the Honeymoon Bandits were good mannered, possessing a strong sense of environmental stewardship and civic duty. Weren’t any of these characteristics more than we’d come to expect from the athletes and pop stars our children had worshipped in the past? Compared to what our kids used to worry us with–drugs, drunken driving, pregnancy, leaving the house without a jacket–a vibrant concern for the environment was an unquestionable improvement. Empathy and compassion were the utmost signs of emotional maturity. What parent wouldn’t encourage such healthy adolescent development?

Growing up, we’d been taught to expect the simple and straight­ forward: marriage, kids, a decent job, a small boat with a dependable outboard motor. A night game at Fenway each summer. This much we understood and worked for, and it rarely came easily, but it was enough. We wondered about growing up now, witnessing things slipping backward instead of moving forward. Adolescence seemed darker today, the jobs fewer, the stakes higher. How else to explain the devastating ways our children found to abuse themselves–our sons and daughters who’d run away, developed addictions, cut their wrists? Some had scars like the girl. Others had gone deeper, never given themselves the chance to heal. How would we have turned out, without the expectation of a better tomorrow? We loved our children. We wanted them to care, we did. We just didn’t want them to care too much.

 

THEN WENT A COAL-FIRED POWER PLANT in New Hampshire. What the media had been calling “eco-attacks,” the government now declared terrorism. Overnight, the handful of federal agents assigned to the bank robberies became a small army. Some believed this proved the Honeymoon Bandits’ involvement. Others believed it proved the authorities’ desperation. Black SUVs prowled our streets. Helicopters chopped our skies. Beefy men sporting crewcuts and bulletproof vests occupied our diner booths and barstools, our motel rooms and parking spots. If they hadn’t tipped so generously, we would’ve called our town selectmen to complain.

With the authorities came the news crews. They unpacked their cameras and filmed our banks. They filmed the authorities. They filmed the authorities filming our banks. They tried to film us, a privilege usually bestowed only upon visiting summer luminaries. We declined. We weren’t people to cavort for cameras. Only Mrs. Mamont agreed to an interview. She appeared on the evening news, wearing her Bandits T-shirt. The correspondent asked if she believed the fugitive couple was involved in eco-terrorism.

“You mean that bit of mischief up north?” Her eyes glittered. “Hard saying, not knowing.”

A week passed with no action. The news crews drove north to Provincetown where they could enjoy the restaurants, art galleries, and nightlife while waiting for something to happen. Another slow week passed, then another. A month. The Honeymoon Bandits had either escaped or retired. The tabloids ran the obvious headline: “Is the Honeymoon Over?”

Everything the boy and girl had stirred up began to settle. The authorities geared down, deploying their resources elsewhere. Soon they’d be gone. We hoped our children’s global-warming anxieties would disappear with them. Then we could all focus on work and school and church and surviving another winter. We breathed a sigh of relief. But we didn’t feel relieved. Some things, once stirred, don’t settle. The Honeymoon Bandits lingered. And then they popped up again in Provincetown for their biggest heist yet.

 

THREE BANKS IN THIRTY MINUTES.

We heard the news and flocked to the nearest television. Nobody imagined they’d be so bold, least of all the authorities. Provincetown, at the tip of the Cape, had been left more or less unguarded. The authorities, recognizing their mistake, immediately closed Route 6, the only way out of P-Town. Police cars, black SUVs, and news vehicles clogged the narrow road, sirens blaring as they raced north.

The cable networks broadcast live from Provincetown. A news­ caster reported from a helicopter. Cameras captured the Honeymoon Bandits sliding down sidewalks. The sky was snowing heavily. Through the flakes we caught glimpses of their masks, the girl’s braids. Plastic bags, ripe with cash, swung from mittened hands. They made tracks in the snow, trails of footprints that pinballed between gray shingled buildings. They paused beneath an awning to change direction, doubling back, trying to shake the helicopter. There was something disturbing in their scrambling, a franticness that seemed unlike them. The Honeymoon Bandits were scared.

Those of us watching from the comfort of our family dens brought our knees to our chests and huddled into the deepest recesses of our sofas. Those of us watching from work chewed nervously on the strings of our aprons and the knuckles of our work gloves. We’d ap­plauded the Bandits, coddled and adored them, and then turned our backs. Perhaps they had funded the eco-attacks. Or perhaps they’d paid off their student loans, or sent money to their families. The only ones who could say what they’d done with their loot were the Honeymoon Bandits themselves, who were now seeking shelter by a shuttered ice cream stand, looking small and alone.

