Quick trigger warning up here for non graphic reference in this chapter to sexual child abuse - in line with what Michael reveals about Father Hughes in S3. It's mentioned in the second half of the chapter, when Tommy and Finn are in Finn's room discussing the reform. Not graphic or specific, but mentioned so please feel free to skip if necessary.

Chapter 63

"Alright Finn lad?" Tommy greeted his brother as Finn ran across the road to them after school.

"Alright Tommy," he replied, grinning toothily up at him and falling into step beside him as they turned and headed back towards Watery Lane.

"I've got a job for you."

"What is it?" Finn asked, excited.

Whatever trivial task Tommy ever asked Finn or Isaiah to do for the blinders, they did it with enthusiasm – he supposed it let them feel like grown-ups.

"Lily here," he said, nodding at the child whose hand was in his, "Bought a few things for the kids at the reform who have nothing – we're going on Thursday after Rosie's exam to hand them in. I figure you've probably got some stuff in that bedroom of yours that could get given away too, eh?"

Finn screwed up his face.

"I want you to have a clear out," Tommy clarified, "See if there's some stuff you're too old for that you can pass on to John's lot, and whatever they don't want we'll take to the reform."

It was written clearly on Finn's face that this was not the sort of job he'd been hoping for.

"When do I need to do it?" he asked.

"When do you ever need to do a job I have for you?"

"When you tell me you have it."

"There's your answer then, eh?"

"I have to do it when we get home?"

"Yup."

"But she's not going til Thursday!"

"Amount of stuff in your room Finn, it'll take you to Thursday."

"Tommy!"

"Stop whinging, it'll keep you out of whatever mischief is going on with your map drawing and your bike riding practise that's got you all black and blue."

Finn scuffed the ground, his eyes on his boots and walked the rest of the way home with a glum look on his face, not saying much. As for Tommy, any considerations of changing his mind were swiftly killed by the fact the cut on Finn's cheek was in the crusty process of healing, looking like a growth on his face - though the bruise he'd sported on Friday was fading.

Rosie was studying at the kitchen table when they arrived back, and Finn cheered up when she announced she was making a chicken and leek pie for dinner – his favourite.

"Can I get roast potatoes with it?" he asked.

"Suppose so," she nodded.

"You can get one roast potato for every ten things you get rid of in this clear out," Tommy told him.

"I don't see what difference it makes to you how much is in my room," Finn muttered darkly.

"It'll make the difference of you getting a thick ear or not."

Finn trampled noisily through the shop – too annoyed at his assigned job to even take the time to wander slowly through the area he was usually barred from, or even to linger on the stairs, peering through the banister at what was going on.

"Over the summer I'm going to get him and Isaiah collecting the bets," Tommy mused aloud, "Keep them busy and out of trouble to some bloody degree."

"Can I collect them?" Lily asked, still at his side holding his hand.

"Nah – you're too small my little love, you need to be at the big school before you can do that. Plus, you don't need to be kept out of trouble, do you?"

She shook her head then asked, "Can I go to Katie's to play with the basket?"

He glanced to Rosie, who in turn glanced to the clock above the fire before she said, "Alright, but I want you back here for dinner at six o'clock. And go change out your school dress first, I'm too busy this week to go to the wash house before Friday at the earliest so there'll be no getting anything dirty."

He held open the shop door for her and watched her run off up the stairs, Pol's beady eyes also following – making sure she was going straight up the stairs as Finn had done. Arthur wasn't back at work yet, Tommy figured maybe Lily heading off to John's to play with Katie's birthday present was an easy way to keep her from realising his brother was still out of commission.

"How's the studying going?" he asked, lighting up a cigarette and pulling the door over.

Rosie spoke quite unnaturally, "I'm tired of being enclosed here. I'm wearying to escape into that glorious world, and to be always there: not seeing it dimly through tears and yearning for it through the walls of an aching heart: but really with it, and in it."

He raised an eyebrow.

She shrugged, "Well, she's on about wanting to leave this life and go to the next."

