o(2)o

It was time for another drink.

Leaning against the cool granite of the tombstone Connor raised a half-empty bottle of whisky toward his brother.

"Here's ta Rocco." He announced, toasting his deceased friend for what had to be the twentieth time that evening and taking a long pull from the rapidly emptying bottle.

Oblivious to the reiteration, Murphy lifted his own bottle in response, balancing precariously on large headstone a few feet away.

"To Roc." He echoed taking an enthusiastic swallow. Both brothers nodded to each other and turned their bottles over, pouring a generous amount of amber liquid onto the ground and watching as it soaked into the dark earth.

Connor looked up at his brother, noting the Murphy's smile had become a little wistful as he stared at the ground covering the Italian's grave and felt a pang of sympathy for his twin through the pleasant haze of alcohol. Rocco's death was a wound in Murphy that had never fully healed.

He had proven that much alone, as well as flabbergasting the fuck out of Connor, by remembering the Italian man's birthday.

Murphy could barely discern what day of the week it was much less call to mind any sort of occasion. But he had remembered nonetheless, picking a chunk of Szechwan chicken out of Connor's plate of rice, frowning as he examined the spicy meat.

"Roc's birthday is tomorrow, ye know." He'd said softly.

Connor had looked up from the Bok Choy he was hunting for in Murphy's take away container, surprised.

"It is, aye."

"I think we should pay him a visit, we haven't been there in a while."

Quickly doing the math, Connor had realized with a guilty twinge that 'a while' was actually well over six months. With the time at the hospital and all of the business with the Street Priests, the time had somehow just slipped by unnoticed, lost in all the commotion. He had also overlooked the fact that they were so near to their old stomping grounds and dimly wondered if McGinty's was still open.

"We should." He'd replied to his brother. "It's been too long."

Now, resting comfortably against Rocco's grave, bottle of whiskey nestled between his legs, Connor sighed and ran a hand through his already disheveled hair, enjoying the night and his twin's company. There were still hints of winter in the air, the breeze too cool to be considered spring weather, but the alcohol in his system was doing a fine job of keeping him toasty.

Murphy was still staring at Rocco's headstone, worrying his thumb between his teeth. And Connor knew what his twin was thinking; it was the same thought that always flashed through his eyes after a little talk of their friend and too much alcohol.

It was your idea to bring him in.

The words had been spoken in the heat of the moment, holding his brother back as Connor had forced Roc to prove that he could handle the job Murphy had so willingly given him.

At the time they were just words, something to subdue his twin and allow Rocco the chance earn his stripes. But after Roc had been killed, his words had taken on a whole new significance for Murph and Connor knew that his brother still felt the culpability they carried in tow. There were times he wished to God that those words had never passed his lips.

"Perk up ye fucker." He said good-naturedly, raising an eyebrow at his twin. "Or I'll tell ye Roc's jokes until ye're bleedin' from yer fuckin' ears."

Murphy grimaced "I don't think I can fuckin' handle too many of that bastard's jokes at once, 'specially with your drunk arse tellin' them." then he brightened, offering Connor a genuine smile. "Although right now I'm polluted enough that they might be funny."

"I don't think there's enough fuckin' booze in the fuckin' world to make that bastard's jokes funny."

"Do ye remember the one he used ta tell about the midget and the whorehouse?"

Connor chuckled, there was no forgetting that one, he knew, he had tried. "What about the octopus and the bagpipes?"

Murphy choked on the swallow of whiskey he had been taking, coughing and laughing at the same time. "Fuckin' hell, Conn," he spluttered, "are ye tryin' ta fuckin' kill me?"

"I'm not," he said, his chuckle turning into a laugh as he brought some of Roc's most awful jokes to mind, "if I were tryin' ta fuckin' kill ya, I'd tell ye the one about the fuckin' toilet that grabs yer

balls whenever ye try ta flush it."

"Oh Christ, yer right," Murphy laughed along with him, the sound infusing him with warmth, "I'd forgotten about that one."