They hid beneath the stand’s overhanging roof, momentarily dis­appearing from view. Then came a new, louder throbbing. The news cameras panned upward. A black helicopter swooped in from the south, rotors thudding through the falling snow.

“Here comes the cavalry!” the newscaster shouted, a little too ex­cited for our liking.

The Honeymoon Bandits poked their heads from beneath the overhang. They caught sight of the chopper and we could practically see them deflate. What they didn’t know was that five miles south, on slippery Route 6, a pileup had brought the caravan of law enforcement and news vans to a standstill.

The newsfeed aired shots of crumpled fenders and spinning tires. Sprinkles of tinted windshield glass dotted the snowy pavement. Local police and federal authorities were standing around chewing each other out while waiting for tow trucks. We couldn’t help but notice that, of the many injured vehicles blocking the road, those at the head of the accident were all black SUVs with government plates. Out-of-towners always took one good bang-up to understand that winter driving isn’t something to be taken lightly, much less learned on the fly.

Coverage flashed back to Provincetown.

“They’re making a run for it!” the newscaster yelled. “This is it, folks! Their last stand!”

We’d had enough of his tone. We muted our televisions and watched in silence as the Honeymoon Bandits ran east, then cut south along the beach. Their tracks, straight and purposeful, headed toward the Provincetown pier.

Had this been July instead of February, the pier would’ve bristled with yachts, speedboats, ferries–plenty of options for escape. The Honeymoon Bandits found only a rusty fishing trawler. The boat listed as they jumped aboard and rummaged about. Whatever they were looking for–keys, a sympathetic fisherman–wasn’t there. They climbed out of the boat. The girl took the boy’s hand. They glanced at the helicopters, exchanged a few words, and walked to the end of the pier.

The news helicopter maneuvered for a close-up as the boy wrapped his arm around the girl. The force of the rotors churned the water. The fishing trawler pitched against its moorings. The girl brushed the snow from the boy’s shoulder and rested her head, and as they gazed out across the harbor, we saw beyond their masks and bags of cash. We saw them not as fugitives, but as a loving couple enjoying a moment of bliss, happily weary at the end of a satisfying day.

The black helicopter veered over the harbor and landed on the beach. A door slid open. Three agents in tactical gear hopped out and ran for the pier. We leapt forward and screamed at our televisions, employing an intensity usually reserved only for when the Sox are down in the ninth and in genuine need of our help. Only, this was no game. We yelled louder, knowing the Honeymoon Bandits couldn’t hear us, knowing we were too late.

The boy nudged the girl and pointed to the horizon. The girl blinked through the falling snow. She mouthed the words: Baby, oh my God.

The camera swept around, bringing into focus an advancing flotilla, dozens of dinghies, Boston Whalers, and aluminum-hulled fishing boats. They were our boats. And captaining them were our teenage sons and daughters.

We staggered from our televisions. When had our boats–pulled up for the winter–slid back into the water? We were confused. And angry. We would ground our children, take away their phones, revoke their driving and internet privileges, send them to military academies, Catholic schools. But above all, we were scared. Our children skipped across the cold ocean, and we were helpless to do anything but watch. They stood tall, leaning into the wind and slanting snow. They’d crowded the small boats, riding five or six to each. Our sons had grown their beards. Our daughters had braided their hair. All wore masks. They pulled up to the pier and the Honeymoon Bandits tum­bled into their waiting arms. The government agents pivoted and sprinted back for their helicopter. At the same time, reinforcements finally arrived. SUVs and cruisers tore toward the water.

Our children pushed off the pier and raced from the harbor. They zigzagged through the waves, spun their boats in tight donuts, curled around and slapped the wake. The air misted and foamed. The news camera attempted to keep the real Honeymoon Bandits in sight, but it was like trying to following the queen of hearts in  a game of three-card monte. We couldn’t tell our own sons and daughters apart. We recalled their many trips into the snowy woods. All those portions of leftover vegan casserole. The purple threads. They were all Honeymoon Bandits now.

In the open waters of Cape Cod Bay, the boats clustered together. We worried something was wrong. Someone was hurt. They’d run out of gas. Our outboard motors–while dependable–had been pushed too hard.

The boats bobbed, gently bumping against one another. The falling snow melted into the waves. Our children looked up. Their breath steamed the air. Snowflakes gathered on our sons’ bearded faces and clung to the feathered carnival masks of our daughters. Our children waved to the cameras. We waved back. Those were our kids down there, our boys and girls. There would soon be consequences, of course–grave consequences–but for now, as each boat pulled away on a separate bearing, we felt something other than anger or fear. Our children had performed better than we could’ve hoped or expected. Better than we ever had. Much better. We’d never been so proud.