He raised both his eyebrows, "Who's she?"

"The woman in the ghost story you got me."

"The studying's so bad you want to die?"

She smirked at him, "No – it's torturously slow and I want the exam to hurry up, so it can be done. Like I said – I'll start my real life then."

"I haven't forgot about that real life of yours, don't you worry," he smirked back, then reached out and ran his hand through her hair.

She took a hold of his wrist and brought the hand to her face, kissing it and running her thumb over his knuckles, releasing it when John burst in demanding cake.

"She's trying to fuckin' study John," he growled.

"Aye well, me eating doesn't interrupt that – plus the races are done for the day so I just need to count the bloody money and do the paperwork. It's fuckin' boring work that, Rosie-girl, a nice slice of cake would help it get done."

"You took the rest of Katie's cake home with you yesterday," she reminded him, then added, "And I want the plate back when it's done by the way."

"Aye alright, fuckin' lady of the house," John grinned at her, "But cake – any here?"

"No, I made Katie's cake yesterday and I won't be making another one till tonight."

"Ah I'll hang about till tonight then," John conceded.

"Alright then," Rosie nodded at him then looked pointedly back down at the equations she was working through.

John took the hint and headed back into the shop, meeting Tommy's eye and winking at him before theatrically closing the door behind him.

"He's wanting a word about something," Rosie told him, not looking up.

He stayed silent, puffing on his cigarette, waiting for her to elaborate.

"Don't know what – but he's been in and out of here all day trying to find an excuse to stay when no one else is about. Thought Polly was going to shoot him the way he was trying to get her out at lunch."

Tommy nodded – he'd come in early for his helping of the soup Rosie had made for lunch, had gone back to his office when Pol and John had arrived, but as he was about to answer Lily pushed the door and appeared back in the kitchen in her yellow dress.

Rosie raised an eyebrow.

"You let me wear it yesterday," Lily pointed out, knowing exactly what the eyebrow was about.

"Yesterday was Katie's birthday tea, today is a normal Monday."

"Oh, let her wear it," Tommy argued for the child, "If she doesn't wear it now she'll grow out of it. She can keep the blue one good."

The younger sister gave him a winning smile, whereas the older turned her raised eyebrow on him, then sighed and said, "Alright – but you keep that dress clean or you'll be sorry, you understand?"

Lily nodded, still smiling that she was getting her way – any threats of being made to be sorry in one ear and out the other.

"What's the time on that clock Lily?" Rosie asked.

Lily's hands went to her mouth as she tried to work it out. Rosie got up and took her over to the fireplace, picking her up onto her hip and pointing out the numbers and that the big hand was the minutes and the small hand was the hour – the two of them eventually coming to the conclusion that it was twenty minutes past four.

"Good girl – and what time did I say you should be back here for?"

"Six o'clock."

"And where will the hands be at six o'clock?"

Lily got it right and Rosie kissed her head gently, "You've got an hour and a half, more or less, so keep an eye and if you're not sure, just get back here, alright?"

Lily nodded, and Rosie kissed her head again before putting her down and saying, "Alright off you go to John's, and you remember what Tommy's told you – if you're going anywhere other than Katie's you come in here and let us know. You understand?"

Another nod and the back door was rattling closed behind the child.

"She gets a mark on that dress you can deal with it," Rosie told him, her voice pointedly acidic.

"Aye alright," he nodded, keeping his own voice even – rather than letting his amusement creep into it.

"You'd be less fucking blasé if it was you who had to get down to the wash house and break your bloody back scrubbing muck out," she told him, rolling her eyes – probably seeing straight through the evening of his voice. She had a way of reading him.

"I'd offer to come help but I'm banned," he grinned, throwing the end of his smoke into the fire.

She cocked her head, waiting for him to go on.

