Chapter 8: Once
5 years earlier...
Buzz-buzz...buzz-buzz...buzz-buzz...
O'Malley, nee McCready, stirred groggily against the settee's plush red velvet cushions as an annoying sound buzzed repeatedly somewhere by his head. He raised his hand in a sleepy attempt to swat it away, but the sound just kept on going: buzz-buzz...buzz-buzz... He groped around, and when his fingers finally encountered hard plastic, he reluctantly cracked open one eye to stare at the noise-producing object in front of him: namely, his cell phone. It kept buzzing and bouncing over the upholstery like an overly excited cricket. McCready grabbed the device and flipped it open to the little glowing screen within. Written across it was a single line of text in all caps:
WHERE R U, U BASTARD?
McCready furrowed his brow and scrolled downward to the next text:
WE'RE GONNA B LATE!
He scrolled down even further:
STOP SHAGGING FOR 1 SEC & CALL ME BACK, ASSHOLE!
McCready stared in bleary-eyed annoyance at the time on the phone. "Shit," he muttered and began to rapidly stab at buttons:
At A's, pick me up in 15.
McCready clicked the phone shut and scratched distractedly at his shaggy red hair. He was lying on his stomach stark naked on the settee, and he began to grope around underneath it in a half-hearted search for his clothes. He put the pieces on as he encountered them: t-shirt, underwear, pants, a random sock. His long bangs fell forward across his face, almost hiding the faded, wine-colored bruise that was arched over his left eye-the remnants of a black-eye he'd received during a bar fight the week before.
McCready swept a searching look across the room as he sat tying his shoes. No sign of Arthur; the only things in evidence were the trappings of his trade: a black and chrome camera sitting alone on a tripod, a couple of lights on adjustable metal stands, and tons of framed photos lined up on the walls-mostly of smiling, wholesome, God-fearing families. The McCready's own family portrait was situated among these-in fact, the taking of that family photo had been how he'd met Arthur.
That had been a little over a year ago.
McCready got up and headed toward the red-painted door leading into Arthur's dark room. He was vaguely surprised that his and Arthur's relationship-if it could even be called such a thing-had lasted this long. Arthur was more than a decade older than he, and McCready had never even seen the inside of Arthur's actual home, only his photography studio. Probably because Arthur's live-in lover of seven years wouldn't appreciate the intrusion. So they arranged to meet twice weekly at his studio instead. It was a set-up that McCready thought worked well. This way, he could keep his 'lifestyle' a secret from his overbearing Irish Catholic parents, and Arthur could keep him a secret from his long-time lover. The two of them were basically locked together in an ongoing stalemate of mutual collusion. And McCready, surprisingly, wanted it to remain that way.
He was already getting very good at hiding various pieces of his identity.
McCready pounded on the outside of the red door. A noise of assent came from somewhere inside. McCready pushed open the door, closed it, and slid back the hanging black-out curtain that stood as an extra precaution against the light. The inside of the room was blood-red; it was like being trapped inside a giant womb. Arthur was busy at work, poised over his developing tray. His tongs were ready and he was watching an egg timer sitting on a shelf. "Can you take those prints out of the fixer and wash them?" he motioned to McCready with the metal tongs.
McCready moved to another metal tray and took up a differently marked set of tongs. He scooped a print out of the fixing solution and moved it over to the sink. He turned the water on and began the rinsing process, mentally ticking off the minutes. He hardly payed any attention to what he was actually doing; he'd seen this process so many times he could probably do it in his sleep.
"Callum's picking me up in a few," said McCready at last.
Arthur merely nodded. There was a tenseness to that nod, because McCready knew, without it being said, that Arthur harbored a kind of irrational jealousy over the relationship between McCready and his older brother, Callum. Callum: the only other person on the planet whom he trusted completely; the only other person who knew the real him. Callum, to whom he was completely, unswervingly loyal. Callum, for whom he would drop everything in a second, just to go running to his side...
Well, Arthur didn't like the hold Callum had on him-didn't like being in second place. He didn't say it out loud, but McCready could tell.
The timer went off and Arthur snatched up the print and moved it into the stop bath. After laying the metal tongs aside, he turned to McCready, and said, with a serious expression:
"Rohan..."
McCready jumped and mentally began to panic. There was no real reason for it, but there was something in Arthur's tone, in the way he said his name...The photographer looked positively demonic beneath the blood-red color of the safe light. McCready's heart was pounding like a jack-hammer, because he was certain-absolutely certain-that the next words out of Arthur's mouth were going to be something along the lines of: "Rohan, I've finally decided to leave Bill and I want you to move in with me...I love you."
McCready was horrified. Goddam it, he couldn't have Arthur fucking up his perfectly compartmentalized life like that...
McCready tossed down the tongs. "I've gotta go," he said abruptly and then all but bolted from the dark room, as if the very demons of a blood red, photo-producing hell were chasing after him. His heavy boots clunked loudly across the floor of the overly bright studio as he went. He could feel Arthur's presence at his back, could feel his perplexed stare.
"Rohan?"
