Chapter 10

Just Friends

"I can't pinpoint anybody with a motive to do this...Well, Kev didn't get along with the neighbor down our street...but why would George kidnap and kill him? Or...or torture him? Jesus, their beef isn't that steep."

Lucille sniffled, wiping her runny nose on the inside of her shirt's collar. She didn't dream she'd wind up running to Francis to vent about Kevin's disappearance, but he was there to listen to her while few others were. She hadn't befriended the strippers and was only on professional terms with the fellow barmaids. Incidentally, upon emptying her woes and worries onto Francis, she saw his dignity and how he seemed disinterested in toying with her emotions and situation. He was making a suitable counselor thus far.

Francis' hands clasped in front of him, he wore a fake expression of compassion. He'd never pretended to care for somebody with such immense endurance. Oh, how he was on the slippery brink of rolling his eyes at her tearful, bloodshot eyes and the snotty mess she was creating. Not a speck of sympathy was mixed in with the criminal's grim selection of sentiments, but Lucille would be shown otherwise.

"The police have been useless, they're probably going to close his case in the very near future. It's not as if Kev's some vulnerable little kid...The cops don't give half a shit what's become of a grown man of the low class, even if I do."

"There, there," Francis consoled her, a miniature waterfall pouring down her cheeks. "There's still some hope left, huh? It's only been, what, a few weeks?"

"You think?"

"Yeah. There's still a chance, I bet." Just maybe Hindrance's bones would be unearthed if a natural disaster ever cruised through Astoria and its woods.

"I've never missed anybody else in my life this bad. I pray that he'll appear at our doorstep one day, beaten and bloody and out of it but alive." She huffed out a whimper. "We paid the rent together, too. I'm fucked with the bills. If he's really not coming back, I'll have to seek out the cheapest shared housing in the city, or move back in with my mom. Hell, it's like I've been abandoned without jackshit to thrive on…" She lifted her puffy eyes from her tumbler of sherry and placed them across the table on Francis' blue eyes. "Why are you doing this for me? You anticipating a payment of sorts? 'Cause I can't give that to you, bub."

"How many times do I gotta tell ya I'm just drawn to ya? I'm bored and in my leisure when I punch outta my stint transporting furniture, I appreciate your attention, and we both know damn well you're appreciating mine."

"I am," she said earnestly, her expression matching her tone, "but you must accept that we're not going to be anything more than friends. I love Kevin and will even if he's missing for the rest of my life."

"But ya don't reckon ya'd ever...move on?" Francis dared to ask, her backlash bouncing back at him in response.

"Possibly in years," she spat. "Too many for you to still be loitering around for me."

"Hey, I don't mean to offend. I just don't quite have a clue as to what I should say. I'm nobody sociable, in case you couldn't tell…"

"Your manners aren't too keen, either."

"Could be because I take more after my dead father," he shrugged.

Her glare faded. "Oh, sorry. Your dad's dead?"

"By now he's gotta be. He wasn't around anymore, gone just like that one morning about five weeks before my twelfth birthday. He either randomly went deadbeat and ran off on us overnight, or something out there murdered him. He wasn't a very kindly bastard anyhow, though he was our money, and Ma was a wreck for a while afterwards, constantly carping 'bout how broke we were and shit."

"My condolences…" she murmured. "As it so happens, my dad hit the road on my mom and me when I was two. We had welfare, but it did pathetically for us. Kevin's upbringing was poor, too, but normal, as he told me." Her face lit up. "I can bring you a picture of him, so you could keep an eye peeled for him! It's not likely you'd see him, but, you could, right? Would you do that for me?"

His face twitched. "Yeah, sure. Anything to help."

"I couldn't thank you enough," she sighed, setting her hand upon his.

"Say, if ya get evicted or something...There's a spare room you can have at my place on the coastline. I, uh, take care of my ma down there."

"I wouldn't burden you or her," she said, but it was clear she was considering the offer.

"Ya wouldn't be, I swear. It gets lonely in there, and Ma wouldn't mind the company, nor would I."

"Well, thank you. I'll tell you if the need arises." She cradled her drink in her right hand, her left still blanketing Francis'. Any additional discussion of Kevin tonight would be redundant, and was dropping on her list of priorities. She guessed Francis was weary of hearing about him by now.

A prolonged silence brewed in their booth, both unsure of what to go on from her last words. A minute came and went, then Francis perked up, his hand rushing to produce two wooden white doves from his vest pocket.

"Almost forgot about these," he said, placing a bird next to Lucille's sherry. "It's a turtle dove; I heard two of 'em represent friendship, so I made them, and that one's for you."

"It's adorable, Francis," she commented, inspecting its tiny sculptured wings and beak. "Is this a hobby of yours?"

"I got a whole random gallery of stuff at home. I'll have to show ya them sometime," he suggested.

"You will," she said, introducing him to her grin.

"Ya have a pretty smile, Lucille. Very photogenic."

"I haven't smiled in over twenty days," she said. "It feels good to do it again."

"Would ya ever model for me? I'm sure I could capture some real nice pictures of ya."

"Me and the camera aren't the best of pals," she said, slightly flattered despite his blatant smooth-talking. "Well, chatting with you hasn't been a total nightmare, like I once assumed doing so would be. I have to get going. If you're here tomorrow night I'll give you that photo of Kevin. Thanks again."

"Not at all," he replied, taking a firmer hold of her hand and planting a sloppy kiss on the back of it. The faint shadow of a beard's hairs prickled against her skin, his lips damp and chapped. The feeling, short-lived as it was, chilled her spine and had her knees buckling.