"My mother used to take me and Arthur with her," he told her, "Stick us in the water when no one else was looking, saved the hassle of heating it at home I suppose. One day the man in charge - can't remember his name, he was old then so he'll be long dead now - comes around and I'm in the water playing with some bit of bloody line that I probably helped myself to on the way in and he goes 'Mrs Shelby, this is the wash room – the bath room is the other side of the building- and it's a separate payment.' My mother looks up from the washing she's sorting at the other end of the stall, plays daft and goes 'Eh? Do I look like I'm having a fuckin' bath to you?' and the man goes 'No, but your son does.' She turns and looks at me, sitting in the water as if she'd no idea I was there then starts shouting at me, hauls me out, grabs the line off of me and starts lashing my bloody legs with it – and me obviously not knowing what was going on and shouting my head off."

"Not so quick on the uptake back then, eh?" Rosie grinned.

"Too young and stupid to have cottoned on yet. Anyway, yer man in charge watches all approvingly as I'm getting bloody whipped for doing as I was told and having a wash and my mum goes 'Thomas Michael Shelby, I've never been so embarrassed in all my days – you apologise to Mr Whatever His Name Was this bloody minute.' And I wasn't for it because it all seemed massively unfair to me, so I said I so and she starts smacking me again until I'm howling that I'm sorry and the whole place is looking on and probably having a good laugh. Then the man goes 'Well Thomas, I think we'll say you're barred until you learn to behave yourself – look at your brother over there helping your mam out, why don't you be more like that, eh?'"

"Arthur being a good kid was he?"

"Oh aye, Arthur was being the fucking golden child, pinching pillow cases for my mum off the drying lines when other people weren't looking."

Rosie laughed, "I'll have to keep an eye out for any suspicious looking kids near the drying wracks in future," then added, dryly, "Especially if I'm washing that bloody dress of hers – someone would have that in a minute, flog it down the bull ring. I'll wash that here and dry in by the fire I think."

"Hang it out the back, no one's going to steal from the back of the Shelby houses, I promise you."

"The kid getting whipped in the wash house has grown up to be the one whipping everyone else."

"Yup."

"I like hearing about you as a kid Tommy," she told him, reaching for the kettle and topping up the cup of tea that she'd been drinking before they'd come home and interrupted her, pouring one for him too, "Makes me feel prepared for this baby you've promised me."

His heart pounded at that, imagining a small version of himself at her side, wondering if the blue Shelby eyes would win out over her molten amber ones. He took the kettle off of her so he could put it down, freeing up her arms to go around his neck as he kissed her, his hands squeezing her waist.

"You looking forward to this baby, eh?" he growled in her ear.

"I'm looking forward to you putting it in me," she told him, making his stomach lurch - as if he were the chaste little virgin of the two.

She glanced to the slightly ajar shop door – Lily hadn't pulled it over behind her - kissed him again, more lightly, then shook him off her, going to drink her tea and continuing, "Tell me though - do you have any stories of your childhood that don't end in you getting your arse smacked?"

He picked up the cup, drank some tea and frowned as he thought, "Most of what was worth remembering was something I got a hiding for. Or I remember it because I caught a spanking and didn't feel I deserved it. Tell you what, one Christmas I stole a turkey."

"Fucks sake, this your coconut nonsense again – what's wrong with a goose?"

"Exactly my coconut nonsense, my little loli phabai - turkey was what fancy people had."

"Your little what?"

"My little red apple."

She snorted and he grinned at her, "So I stole one for my mum. That was when our grandparents were still around – they had the house Arthur keeps now – and my grandad put me on his shoulders and paraded me across half of Small Heath, telling everyone what I'd done and how we didn't need no fucking Father Christmas in our house because they had me. Not sure most of the neighbours were that impressed but my grandad was proud of me. Our Christmas lunch was brilliant that year, my dad got pissed - probably off the money that was meant to have paid for the bloody lunch in the first place - and passed out before the turkey was done so we all got plenty."

She shook her head and started closing over the books on the table, "I think I'm done studying for the day – better get started on the new cake. And the pie."

"No need for Father Christmas with you in the house either, eh?"

"Oh, I think Lily expects presents on Christmas, not just a meal."

"Spoilt little wench, eh?"

