A/N:
All of Joey's observations from the interrogation room throughout the chapters are in bold.
The story is told from my character Maddy's perspective. The chapters will continue weekly as the episodes progress. I'll write one chapter for every episode. Possibly more if the episode is eventful.
Have fun reading and please review!
--------------------------------------------------
The unamused cop leaned back in his chair and let out a deep sigh, eyeing the lanky Irish kid who he and his partner had been questioning for the past half hour. He puts a hand up, "Enough about that. Go back. We need you to tell us about.." He looks at a file, "Madolyn Bella Fabrizzio. Her name's right under Jimmy Donnelly's. Girlfriend?"
Joey laughs, placing his hands on the table in front of him. "When they weren't trying to tear eachothers heads off, yeah. She was his girl and everyone knew it. Even the people who didn't know Jimmy knew that Maddie belonged to someone. Girls like that always do. She was more like family, actually. To all of the Donnelly's. She was the last one to come into the gang. You see, Maddie moved to the neighborhood after her Ma died with her Pop. Mean son of a bitch. Always drunk. I don't think I ever saw that guy sober. Even the bad ass Irish neighborhood guys were sober once in awhile. But this guy? Not a chance. Mad's Grandmother lived on Riverton Court.. like.. I don't know, a block away from where everyone else lived. She was always over there and everyday she would sit on the front steps and wait for her Pop to pick her up. She'd been doing that at the same time every day since she was five years old. It took four years for anyone to notice her."
And on a certain Summer afternoon, fate stepped in...
--------------------------------------------------
I had seen the tall and skinny girl with the unkept brunette mop of hair, usually covered by a red baseball cap, before. I'd gone to the same school as all of them since the first grade. Why was it that day? Why not some other random afternoon? It always confuses the hell out of me. Who knew they'd end up being the only family I'd ever know? Life's funny that way. If it doesn't kill us, it makes us stronger.
I was sitting on the second to last step of my Gram's apartment building trying to fasten one of those barrettes into my hair. It wasn't going well. The damn thing kept sticking to my hair. I'd spilled some juice or something on it earlier. I loved my hair. No, fuck that, I love my hair. Most people won't admit what they really love about themselves, but I will. My favorite part of every day when I was a kid was brushing my long, red hair and choosing what kind of barrettes I was going to put in. I must have owned about a hundred of those things. But these new ones were useless. Blue diamond butterflies I'd gotten for my birthday the week before. They came from my crazy Aunt Maureen from South Boston. Maureen was always giving me gifts that either didn't work right or got lost my first day of having it. Go figure.
I try again to make the barrette stay, and I mean I'm really trying hard, when I hear someone screaming from the side of me.
Jenny Reilly was barrelling down the sidewalk towards me chasing Joey. He was running away from her with the red hat in his hand. "Give it back, Joey! Come on!"
I look up and when I did the barrette dropped on the sidewalk. I lean down to pick it up and Jenny's foot passes by so fast I don't know what to think.. until I hear a small crack. She crushed my birthday present. My face dropped. I would have started crying if she hadn't have come back.
Jenny leaned over beside me, panting. "You okay?"
I shake my head, trying to hold back the tears. My eyes are still on the broken present on the sidewalk. "Yeah, I'm fine. Forget it."
Jenny's eyes shift to where mine are. A sad expression comes across her face. "Oh, I didn't see it there when I passed by. I'm sorry I broke it." She picks it up, and examines it. I still remember that moment. Jenny Reilly the tomboy being exposed to something girls actually wore. She didn't even know that it was normal to put things in her hair other than a stinky old baseball cap.
"This is probably a stupid question, but-- what is it? Or, what was it?" Jenny asks and hands it back to me.
I look up at her shocked. "You've never seen a barrette before? You put it in your hair. Or most girls do anyway. Don't you wear them?"
She shakes her head, "Nah, they wouldn't go with my lucky cap. Or at least it was lucky until Joey got ahold of it. I never go anywhere without it."
A dark haired kid runs up to us from the opposite direction with one hand behind his back. I'd seen him around the neighborhood before. He was always with three other kids. One older and the other two younger, I had always assumed. One of them always called him Tommy. "Guess what I found?"