Laughter dying away into quiet chuckles, Connor sighed as an annoyingly insistent sensation swept through him. He shifted slightly, hoping the feeling would go away. It was no good however, he had waited too long already, and there was no ignoring it now.

He had to piss.

Getting to his feet, swaying slightly once he got there, he looked over toward his brother. Murphy was quiet again, staring at something only he could see in the distance, still perched precariously on the tombstone.

"Ye all right, Murph?"

Murphy nodded absently "I think there's someone fuckin' out there."

"Yer fuckin' full of shit."

"I am not! I'm fuckin' langered, there's a difference." His twin shook himself, and took another pull from his bottle, tipping his head back. The change in position threw him off balance and he tumbled off the granite marker with a surprised curse, a tangle of limbs and black wool.

Connor was certain he'd never seen anything quite as funny as watching Murphy go arse over teakettle off that grave. Laughing, he ignored his brother's indignant shouts and drunken flailing.

"Hey Grace," he whooped, "how's fuckin' charm school?"

From behind the tombstone his twin made an irritated noise and muttered something that Connor was certain wasn't polite, and then there was a muffled sigh, followed by silence.

Unnerved by the sudden quiet, Connor peered over the tombstone, seeing his brother stretched out over the newly sprouting grass, hands behind his head, and the whisky bottle beside him.

"Got comfortable." Murphy mumbled and Connor chuckled, shaking his head.

"Ye fuckin' dope."

Murphy merely shrugged in response, staring thoughtfully at the night sky.

"I need ta have a slash." Connor informed his brother, waiting for Murphy to nod before turning to meander off in search of a place to empty his bladder. "Be right back."

His mind pleasingly numbed by alcohol, Connor's main dilemma for the moment was finding the right thing to relieve himself on. He found an ancient tombstone, worn, anonymous, and weathered by time and figured the nameless bones underneath would understand. His back teeth were fucking floating after all.

Lowering his zip, he sighed and looked up . . . directly into the unseeing eyes of a stone angel, its cherubic face staring disdainfully down at him.

Connor blinked at it for several moments before making a face and rezipping his fly.

Maybe this wasn't such a good place after all.

o()o

Of all the people Maire would have expected to see in the cemetery that night, he certainly wasn't on the list.

She sat, legs curled under her in front of the small headstone, toying absently with a brightly colored hot-wheel car, buried alive beneath an avalanche of thought and emotion. She had lost track of how long she'd been sitting with her son, stubbornly ignoring the pins and needles that had prickled along her feet and legs until finally, mercifully, they had gone numb.

"I don't know what to do, kiddo." She whispered to the granite marker. "Everything's so wrong now."

It had been two nights since she had seen a man die at the hands of a group of criminals, and in those two nights, Maire felt she had been closer to hell than she could have ever imagined.

There had been a whirlwind of police and statements, and filling out forms that all looked the exactly same and repeating the same things over and over. She had complied with it all only to receive the most unsettling response they could have supplied.

"We'll keep an eye out for them, send an extra patrol car around at night, but there's really nothing else we can do."

The words had stunned Maire. Weren't they the police? Wasn't this sort of thing their job? How could they stand there, look her in the eyes, and tell her there was nothing they could do?

She had witnessed an execution. Those men had put a gun to another person's head, pulled the trigger, and murdered him, and she and her daughter had been right there and had seen everything.

And those murderers had seen her, chased her to her home, and threatened her from the other side of her front door.

How could there be nothing they could do?

Her attackers had scattered at the first flash of red and blue lights, and she hadn't heard anything from them since, but there were times when she would catch a fleeting shadow outside of her window, or hear someone following her on her way home from work at the diner, turning only to find an empty street.

Threading her fingers into her hair making loose fists around the tangles there, Maire shook her head trying to dispel the idea. It was just her nerves making her paranoid; those men wouldn't be so thickheaded as to terrorize her after she had called the police. They had probably forgotten about her by now as it was.