Rosie snorted, "Becoming one. This man who looks after her keeps buying her fancy things and now she expects them. She's waiting for a horse to appear out of thin air at the moment, too."

"I'm going to get her a new horse."

"Not any time soon," Rosie ordered, suddenly going serious and narrowing her eyes at him, "I mean it Thomas, she's got plenty."

"It's peak foaling, I'll need to get her it soon. Be good for her once the summer holidays are here."

What he meant was, similar to the turkey, it was peak foaling and there would be plenty of young horses in paddocks to steal. He'd got the turkey, practically the size of him, by sneaking into a delivery van and snatching one whilst the man was transporting them inside, four at a time, then making scarce as quickly as he could. He'd reckoned one wouldn't be missed out of a van full of them until he was long gone. In hindsight, if the truth be told, he wasn't convinced the delivery man hadn't seen him and hadn't just let him take the turkey, like the delivery man was Father fucking Christmas. But he had left that out, his grandad had been so proud of him for being fearless enough to take a bird as big as he had done, and Tommy had loved being up there on his shoulders – that was what he mainly remembered.

And remembered wondering how a man as big and impressive as his grandad could have produced his dad. He had fucking loved, worshipped, his grandad when he was a kid – he'd been a proper king amongst the Gypsies. They'd go the fayre and people would clear the way for him – and if his grandad had turned up with his grandmother anywhere, people would go silent. His grandmother had been a Boswell before she became a Shelby, and she'd been royalty in her own right too.

He'd been scared of his grandmother when he was a kid, she rarely raised a hand to him, but she'd threatened to curse him and that had scared him more than any threats of being clouted might have done. Plus, she'd had that nasty knack Polly had inherited of knowing things – he'd come in and tell her the adult friendly versions of what he'd been up to and she'd just fix him with a look and he'd know she knew he was lying - and he'd go to bed waiting for the curse to take hold, wondering what it would be. He'd eventually got over it when his mother had come into his room to find him hiding under his bed one day and asked him what he was at – he'd told her he was hiding from the curse. She'd dragged him out, demanded a further explanation of what he'd done and why he thought he was being cursed, then she'd clouted him and told him not to be so fucking stupid, that curses were for getting back at people not for punishing little boys and the only curse his grandmother was going to put on him was the curse of telling on him to his grandad, same as she told on Polly and Arthur.

His grandmother's curses hadn't seemed as scary then until a woman down the road had got their grandad arrested for something he hadn't done, and his grandmother had cursed her for it. The woman had taken to her bed and was dead within a week. The fear had crept back in a little after that, though he was hopeful his grandmother wouldn't literally kill him. Still, he had a feeling his grandmother had enjoyed making them all twitchy without needing to lift a finger.

"Tommy – I mean it," Rosie said, her own eyes as nastily piercing as his grandmother's had been, "You heard her yesterday telling Charlie about how she needed you to get her a horse. I'm not having it."

"If she starts getting too big for her boots I'll bring her swiftly back down to size," he assured her, "But if I get her a foal she can grow with it, learn to look after it – teach her some responsibility."

Rosie raised her eyes to the heavens, obviously not convinced that being given a horse was a way to learn responsibility.

o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o

"How's it going?" Tommy asked, pushing the door to Finn's room open, finding his brother sitting in front of his wardrobe, a pile of stuff next to him.

Finn looked around at him and shrugged.

"This a pile of stuff that's going?"

Finn shook his head and Tommy came into the room properly, closing the door behind him.

"Am I going to have to stand over you until you find some rubbish to get rid of?"

"It's not rubbish Tommy!"

Tommy yanked open the top drawer of a chest and grabbed at a bundle of cloth, demanding "Well what's all this?"

"Clothes."

"How come they're all bundled up in a ball?"

Finn shrugged, and Tommy threw the bundle at him, "Go through that and fold it properly – and there's got to be stuff in there that doesn't fit you anymore."

Finn shrugged, but turned to it and started hauling things out in obedience, folding them into abstract shapes that probably weren't going to be any neater than the ball had been to start with.