"Tommy, you have to--" Jenny's eyes got wider when she saw the hat in Tommy's hand. "Did you have to fight him for it?"
He shakes his head, a little embarrassed at the question. "Nope, I just told him to give it to me and he did."
Jenny gives him a small peck on the cheek as she puts the hat on backwards. "Thanks, Tommy."
I look up to catch him start to blush and his eyes turn to the ground. It was so obvious that he was in love with her. Even then. At least it was to me.
Jenny looks down at me, "So, what are you doing?"
She had one of the most innocent sounding voices I'd ever heard. She sounded almost like a small bird. I look up at her, sheilding my eyes from the sun. "Waiting for my Pop. He'll be here, but sometimes he's late. I'm not supposed to move until he drives up."
Jenny glances around, "Says who?"
"My Gram. She lives right up there." I point to the building above my head.
She smiles down at me, "Want to play with us until he gets here? We play right over there by the fence."
"Umm-- what are you playing?" I ask hesitantly. I hate getting dirty. It's my least favorite thing to do next to leaving my Gram's apartment.
"Stickball! It's the best game in the world. Isn't it Tommy? Tell her."
Tommy only shrugs, making eye contact with me from his ground view. "It's okay. My big brother Jimmy usually wins. But it's fun I guess."
I look up at the apartment building thinking that if my Gram looks out the window and I'm not there, she'll got nuts. She'll probably call the cops. At that point in my life, I had nothing against cops. Key word being that point. So, it didn't scare me. Police officers were there to protect people in the neighborhood. Nothing wrong with that.
"So, whaddya' say?" Jenny asks me with the same smile still plastered on her face. I'd never met someone who smiled so much in my life.
I turn back to them and stand up. "Sure. Until my Pop comes."
Jenny and Tommy start leading me across the street. "Great! We have enough players for two teams now! We never have enough players. Jimmy's team always has more. I'm starting to think that's why he always wins. He really likes winning."
Jenny extends her hand to me. "I'm Jenny Reilly, by the way. This is Tommy Donnelly."
I shake her hand. "Maddie Fabrizzio."
Here was the confused look again. One of many Jenny would give me over the years. "Like Matt? That's a boys name."
"No. Like Madolyn. But I hate my name. So I tell everyone to call me Maddie. Or Mad. I don't care which." I explained.
Tommy looks over at me, finally speaking up. "I like that name. It's cool."
I smile at him, "Thanks."
From that moment on, I was always with them. I didn't sit on the steps anymore. I played stickball in the street. Or I sat with Kevin when he was benched by Jimmy or Tommy, which was alot of the time, and keep him company. He was only a year and a half younger than me, so we got along well. The game wasn't really interesting to me. It was Jenny, Joey, and the Donnelly brothers. Well, except for one.
Jimmy. Jimmy Donnelly. What a jackass, son of a bitch. And yes, I knew what that meant at nine, and I knew that's what he was.
--------------------------------------------------
The officer stops Joey in mid-sentence. "Wait a minute-- wait a minute. It says here in a statement by Jimmy that she changed his life."
"No, no. That came later. Much later. Something else changed his life first and it didn't have anything to do with her. No, at that point, well-- Jimmy and Maddie pretty much couldn't stand eachother. I mean from minute one she downright didn't like him. He thought she was a spoiled bitch and she thought he was an arrogant, roughneck jackass. And they weren't shy about telling eachother either. Now, you've gotta remember, we were only kids. Here they are, these nine and ten year old kids screaming at eachother at the top of their lungs over a foul ball in the middle of the street. I'm talking pushing.. shoving.. cursing like sailors. Tommy had to hold Jimmy back just so he wouldn't kill her. And the same went for Kevin with Maddie. Most girls, well no, most people were scared of Jimmy even then. Hell, I was scared of him. But not Maddie. She always stood up to him. Calling him on his bullshit when everyone else wouldn't touch it with a ten foot pole. This was an everyday thing. Until that day the next year. That's when his life changed forever..."