She was safe.

Safe.

The word reverberated around inside of her, creating tiny ripples of disquiet that only emerged when she lied to herself. Drawing in a shuddering breath, Maire redoubled her efforts, trying to force herself to believe that she and Sasha were fine, that they were out of harm's way.

But deep down, she knew better.

Any chance of them being safe went out the window the second the disposable's flash went off.

She had found the brightly colored camera under Sasha's bed yesterday morning, hunting for a missing shoe. It had shone up against the worn carpeting like a treacherous rainbow, a painful reminder of what her young daughter had witnessed. The missing shoe forgotten, Maire had sunk to the floor, picking up the camera and turning it over in her hands thoughtfully.

Sasha must have held on to it the entire time. What were the chances?

Now, pulling her knees to her chin, Maire let her head fall forward, banging softly against the granite marker, still fidgeting absently with the toy car.

What were the chances that her daughter had captured those men on film?

Ungainly, heavy footsteps startled her from her thoughts and she turned around, her heart quickening, expecting to see an angry Spanish man aiming a gun at her head.

But instead, she saw him.

It took her a full second to realize that he looked familiar and another one to put a name with the face.

"Connor?"

She'd only met him once, the wounded man who had become so important to her son during his final stay at the hospital.

A real-live superhero Martin had called him once, just like in the comics.

She wasn't sure about the superhero part, but Maire knew that anyone who would spend a majority their recovery time with a little boy in hospice had to be something above the ordinary. And, she admitted a little guiltily, the blue eyes, beautiful smile and lilting accent didn't hurt either.

He looked down at her, surprised. "Aye. Do I know ye?"

His words were accompanied by the strong odor of alcohol and after a moment, Maire realized that he was utterly intoxicated.

"Strange place to be out for a drink isn't it?" she replied, purposefully ignoring his question, unsure if she trusted him enough to answer it.

"S'more of a memorial." He said, pressing his lips together. "We're celebratin' a dear departed friend's birthday today."

Nodding, Maire looked down at the hot wheel she was holding. She understood, all to well, the need to remember the dead, no matter how it was done.

Every toy car and action figure surrounding her son's headstone was testimony to that. She had brought him at least one every week since the day of his funeral, sometimes more, clearing away the ones that had broken or become dingy, replacing them with new.

When she looked up, Connor was frowning at her, no past her, reading the small tombstone she was pressed against.

"Christ," he murmured, his words slightly slurred, making his accent seem thicker, richer, than when he had first spoken, "I do know ye. From the hospital, aye? Martin's Ma?"

"That's me." She said, pressing two fingers against her son's name in the carved granite, more from ritual than anything else. In the first months after Martin had passed away, she was certain that the R and T were going to be forever embedded into the pads of her fingers, so often was the action repeated.

"Jesus, what're the chances?" he muttered, swaying a little on his feet, still staring at her. "What're ye doin' here, then? We're a long fuckin' way from that hospital."

"We've always lived here, but Martin's oncologist moved his office to Mitchell County, so I got an apartment up there to save us the commute. After . . ." the words caught in her throat, still refusing to be spoken after all this time. Martin died, after my little boy died,

" . . . after everything happened, I moved back."

Connor nodded, remaining silent, and she looked at him, unsure what else to say. She wasn't exactly at ease with making idle conversation with a drunken stranger in the middle of a cemetery.

The awkward silence was broken by the stomach-churning sound of retching not too far away making them both jump. Connor grimaced and ran a hand through his hair.

"And that would be me brother." He sighed. "I should go see that he's all right and not heavin' on some high and mighty's grave somewhere."

Maire shot him an incredulous look, but he had already turned away and was ambling back in the direction he had come.

"Murph, ye fucker." His voice rang out in the stillness of the cemetery and Maire snorted, unsure if she should me amused or appalled by his actions. "Ye'd better be right where I fuckin' left ye."

Then quieter.

"Fuck, and I still have ta piss."

o()o