Tommy sat down on the bed and lit a cigarette, watching Finn making a hash of it.

"This is too small," Finn said, holding up a jumper from the pile.

"Give it here," Tommy replied, reaching out his hand.

He held his cigarette in the corner of his mouth, lifted the jumper up and shook his head, "The parish wouldn't thank us for this, this is just about good enough for the bloody rag and bone man and even he'd probably turn up his nose at it."

Finn shrugged and went back to his pile, whilst Tommy put the jumper down beside him. It'd probably been Arthur's at some point, he remembered wearing it himself – and then remembered John wearing it. All four of them and one ratty old jumper. His kids wouldn't need to wear out their clothes till they were in this state – the jumper should have probably gone after he had worn it, or at least after John. Finn shouldn't have ever been given the bloody thing.

Something like guilt stabbed him then and he was glad that it coincided with Finn fishing a shirt with a rip in the side out of the pile to get rid of, so he could tut at the state of it.

"How'd you manage that?"

"Got caught on a bit of wire."

"Would it fit you if it was mended?"

Finn shook his head, "Don't reckon so."

"When did you rip it?"

"I didn't rip it – the wire did."

He raised an eyebrow in response to that.

"Before you were back."

"How come Aunt Polly didn't mend it for you?"

"Didn't tell her, I'd fallen over and got a hole in my shorts earlier that week," Finn told him, a slight worry on his face as if he thought he'd be punished now for a happening of at least a year ago, "Thought she'd kill me if she knew I'd ripped my shirt too."

Tommy rolled his eyes and shook the shirt out.

"Not too bad, I'll see if Rosie can mend it. Might do one of those poor kids in the reform, eh?"

"Can she do that sort of thing?"

"Dunno," Tommy answered, "I suppose so – she's a woman."

"Yeah," Finn nodded, "I didn't think she'd be good at cooking, but she is."

"Aye she's that alright – though if you want any of those roast potatoes you better get on with finding more stuff to get rid of, eh?"

"Did you ever go to the reform Tommy?" Finn asked as he went back to the pile.

Tommy exhaled and flicked ash into a glass that had been left on the top of Finn's bedside chest, "It's not like a daytrip to the seaside."

"No but Arthur went, he told me."

"Aye, he went for a fortnight," Tommy nodded, "Kicked a policeman in the balls."

"Was that the same one he stabbed in the leg?"

"Yup," Tommy nodded, inhaling and grinning at the memory, "Did always hold a grudge, did Arthur when we were kids."

"He didn't go to the reform for the stabbing though, did he?"

"Didn't get caught that time."

"That's cause you got in the way," Finn said.

"Who told you that?"

"Arthur."

"Aye?"

"Aye – I was mad at you," Finn told him, screwing up his face as he recalled, "You'd spanked me right in the kitchen with everyone in the shop cause you said I was giving you backtalk."

"You obviously were giving me backtalk."

"Well I decided to run away, so after I saw him leave here I went down to Arthur to ask if I could live with him instead o' you."

Tommy didn't know whether to frown or laugh and settled for observing, "Funny idea of running away, going and asking your other brother if you can live with him – running away is meant to be you running away."

Finn shrugged and pulled an old waistcoat of John's out of the ball, thought about it, then folded it diagonally and put it with his pile of clothes he was keeping.

"Go on then," Tommy prompted, suddenly keen to know more, "How did you get from running away to talking about Arthur and me and the policeman?"

"Arthur said he knew you were a pain in the arse at times, but you were alright underneath and told me how you headbutted the policeman to take the attention, so he could run away, cause you were too young to go to the reform. Said you'd give me into trouble and I wouldn't like it, but you'd keep me out of bigger trouble."

Finn had stopped the untidy folding as he talked and was staring at Tommy, who stared right back, then gave a very small nod.

"That's about the jist of it," Tommy told him, then stuck the cigarette in his mouth.

"People are always threatening to send their kids to the reform," Finn said, looking at him carefully, as if this was something he'd wanted to ask about before.