McCready paused at the coat rack by the front door, in order to retrieve two important items: his knee length, black canvas trench coat, the one that his mum had bought him for Christmas earlier that year, and-
-a brown leather holster with two fully loaded pistols, this being a gift from his older brother.
McCready risked a glance at Arthur, who was standing in the dark room doorway, and what he saw written across the other's man face hit him like a sucker punch: a look of regret, of infinite sorrow. No, damn it! It's not supposed to be like this! Not like this! The two of them never discussed the holster with the guns, didn't talk about their silent meaning. It was an unspoken rule. But Arthur knew; he had to. The McCreadys were an Irish Catholic family firmly planted within the bowels of Hell's Kitchen, and if the guns and the occasional black eyes and the sudden, random absences in the middle of the day weren't enough to tip him off-well, Arthur would have to have been deaf, dumb and blind not to have noticed something.
And damn Arthur for pitying him-for wanting to take him out of that life, a life away from his criminally-inclined family. This wasn't some goddam Cinderella story they were working out here. He didn't need Arthur to save him, for god's sake. He didn't need anyone to save him. He could damn well take care of himself.
McCready wordlessly slammed the door-and Arthur's unasked for sorrow-securely behind him, and walked away.
McCready slouched against a streetlamp beside the road, his hands stuffed deep within his pockets, waiting for his older brother. A few minutes later a mossy green Pontiac GTO pulled up to the curb, and his scowling, blond, blue-eyed sibling leaned across to the open passenger side window and said,
"Get in, douchebag."
McCready slid into the passenger's seat and Callum peeled off. Seeing the expression on his younger brother's face, Callum said:
"Hey-did that asshole do something to you? 'Cause if he did, I'll fucking kick his ass. I mean it. I don't fucking like that jerk-off."
McCready rubbed his temples as his older brother's New York Irish ghetto accent pounded against his ear drums. "He didn't do anything, Cal."
"I don't care. I still don't like him. Screwing around on you like that. He deserves a good old-fashioned ass-kicking, I swear to god."
"Speaking of screwing around, how's Mrs. Dansworth?"
"Don't fucking start, Rohan. It's not the same thing-"
"-the fuck it isn't! The moment her truck driving husband sets foot out the door, there you are, sneaking in, servicing the guy's missus behind his back-"
"-shut-up, douche! Me and Rosie are square."
"You're gonna be fucked, is what you're gonna be, when that baby she's carrying turns out to be a little McCready. Her husband's gonna come knocking on the door with a loaded gun for sure-OW!"
McCready winced as his brother punched him in the arm. "Fucker!" yelled McCready, and violently punched him back. Back and forth they went, the car careening wildly, with the two of them punching, ranting, airing out the same tired, familiar accusations, until finally Callum said:
"Man, we need to get our own place."
"Agreed."
"We gotta move out of our parents' house..."
"Yey, absolutely."
"...before dad finds out what either of us are doing."
Both brothers shivered involuntarily. They may have been hard drinking, hard fighting, gun-toting Irishmen, but nothing scared them more than the sanctimonious wrath of their hardcore Irish Catholic father. The man was a fucking believer. A bible-quoting, sabbath observing, live-by-the-good-book-or-not-at-all fucking believer. McCready had once told Arthur that his old man would shoot them both if he found out what they were doing. And he had been deadly serious in that statement. If Connor McCready found out his middle son was queer-well, he would disown him so fast his strawberry head would spin.
And never mind all the other, illegal things he and his brother got up to...
But these acts were not committed at the behest of their father. Oh no-the orders came down from their uncle Joseph, who was the real power in the family. Strictly speaking, Joseph McCready owned a string of perfectly legal pubs and restaurants in the New York area, but he also dealt in a lot of illegal things below the bar: embezzlement, prostitution, the sale and movement of stolen goods, extortion, drugs-basically, all the underworld goodies. His roots in the Irish mob ran firm and deep, and like most "family run" mob operations, Joseph preferred to leave things in the capable, trustworthy hands of his family members. So the fact that he employed two of his own nephews to act as his sometimes very violent left hand seemed like a very sound, very logical, business decision-nothing more. If that decision ran contrary to the moral beliefs of his own strict, overbearing Catholic brother, well, what Connor didn't know wouldn't hurt him...
"So, where are we off to?" asked McCready.
"To Kevin and Maeve's birthday party, you douchebag! God, I can't believe you forgot!"
"Shit! That's today?"
"Yes, it's today! And we're already late, goddam it-I told you! Mum sent me to fetch your derelict ass-"
"-sorry," McCready muttered, and slumped down in the seat like a pouting, chastised four-year-old. Great...now his mum was going to be pissed at him. Actually, both of his parents were. He was never going to hear the end of this...
The two brothers rode in silence the rest of the way. Their destination was one of uncle Joseph's restaurants, closed to the public so an extravagant, family-only party could be thrown in honor of their twin siblings' thirteenth birthdays. Their uncle was nothing, if not generous. And all the McCreadys in the area were going to be gathered at the restaurant for the occasion. The thought of having to be around that many family members all at once made Rohan's stomach do flip-flops.
"Pull around back," said McCready as they neared their destination.