"Goodnight," she said awkwardly, pocketing her dove. His smile spooked her, as it had in past instances.

Once in her car outside her workplace, she sniffed the back of her hand where he'd nearly slurped on her. The splotch of spittle smelt of what he was nursing: whiskey, which was ironically one of the alcohols Kevin's taste buds had disfavored.

She dreaded her duty of that night. Looking through a photo album of her and Kevin's most recent pictures was bound to reverse her serene mood, vengefully returning her to her prior gloom.

Adapting to sleep in an empty bed had also been strenuous for Lucille. She missed everything about Kevin, from cleaning up after him to being buried beneath his naked weight. Splayed on their mattress, she couldn't help reminiscing about their pettiest activities. Would she ever again come into contact with the warmth of his body, or cook him breakfast, or go biking with him on the weekends?

Following his departure, she'd undergone numerous nightmares where he was brutally slaughtered to death by a scaly monster. She'd wake with a shriek, wondering if they held any meaning.

Francis' pushy and arrogant personality could have done with some reconstructing, according to Lucille, but she needed his companionship and assistance, so she'd veer from booting him out of her life for the time being. He wasn't a complete jerk, and if, God forbid, Kevin was permanently out of boundaries, Francis might have been viable to fill in a chunk of the void her boyfriend left her with.

A fleeting, tight-balled fist rammed into Sloth's head, a bruise promising to bloom in its place. The incapacitated Fratelli howled out, a fresh flow of tears gushing from his tearducts.

"Sloff swear he behave!" Sloth assured Francis, who'd been pounding on him for what felt like hours, but was only a couple of minutes.

"Goddamn right you're gonna behave! Jake told me all about how ya interrupted his phone call and dinner here with his bitch, so you're sure as fuck not to try any of that with me and my Luce, and since you're handicapped, I gotta beat the simple requirement into you till it's lodged deep inside your pea-sized brain."

"GAAAAHHH!" boomed Sloth, his eyes so widened they looked to be bulging out of their sockets as his brother stomped his foot into his crotch. Francis was putting on the wickedest of smirks in his torturing; the heinous activity enthralled both him and Jake, but him more so.

"Take it like the giant man ya are, ya pussy," Francis scolded, swatting the chained sibling silly across the face. "You're a muscled freakshow who's six feet and eight inches of height. If I were ya, I'd break free of these chains, slaughter anybody who stood in my path while I escaped, then I'd rob this city clean and rape hundreds of its women."

The battered brother was particularly bothered by the other's latest sentence, his pained expression morphing into one of total hatred. "NOOO!" His massive hands lurched forward for Francis' shirt, and Francis sidestepped, missing his clutch by a fraction of a second.

His pulse thumping wildly, the cruel felon snickered once he'd spaced out two yards between himself and the flailing, highly fed-up Sloth. "You're a pitiful retard, Lotney. If I had a soul, I'd probably sympathize ya."

"LET SLOTH GOOO!" The only humble son of Mama hopped up and down in his seat and struggled with his metal cuffs. "PLEEEEAAASE!"

"This is for your own good, and you know it," Francis said, spewing out a loogie for Sloth's cheek. "You'd last in the public's eye for a minute before being tranquilized and shipped off to Area 51 for dissection and studying." He leaned in just close enough to keep out of his reach to sneer, "We only imprison ya here 'cause we love ya."

That was true. If Mama and her two rotten-hearted sons paid no heed at all to the helpless mutant's well-being, they would have cast him away when he was a toddling young boy.

Sloth abstained from ceasing his battle against his bindings, remarkably exhausted of his three decades' abuse. Francis had motivated him to try and rid his wrists of their cuffs, then breakout of his prison, though he would never in a million years harm or sexually violate anyone as his hostile eldest brother would. Lotney wasn't a monster, even if he looked like one.

Vomit of repulsed loathing surged up in Francis' gullet when he eyed the photograph of Lucille and Hindrance, their arms linked, her head against his chest as they posed in a sunset-lit valley. The sole pleasant feature about the image was her daisy dukes and crop top, cleavage exposed, but the mere presence of her late boyfriend detracted from her beauty, Francis thought glumly. Seeing them together, so at peace and devoted to each other, sparked an urge in Francis to assassinate the guy all over again. Oh, if he were granted a single wish…

"You can have that for reference," his blonde crush permitted from across the table. "It's one of the clearest photos I've got of him...well, I have clearer ones, but you couldn't see them."

"Why—Oh…" The bile oozing upwards in his chest was now worth spouting onto the tabletop. But of course they'd screwed and taken naked and erotic pictures of themselves, Francis had to accept.

"Damn, I shouldn't have told you that. How personal. My common sense has been on hiatus for this whole deal of bullshit...I just blurt anything on the edge of my mind nowadays, no second thinking whatsoever...Sorry."

"Drop it. It's only natural," Francis said, stowing his frustrations away for later when he could vent them out on something, whether a bag of flour or Sloth.

She nodded, lowering her gaze to her overgrown, chewed-at fingernails. "I'm in this sleazy dump long enough as it is...Take a walk with me?" she asked, distractedly fiddling with a napkin.

"Yeah."

A stroll outdoors with her would build on their plain but budding mutuality, thereby increasing their likelihood of reaching intimacy somewhere down the road. This spell of friendship wasn't so hopeless, was it? The tedious step towards dating her was all too necessary to forfeit, Francis decided, glowering at Lucille's sad half-serious suggestion that they search for Hindrance on their hike.