J. Fynn - The Long Game

I ducked my head, rubbing at the back of my skull. “Hey, finishing school wasn’t my idea. You know I’d rather have been out on the road with you.” I hadn’t hated high school if I was being honest, but I had hated the feeling of being different. Going to school past the seventh grade wasn’t done. I’d once heard of a few Traveler boys from another clan who had gone on to play for the LSU football team, but they were definitely the exception and not the rule.

“If it had been up to me, you both would’ve been in school,” Maggie said.

Jimmy Boy snorted out a laugh. “Then I’m glad it wasn’t. What good it do him?” He jabbed an elbow into my ribs. “All that schooling, and he’s still empty-headed enough to go weak in the knees whenever Rosie Sheedy bats her eyes at him.”

“At least I don’t flirt with country girls,” I said and aimed my own elbow-jab in return.

“Stop trying to change the subject. I thought you didn’t even like Rosie.”

“I like her well enough, and she can get me to where I wanna go. Feelings, love, and all that—they just get in the way.”

Jimmy Boy shook his head. “How in the hell’d you get to be so jaded? You tell those mutts over there you love ‘em every chance you get, but when it comes to people, you’re as closed up as Pop Sheedy’s safe.”

“Aww, that’s not true.” I wrapped my arm around Jimmy Boy’s neck and pulled his head down to pin it against my side. “I love you, big brother.”

Jimmy Boy shoved me hard to free himself, then punched my arm for good measure. I lifted my hand to retaliate, but Maggie’s voice stopped me mid-swing.

“That’ll be enough from you two. You’ve got a table to mend, and I need to fix myself up before the women head over to the church.” She took a few steps toward the trailer before turning back to look at me through narrowed eyes. “Your brother’s right, though, Shay. If you don’t watch it, your ambition’s going to get you in trouble.”

I opened my mouth to argue, but her expression warned me that it best remain shut. Maggie gave a curt nod, and a smile brightened her face again. Without a word, she retrieved her basket and marched toward the trailer. The wolfhounds hopped to their feet and followed after her. Maggie stood on the steps of the trailer, patiently holding the door open, then pulled it shut behind them.

Left alone with my brother, I stood so I could face him full-on. Maggie might not understand, but I had to convince someone I wasn’t being a fool.

“If we started working with the Sheedys, think how much more money we’d be bringing in. Our family’d be back on top like before Da went away.”

“Da didn’t ‘go away,’ Shay. He got himself killed because he wanted to be the best, bring in the biggest scores. And you’re picking up just where he left off. You need to learn your place in this clan, and that ain’t beside Pop Sheedy’s daughter. Got it?”

His words stung, and I clenched my fists at my sides. It wouldn’t have been the first time my brother and I came to blows over something, but before my temper reached its boiling point, he stood and gently gripped the back of my neck in both hands. “I know it’s tough. I want a new truck and a bigger place and a pretty girl on my arm just like the next fellow, but it’s just not in the cards. You and I are on our own, and that’s fine. We bring in enough to put food on the table and take care of Maggie, and you getting in over your head with Rosie Sheedy could ruin us. Promise me you’ll stay far away from her tonight.”

“But, Jimmy, I—”

“Promise.”

“Fine.” I jerked free of his grasp and took a step back. “I’ll be sure to keep to myself.”

“YOU KNOW, THOSE are meant for drinking, not staring at,” Jimmy Boy said, settling himself in the lawn chair next to me with a sweating glass of Guinness in each hand.

“Sláinte.” I grinned and raised my own glass, then followed the toast with a gulp of the thick stout.

“That’s how it’s done,” he said, tipping back one of his.

“But I’ve got an empty hand,” I said, gesturing to Jimmy Boy’s dual drinks. “I’m already falling behind.”

He chuckled. “I’ve gotta take up the slack for old Seldom Fed over there.” He pointed to a portly, middle-aged man sitting alone at the end of a long bench that ran along one side of the pavilion. “He’s taken the pledge again, mostly to get that goat he calls a wife off his back for a few more months. He looks miserable, poor old fool. I think he was better off listening to the banshee wail about his drinking.”

Seldom Fed O’Hara had earned his nickname by eating like a starving man who’d finally been blessed with food. Apparently, giving up the drink only increased his appetite because he already had a heaping plateful on his lap and was attacking it with a fork. I wondered what Jenny O’Hara would have to say about it when she returned from the church with the other wedding guests. Although many of the men didn’t bother attending the service—we preferred to stay behind to start the drinking portion of the festivities early—most of us weren’t bold enough to dig into the food before the rest of the clan had returned.

Jimmy Boy emptied the glass in his left hand and started in on the one in his right. He downed a quarter of it in one swig, then belched loudly. “I’ll tell you, Shay. Living is sucking the life outta me.”

I grunted in amusement. “Yeah? How’s that?”

“All…this.” He waved his arm in front of him as if he were trying to shoo away imaginary flies. “I know you’ve only been going out on the road for two years or so, but I been conning since I was twelve.”

“Right, but you’re only twenty-three. You sound like you’re coming up on retirement.”

“Sometimes I wish I was. Honestly, the only reason I give your big schemes any attention at all is because I figure a big score would make it possible to take it easy for a while. Maybe get married, give Maggie a couple grandkids.”

I took another sip of beer to buy time before I responded. The alcohol was already beginning to make things seem a little dream-like. Other Traveler men could drink several pints before feeling anything, but I tended to approach drinking the way the women did—as something only done on special occasions.

“If you hate conning so much, you could always give up the game,” I finally managed after giving the alcohol a little time to loosen my tongue.