He wondered if Finn had heard him making the joke to Rosie on the way to church yesterday morning and his stomach swooped.

He stayed motionless on the outside through, simply saying, "That right?"

"Yeah, me and George and Katie were talking about it – but none of you ever tell us we're going to the reform if we do something."

Tommy didn't answer, just looked at his little brother. What fucking type of topic of conversation was that supposed to be anyway?

"George reckons it might be fun to go, cause everyone in there would be wild."

"George is a fucking idiot sometimes – get him to say that to Arthur, eh? He'll know all about it. Might be entertaining for you," Tommy said, keeping his voice casual.

"What's the reform like Tommy?" Finn asked, his voice careful.

Tommy inhaled, exhaled and considered the question. The truth was ugly. But Finn would need to know ugly sometimes. He was from Small Heath after all. He'd grow up to be a blinder. Ugly was best starting sometime.

"Is it like prison?" Finn pushed – since Tommy was obviously taking too long to come up with an answer.

"Who runs prisons, Finn?"

"The police."

"Who runs the police?"

Finn pulled a face – he didn't know.

"The police," Tommy told him, speaking slowly, thinking as he spoke, "Are run by the government, Finn. What do we know about the government?"

Finn shrugged and chewed his lip, like he thought he was going to get in trouble for failing a test.

"It's full of corrupt bastards," Tommy told him, "At all levels. But they have rules they're supposed to stick to, and we can use that. We can use all of it. Every time I bribe a policeman for information Finn, I'm corrupting him – he's breaking the rules. And if he gets caught breaking the rules, then it comes down to whether or not the person catching him is a rule breaker or not too, you understand?"

Finn nodded, though Tommy didn't reckon he did.

"The point is Finn, a system that's supposed to play by the rules is easy to manipulate because you know what you're manipulating. If there's something easy to control, it's a man who works for the government."

He thought of the inspector. Of the deal they'd made. He was being allowed to make progress with Billy Kimber in exchange for Freddie Thorne and the location of the guns once he was done. He needed Ada to appear home soon, so he could keep her there and run Freddie out like he'd promised. It was easy to control the situation as long as he didn't lose control – and Ada and Freddie were slipping out of his control, jeopardising the whole fucking thing.

Finn nodded.

"And who runs the reform?" Tommy asked him, focussing back on the conversation at hand.

"The parish?"

"Nope."

Finn frowned.

"The parish council is part of the government Finn. And the government use the services of the reform," Tommy told him, "If the parish has an orphaned kid or the police have someone too young to go to jail, they use the reform to house them. But they don't run it. Same as some shops use the services of the Peaky Blinders for protection. They pay us for it. They don't run us."

"We run them," Finn stated confidently.

Tommy sucked on his cigarette, appraised Finn and nodded, "Spot on kid."

Finn grinned and seemed to swell under the praise.

"The reform, Finn, around here anyway, is run by the church."

"Well the church has rules…" Finn said, trailing off - as if he was unsure of himself.

"What are they Finn?"

"Thou shalt have no other Gods before me, thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image," Finn began to recite from memory – couldn't remember the fucking eight times tables or whatever but Polly had battered the commandments into him.

"No," Tommy cut across his brother, shaking his head.

Finn looked at him in surprise, questioning.

"Those rules, Finn, are for the people who go to church. I'm talking about the rules the church is meant to be run by."

Finn looked at him for a long time in silence before Tommy took pity and continued, "When the government make rules, Finn, they have to publish them. Do you know what The Children's Act is?"

"That a story?"

"Just about," Tommy nodded, "Government wrote it. But you can read it Finn, that's the thing. If you can read and if you can be bothered. They wrote all sorts of rules for how kids were to be living from then on and they wrote about Reform Schools and Industrial Schools. Know what the difference is?"

Finn shook his head.

"Nah – cause there's supposed to be one, according to the rules, but there isn't. Not round here anyway. And why is that, Finn?"

Finn chewed his lip.

Tommy let out a frustrated exhale of smoke and pinched the bridge of his nose, "Who wrote the Children's Act?"