"Why?"
"I don't want to go through the parade of relatives in the front of house. Aunt Patty's gonna squeeze me so hard my ribs'll crack and then Aunt Dee will tell me to get a haircut-not to mention a girlfriend-and cousin Roland will tell us both to get real jobs and-gah! I can't take it!"
"Okay, okay. We'll go through the kitchen."
McCready remained slumped in his seat as Callum pulled the Pontiac into a back alleyway. The car bumped to a slow stop, and as Callum killed the ignition, McCready noticed a flash of something odd in his rear view mirror. Callum had started talking again, but McCready ignored him. Instead, he carefully opened the door, slipped through it, and fell quietly to the ground, as soft and as silent as a falling feather...
"What the fuck?" McCready heard his brother say from inside the car.
"Freeze, you stupid Mick!" There was the click of a gun being drawn from the opposite side of the car.
"Watch where you're pointin' that thing, man! Someone's liable to get hurt," said Callum in an altogether too calm voice.
"Shut up and get out of the car, idiot."
McCready stared at the pair of feet underneath the car. It wouldn't make for the best shot in the world, but still...
He pulled out his Walthers and fired from his spot on the ground-at the exact same time Callum decided to slam the car door into the guy's ribs. The guy hit the dirt, and his eyes met McCready's underneath the space of the car just as McCready fired a second shot straight at his head.
"Fucking Dago!" McCready heard his brother say as he got out of the car, kicking the now motionless body out of his way as he went. McCready bounded up from the other side, and his brother just looked at him. "God, you're a sneaky bastard-what the hell?"
"Something's wrong," was McCready's only answer.
His brother nodded stoically. Drawing their guns, the two of them headed for the back entrance of the restaurant.
The two brothers crept noiselessly through the restaurant's back door, weaving through a narrow hallway lined with boxes of produce, stacks of cups, buckets of flour and sugar and other basic kitchen accoutrements. There was an ominous silence in the air; the atmosphere was thick with it, a kind of noxious fume that made one sick just to breathe it. In absolute silence, the two McCreadys approached the stainless steel double doors that led out into the dining area of the restaurant. And Rohan, who was taller than his older brother, caught a fatal glimpse through the swinging door's glass pane and-
-he burst through the double doors without thinking, propelled forward by the blood-soaked images he saw through the glass. A bullet exploded in the wall mere inches from his head, shattering the plaster, and he heard his brother screaming his name, felt Callum pulling him back by the collar of his coat. His brother all but bodily hauled him back through the stainless steel doors. McCready fell to the ground, trembling uncontrollably . "Callum, my god, did you see-"
Another bullet annihilated one of the glass panes in the door, shattering it like a hail of diamonds. McCready was frozen in an awkward crouch on the ground, his hands shaking, unable to move. Good god! There was so much blood! Everywhere! So many of his relatives, just lying there, unmoving! And his little brother and sister...
Callum was shaking him, yelling at him. "Rohan, get up! I need you to move! Now! Steady on!"
"Callum, you didn't see..."
"Rohan-up! Now!" His brother shoved his own gun through the now open window and fired. The sound of bullets reverberated through the restaurant; the return fire ricocheted off the metal doors. It was awful. His older brother's hands were completely, confidently steady.
The firing suddenly ceased. And in the ensuing silence, a voice called out from somewhere beyond:
"Well...the infamous McCready brothers, I presume?"
Rohan's head snapped up at that; he watched his brother by the doorway-his brother who stood as still as a statue: armed, silent, and scowling. Then the voice said:
"We've been waiting for the two of you to arrive. Couldn't wrap up this shindig without you boys, no siree..."
More silence followed. When there wasn't a response, the voice said:
"You two might as well come on out of there. You're outgunned, three to one."
McCready watched as Callum's eyes narrowed slightly at this information. He could see the calculating look on his face. But what he didn't expect was for his brother to say:
"Rohan, I want you to go out the back. Now. I'll cover you..." The frank, fatalistic tone in his brother's command didn't go amiss.
"What? No! I'm not leaving you here! I won't-"
"-goddam it, Rohan-just do as I say!" and here his brother hauled him up by the collar again, pushed him in the direction of the back hallway.
"I'm not going!" Another hard shove, a determined look. He thinks we're both going to die here...
McCready was aware of the rather shaky truce that existed between the Italian and Irish mobs in Hell's Kitchen...so shaky that both factions knew that it was just a matter of time before they went to war with one another again. Well, something had apparently, finally, broken that truce. And that something was enough to cause the Italians to move in on the McCready clan, in the most dishonorable, despicable way possible...
The look in his brother's eyes was desperate. "Rohan, go..." he couldn't stand the resignation in Callum's voice, the sound of defeat.
He would die for you, you know he would...
McCready locked eyes with his brother; an unspoken exchange flew back and forth between them. And McCready hesitated briefly, once, before turning. Before turning to round the corner leading into the back hallway-
-where he walked straight into the barrel of a gun...
End Chapter 8.
Sorry for the delay, but both my work schedule and life schedule are sucking away my writing time. It's as if I'm writing on an egg timer, stealing minutes...