A/N: If you ever doubted the power of the review/PM, check out starryeyedwr1ter's kind review of the last chapter. Absolutely true; back last year, when I gave Tim a walk-on in my Evie fic, starry encouraged me to 'write some more Tim.' This fic would not exist without that nudge. :) Communication, gotta love it!


Start of the year, when he's a freshman, I see him around school, off and on. He's hard to miss, with his cocky walk and his strangled accent, North Side by way of the Bronx, vowels slip sliding from one city to the other in the same sentence.

We bump into each other, but rarely go up against each other for real. I got no beef with the pansies he runs with and he don't mess around in my turf, for the most part.

And then he does.

I get a couple of the boys to wait with me in the alley, outside the liquor store he's ripping off. The usual kind of pleasantries are exchanged:

"Winston, you're one stupid fucker, you think I'm lettin' you run free in my neighborhood."

"You ain't but a small time hood, Shepard, in a fucking small town at that. You'd piss your pants you ever went up against a real New York gang. Why in hell you think I'mma listen to anything you say?"

I tell the boys to leave it to me, they can go back to the car. Tell them that I don't need no help against one skinny little rodeo clown. He don't like that I call him that, which is what I was banking on.

He don't fight clean, he swings wide and wild, and in anyone else that'd be a flaw, but he makes up for his bad aim with fierce energy. We go a couple of rounds; eventually he clocks me a good one, but I sweep his feet out from under him.

"Thought you'd've had better balance, you bein' such a good horse rider an' all," I crow.

"Screw you," is his answer, lighting a weed without even getting up. No word of a lie, he flicks out a lighter, takes a stick out the pack in his sleeve and takes a drag, still flat on his back.

I ask him what the fuck he thinks he's doing.

"I'm takin' a break. Union rules," he says. "I already had two fights today. Can't put too many minutes on the clock."

I kick his foot. He waves the weed, like he already explained.

Since the first day I met him, Dallas Winston ain't been afraid of me. Ain't been impressed by me, neither. Pretty much the way I feel about him.

"You are so far outta your tree, you can't see the woods no more," I tell him, reaching down for one of the bottles of liquor he just boosted. He looks like he's going to object, then he waves it away.

"This store?" I point over my shoulder. "Mine. Fuck off down by the river, you wanna play at heists. See how you get on with the Kings. Gimme half of what you got out the register."

He shrugs as he climbs to his feet, hands over the dough. He don't care. It's just kicks. And truthfully, I don't much care neither. It ain't like he's got a real gang to move in on my turf.

But he's useful, with his fists, with his blade, and one day he'll see it makes more sense to be my second, than to keep hanging out with the bunch of misfits he usually pals around with. I know what Dom used to say, but I think there's a case to be made for keeping the smart ones close too; keeping 'em where you can watch them.

So, I would still make him second. Frank's tough enough, but he ain't as smart as Winston and sometimes it might be nice to talk a plan through, not just have everyone accept whatever I say.

I know, I got a brother in the gang. But Curly? Curly's liable to go off like a frigging Fourth of July rocket. There's nothing watchful about Curly, no matter how I try and tell him. He's just a kid yet, I guess. Maybe he'll wise up as he grows up. Maybe the reformatory'll calm him down some.

Otherwise, the gang works real well.

Paulson never came back after his stretch inside. Not to the gang, not to Tulsa. And the draft board dealt with Morris for me. I can't say I was sorry to see him go. Carter hung around for a while, I kept my eye on him, seeing as how he would've supported Morris against me. Eventually, he went up to Big Mac too, after he was stupid enough to get hauled in with his pockets full of speed.

That was all the older ones, the ones who were there when Dom had the gang. The guys who are left are all mine. Spaghetti and Frank, Donny from the grade below, we all go back to middle school. We got history. Spaghetti's got kid brothers, about a hundred of 'em, all lanky like him, we'll be recruiting them for years. A couple of others. I keep my eyes open still, for who would be useful.

And then there's Sammy. Oldest Freshman in the world. Makes Mathews look like some kind of AP genius. Sammy was on his third repeat when I got to high school and still late to every class 'cause he couldn't remember where they were and he can't read the numbers on the doors.

I think I got him as close to passing in class that year as he'd ever been, but I couldn't do nothing about the exams and when he quit school because he couldn't pass up with me, the school had nothing to say about it. The fuckers. I bet if he had a daddy and that daddy was a lawyer or an exec over to the oil companies, they'd have got him tutors and extra help and whatever shit they throw at the stupid Soc jocks, who can't add two and two, but who seem to pass up okay every year. No daddy and greasy hair? Forget it.

Shit, Sammy couldn't even tell the time good, until I showed him.

He's huge. Like, built like a fucking tank, huge. Like a full on truck. Which is funny since his name is Ford. And that's mostly how I use him. Shifting stuff, lifting stuff, over to the yard. General looming purposes. It's like having a mountain at your back. Not that I need back up, but it looks impressive all the same.

The funny thing is, he don't even like to fight. I had to teach him the basics, after I saw a couple of damn Socs giving him the runaround in the hallway. He got raised by some aunt, told him to be careful not to hurt the littler kids when he was in kindergarten and that kind of stuck with him. I mean, he does break things without meaning to and all that. I can see what she was thinking.

He's waiting by the car as I come out the alley. Him and Spaghetti, that's who came with me. Frank has a date, some chick he finally wore down. I guess we'll hear how that went, soon enough.

"Back to the yard, Boss?" Sammy's still excited by the fact I let him drive. I tell him yeah, back to the yard. I never asked him to call me 'Boss', but it makes him happy, so what the hell?