Jimmy Boy sputtered on Guinness. He swallowed hard, laughing as if I’d made the funniest joke he’d ever heard. When he caught my awkward smile, the laughter died. His brow knitted in confusion.

“For all my bitching, I honestly can’t imagine not going out on the road once in a while. Settling down and giving up the game sounds great, and it’s worked for men in other clans, but you know what would happen if one of us just up and quit. While everyone else would be out on the road, I’d be here alone. I couldn’t stand all these people going on like I never existed.”

I blew out a long breath and relaxed back in my chair. “It’s just that sometimes you make me nervous. You start going on about packing it all in for a simpler life, and I start to worry about what that would mean for me and Maggie.”

“I’m talking outta my ass is all. Hey,” he said, clapping me on the back. “We should talk to Uncle Pete and Hollywood about—”

Jimmy Boy didn’t have a chance to finish his sentence. Car horns blared from the front, and everyone in the pavilion turned their attention toward the sound. The honking continued, and vehicles appeared on the lane, traveling in a slow procession. The parade of Cadillacs, Lincolns, and late-model pickups crawled past us. Metal clanked as each car circled around, shifting the coins the owners had dropped into their gas tanks to bring good luck.

In the back of every truck, two or three girls perched on lawn chairs, poised like beauty queens and twice as painted up. In stark contrast to the men, who’d been drinking at the pavilion in rumpled slacks and collared shirts, the women wore huge gowns filling the space of each truck bed with a wash of pink, purple, and green. The jewels they wore in their hair and the sequins coating their dresses glittered in the dying sunlight. Young men gathered around the edges to get a better view, some standing, some pulling up chairs and settling in for the show.

I stayed in my seat but craned my neck, trying to see beyond the fence of onlookers. The young women on display were almost unrecognizable and not only because unmarried men and women rarely spent time together outside of formal occasions. Each one was so heavily made-up that she resembled a porcelain doll more than an actual human girl. They all beamed, clearly enjoying the attention.

Once the pavilion was surrounded, wedding guests began unloading from their vehicles. The groom and a younger man, who I guessed was his brother given the similarities between them, climbed out of a silver Lexus, grinning in matching designer tuxedos. They made their way across the cement floor of the pavilion to a row of chairs decorated with flowers and ribbons for the wedding party. Next, a stout man with a shock of white hair stepped from a black Cadillac. Pop Sheedy stooped for a moment to help his wife out of the car and then rested both hands on his burgeoning belly, offering his elbow to Bridget. The groom’s father was next. Rail-thin and well over six feet tall, he ducked his head to clear the doorframe of his own black Cadillac. Apparently, he had no wife to help from the car and so crossed quickly to his sons.

Next, the community procession began. Women with new babies to show off came first. Next, some of the older married women, who took this opportunity to show off new jewelry purchases instead of children. Finally, the unmarried girls began climbing down from truck beds, aided by the young men who’d had the privilege of driving them. They walked slowly through the pavilion, circling around the huge floral arrangement in the center of the floor in a loop of brightly colored satin, tulle, and organza.

The last car door opened. Rosie Sheedy, a baby-faced seventeen-year-old girl with black curls teased to a height that defied gravity, took the hand of the young man who’d chauffeured her to the party. A pang of jealousy tightened my stomach as her gloved fingers closed around his, and I was secretly glad that he struggled to get her out of the Lincoln Town Car with any grace. Her hoop skirt crumpled as she squeezed herself through the door, but immediately sprang back to life, forming a three-foot barrier around her legs on all sides. The dress was an irritating shade of teal blue, but I could easily look past her bad taste in clothing given who her family was.

Rosie turned her back to the pavilion and reached inside the car to help her sister make a grand entrance. A head appeared, crowned with a sparkling tiara. Ringlets of dark hair bobbed as both Rosie and the driver pulled the bride’s arms, struggling to free her from the car. For nearly ten minutes, the trio fought with the bride’s enormous dress, shoving sections of it in every direction to manipulate it through the car door. Finally, Mary Sheedy burst from the car like a cork from a champagne bottle. Her sister caught her and set her on her feet again, both girls giggling.

Mary and Rosie Sheedy were Irish twins, only eleven months apart in age, and they were so similar it was sometimes hard to tell them apart from a distance. There was no mistaking which was the bride this day, though. Mary strode to the center of the floor, making a concerted effort not to wobble under the weight of her dress.

I leaned closer to my brother. “If the competition over having the biggest dress doesn’t end soon, these girls are going to have to be wheeled around on carts.”

Jimmy Boy offered a smirk in response.

Mary’s dress was certainly a sight to behold. The skirt was made up of at least a dozen layers of fabric held aloft by a wire hoop skirt, and Mary had to spread her arms to their fullest width to gather the sides in her hands as she walked. Huge stars made of gold and silver sequins trailed their way down the front of her skirt in two lines. The bodice of the dress had genuine pink diamonds sewn along the collar and extending to her waist in a V-shape down the front and back. All the glittering gems, along with a little help from a glass-and-a-half of Guinness, were making my head cloudy. I closed my eyes for a moment, hoping the feeling would pass.

Once Mary had completed her laborious journey across the pavilion, Rosie helped her arrange the dress so she could take a seat on the throne next to her new husband. The dress spilled out over the chair’s sides, and Mary seemed to hover above it rather than sit in it, boosted by the fabric of her gown. Pop Sheedy stood and raised a glass to toast his daughter and new son-in-law. The entire reception rang out in a chorus of well wishes and congratulations. He beamed with pride as he looked down at his bedazzled offspring.