"The government," Finn replied promptly.

"And who runs the reform?"

"The church."

"And does the government run the church?"

"No."

"Right," Tommy nodded, looking expectantly at his brother.

Finn fell somewhat short of the expectation by screwing up his face and saying, "So how come the government wrote the rules if the church doesn't have to follow them?"

"To make it look like they were doing something."

Finn didn't look like he understood anything.

"The point is Finn," Tommy said, irritation in his voice at his brother's slow uptake, "When the government runs a prison and there are rules on how it's supposed to be run, you can corrupt people into breaking the rules - but you know how to control it, you know what's going on and you plan for all the outcomes of what's being broken. When the church runs something, it doesn't publish its rules – the rules that come from the church are for the people like you and your Aunt Polly who go to church, they're not for the priests and the nuns running it. We don't know what their fucking rules are, if they have any. So, we can't control what's happening in the fucking reform. They can do what they like. The government, the parish council, they record what happens up till someone gets sent to the reform and then the reform doesn't keep records or publish its rules. And the government knows that and so the government wrote some pretty little rules for them, but if they don't follow them – who's going to do anything about it round here? There's no one else volunteering to run the place. No one round here has the time or energy to take on parentless kids for no pay."

"You could do something about it," Finn told him.

It was the same confidence with which he'd assured Lily that Tommy would do something about her teacher smacking her.

He thought of the girl downstairs making a pie – and of the baby a few doors down playing with the moses basket they'd lugged back from London – he thought of how terrified Rosie was of the parish finding out their mother had left, of the way Lily would be lost into their closed system. He wondered if Rosie had heard the same ugly things about what happened behind the closed doors of the reform as Arthur had told him he'd heard happening.

It hadn't happened to Arthur, it happened to the kids who were in for the long term. The kids who wouldn't be going home to parents who might cause trouble. It happened to the kids who had no one, the kids who would only be able to tell other priests or nuns what had happened. The kids who wouldn't bother telling because if it was fucking priest in the first place, then what were the chances of another one caring.

He looked at Finn for a long time. Ugliness might have to start, but there was probably enough of it in the room for now. Let the boy have his introduction to sex when he was slipping his hands up a girl's dress round the back of the outhouse where they thought they wouldn't get caught.

"I'm going to do something about it Finn," he told him, "But it's bigger than me just now. I'm not ready to take on the church yet. One day, I will. But the point is, until then, you don't want to find yourself in the reform and you'll feel fucking sorry for the kids who do end up in there, eh?"

Finn nodded.

"Right," Tommy nodded back, dropping the smoked cigarette into the glass and yanking at the top drawer of the bedside chest, wanting to move on, "What's in here then?"

"Tommy no!" Finn shouted, springing up and throwing himself at the drawer, wanting to keep it shut.

Tommy stood, grabbed the back of Finn's collar and yanked him back, growling, "Don't you fucking tell me no in my own house son!"

Finn looked at the floor as Tommy pulled the drawer right out of the chest, letting it land on the floor and sending some of the contents bouncing out.

"What's this?" he asked, grabbing at the top piece of paper in a pile.

He regretted his demand as soon as he unfolded it and realised it was very clearly one of Lily's drawings.

"Lily drew it," Finn said, shrugging and looking at the floor.

"I can see that," Tommy replied, his eyes tracing over the figures in the picture.

It was a picture of Finn, who had 'bru' written underneath him, then crossed out and replaced with 'phral', standing next to Lily with 'bab' under her own figure, and a black mass was in the background with 'Magi Murfi' above it.

Drawing Maggie fucking Murphy. Of all the fucking things.

"Phral?" Tommy questioned.

"I didn't know how to spell brother."

"What did you tell her phral was then?"

"Brother in Gypsy. Easier to spell."

Tommy nodded, "I take it this was after we had our talk about Maggie Murphy stealing children away, eh?"

Finn nodded then said, "Tommy?"

"Yeah?"

