Dean


Tears of pain leaked out of the boy’s eyes, almost boiled to a vapor on his hot cheeks, but he wasn’t blubbering. Dean would keep that in mind for later, when the first wave of brutality was over and the message understood. You take it like a man and I’ll treat you like a man – the words of wisdom imparted by Liam Hollis to his son. These individual bricks of fear, hatred, and respect built Dean up to the man he was today, and for that, he couldn’t condemn his father. Loved him with the same beating heart that wished him dead.

Dean sat straddling a wooden chair, arms folded on the backrest, just beyond the hard edge of light cast by the lamp over the pool table. The Lucky Strike had closed a couple hours early this evening. The few patrons inside abandoned their drinks without much complaint when Dean’s crew busted in, dragging young George Casper in by that shaggy red head of hair. George’s knees were shredded, both denim and skin; obviously hadn’t been allowed the small dignity of walking into the pub. The boy wasn’t howling at that point, either. Breathing through his mouth, trying not to snort blood back into his throat from the damage done to his nose. He kept trying to stand up too, only to have his feet swept out from under him and his face reintroduced to the floor. Dean walked in after his boys and their victim, told Kit to lock up, made an offhand announcement to the customers that he’d cover their tabs for the evening. Kit, the owner of the pub, didn’t voice an opinion on the situation; she knew Dean Hollis didn’t dare pull this shit without the go-ahead from her father. Aidan Flaherty had to be aware of it, at the very least.

“Christ. What the fuck did he do?” she asked, locking the front door and killing the main lights.

“What the fuck did you do, George?” Dean redirected the question. Bobby Miller, one of Dean’s crew and a stocky buffalo of a sonofabitch, shoved George into a chair, pulled him up to a sitting position. George’s body would've clearly rather folded in on itself.

“I... I didn’t... Dean, please. You know I wouldn’t...”

They were a pack of four, the core group of Dean Hollis’ crew, proud enforcers of the Flaherty clan. And the twenty-nine years he’d been surviving the streets of Queens, Dean had earned his place in the hierarchy of the asphalt jungle. He sat and watched Lucas Flaherty, a cousin of Kit’s, step up and backhand George. Then Lucas flicked open a blade and seized George’s arm, wrestled it to an angle where he could restrict movement and isolate the fingers.

“George, which of these here do you think you’d miss the most?” Lucas said, grunting and digging his elbow back into George’s throat. He held up his own hand, the one holding the knife, to show George the stump of a middle finger. “This here... this was for flippin’ someone the bird though, so I s’pose the punishment fit the crime.”

And Lucas went to work. This would be the real test of George Casper’s spirit. He was young, probably nineteen or so, but looked much younger when the color drained from his face, when he squinted his eyes shut to find a place away from the pain. He howled then, screamed the word “please” so many times that it lost its meaning to Dean – “please, continue”, or “please, show some mercy, don’t take my fucking finger”? A glass hit the floor and shattered, sounded like the music of wind chimes compared to the ragged human sobs coming from their side of the room. Dean looked back over his shoulder, saw Kit as she ducked down behind the bar to clean up whatever mess she’d made; he’d forgotten she was still there. Even more disturbing than the screams was when George relaxed into the pain, settled a wildly unfocused gaze on the knife and the blood that flowed thick down his hand like candle wax. Dean was still watching the bar – when Kit reappeared, he stared back at her, brows furrowed slightly as if to ask, “What are you doing back there?” As if he could be curious about her in the middle of orchestrating torture, so patient for one task to be completed before he’d move on to the next.

Lucas Flaherty stepped away with half of a new finger, clutched in his palm with the knife handle. He didn’t have to show it to George to prove it was gone.

“George,” Dean said, satisfied that he had the boy’s attention. “Don’t look at it. Stop. Fucking. Looking at it. If you pass out...” he slowed his words as if explaining to a child, “I will cut your throat myself.” George’s eyes looked bluer, his hair a more offensive shade of orange, set against his paper-white skin.

“You lost your job and a finger, all in one night. I wouldn’t run out and buy a fucking lottery ticket, if I were you,” Dean said, rising to his feet and moving around the chair. “Stand up.”

The inside seam of George’s pant leg was soaked, he noticed, glancing down when the piss-smell ripened the air. George wasn’t fully present in time, but he obeyed the command like a puppet, picked up one clumsy piece at a time by its strings. Dean felt pity for him, reached out and smoothed the boy’s hair with both hands, slid them down to hold the boy’s face... in his mind, watched his father’s hands, heavy and calloused, do the same. He let go and stepped back, sent Bobby to raid the cleaning closet for a mop and bucket.

Dean dipped the mop into the water, pulled the lever to wring it out over the mess they’d made, diluting puddles of blood on the hardwood floor. He handed the mop to George but held tight, jerking it to pull George off-balance and closer. Dean’s eyes burned as he leaned in, lowering his voice to an octave only accessible to George’s ears. “You steal from me again? You get to clean up your little sister’s blood and piss off of this floor.” Startling George with a hearty clap on the shoulder, Dean turned and headed for the bar.

“Show him out when he’s done,” he called back, hitching himself up onto a barstool. Lucas followed, leaned his long body over the bar and dropped something down the drain of one of the sinks, flipped on the garbage disposal. Dean rubbed his temples just below the beanie cap over his hair, opened his eyes as Kit walked by. “How much do I owe on those tabs?”

She gave him a look that said are you fucking kidding me?, but answered, “I’ll let you know.”

Dean took in a deep breath, let it out in a sigh. Feet on the support rails of his barstool, he stood up, dove in to land a kiss on Kit’s cheek... and when she tried to dodge out of it, he grabbed her chin, pressed his mouth hard against hers. He knew that look in her eye. Knew the minute he walked out, she’d rescue poor shell-shocked George, play nurse and bandage up that sawed-off knuckle. Not to make up for anything her family was responsible for – she knew business and justice and the law of the jungle, the way it was enforced on these streets. She’d do it because George was nineteen. Because he was taking care of that little sister. Because otherwise, he wouldn’t have helped himself to a bigger cut of the profit from his coke deals.

“Stay the fuck away from him when he’s finished.”