"You said the church doesn't do records or tell people its rules. But we don't either, do we, because we're Gypsies?"

He managed to stop himself from shaking his head and rolling his eyes at the observation, "That's right. But Gypsies don't run reform schools for gadzes so it's alright for us."

"Alright," Finn said – thankfully accepting the explanation then asking, "Is Lily and Rosie Gypsy now too?"

"What did I say yesterday?"

Finn looked alarmed, not knowing what to say.

"You're all Shelbys. All the Shelby kids. Lily's a Shelby, same as you."

"Alright," Finn nodded.

"Alright," Tommy nodded back, then decided to abandon the paper in place of picking up some toy horses and soldiers that had bounced out of the drawer, "You can get rid of these though, you never play with horses or soldiers anymore."

"I can't get rid of those ones," Finn replied making to grab the one he'd picked up off of him.

"Why not?"

"Just cause."

"Finn, I've just told you to start feeling sorry for the kids in the reform, we're going to go give them some of your stuff because they've got nothing, and you want to hang on to this just cause?"

"I'll give away some others but not those ones."

"You don't even like horses Finn, you've never been interested in riding whenever there's been horses at Charlie's. You've always preferred cars."

"Aye, well, those three are different."

"How?"

"They're from the fayre."

"What fayre?"

Finn swallowed hard then mumbled, not looking up, "When you went away, I went to the fayre and I ran away from Polly, so I could go see the witch. And she said I had to bring her three horses and three soldiers, and she'd put a spell on them and it would protect you an' John an' Arthur. One solider and one horse each."

Tommy was struck dumb for a second before he cleared his throat and asked, "And let me guess – these were being sold at the fayre, eh?"

Finn nodded.

"Where'd you get the money?"

"Polly used to make me do stuff for her to earn money for spending at the fayre when it was comin'," Finn shrugged, "And then I took some of the rest of it."

"Took it from where?"

"The shop," Finn answered and grabbed his backside as Tommy made a swing with his hand.

"You don't steal from your own family," he growled, smacking the backs of Finn's legs instead.

He wasn't going to give out over a shirt ripped at least a year ago - but stealing from their own was never going to be tolerated in his world.

"Yeah but it was for your own good," Finn argued, trying to dance out of the way.

"For my own good," Tommy snorted at hearing a phrase usually given out by Pol being parroted by Finn and left off him.

He thought about asking Finn what he made of it that not one of the three of his brothers had ever had a horse while they'd been fighting.

"Well you all came back, not everyone did," Finn pointed out.

"Well we're back, so you could get rid of these now, eh?"

"Tommy!"

"What?"

"Just let me keep them – just in case."

Tommy moved his hand to his brother's hair and ruffled it, "Alright. Is everything in this bloody drawer sacred?"

"Yeah."

"Fine," Tommy gave in and picked the drawer up off the floor, sliding it back in to place.

He folded the drawing back up and put it in on top of the paper pile, noticing as he did – "Finn, are these all my letters I sent you when I was away?"

Finn nodded.

"How the fuck with all of these in here do you not know how to spell brother?"

Finn shrugged, Tommy rolled his eyes and shut the drawer over before sitting on the bed.

"C'mere," he said, reaching out his hands the way he had done to Katie the day before.

Finn didn't look like he was entirely sure that he wanted to come, but he did so – slowly.

Tommy grabbed him and pulled him to stand between his legs, his hands holding his waist tight.

"I'm right proud of you Finn," he told his brother, "I know you're being a good phral to Lily, eh?"

"Like you for Arthur," Finn said, shrugging.

Tommy pulled him closer and hugged him, relieved when Finn's arms threaded around his own back.

"Alright you," he said, drawing back and ruffling Finn's hair once more, "You do need to get some stuff you can give to the poor reform kids together, eh? I'm going back down – dinner's at six and I expect you down with at least twenty things by then, alright?"

Finn sighed.

"What?"

"That's only two roast potatoes."

Thank you as always for your reviews and messages! Hope everyone is keeping safe and well and spirits are as high as they can be during this pandemic!