Boston Blood

Two

Dublin, 1985

Frances tossed and turned in her bed. She tried not to wake Michael who was fast asleep in the twin bed next to her. She looked at her watch and sighed in frustration. He promised her he'd be home by now. She's worried sick. The bastard. Frances thought as she pictured her mother sitting at the kitchen table downstairs, no doubt, with a cup of cold tea placed in front her her and a cigarette in hand. She pitied her mother. Margaret was a beautiful, kind and loving woman and loved her children very much. But she was desperately unhappy. Trapped in an abusive marriage to a horrible, dangerous man who treated her like dirt. She didn't deserve this life. 

Frances contemplated going downstairs but she decided against it. There was nothing she could say or do to comfort her mother who was now, Frances realised, becoming a shell of a woman. She had lost so much weight in the last two years and her once fabulous long auburn hair was greying, significantly. 
Over those past few years, Frances had become much more aware of the line of work her father is in. Not by choice, mind you. She tried to ignore the hushed whispers from the other girls in her class, the stares of disgust from the nuns that taught her and the fact that the boys from Saint Patrick's school down the road were terrified to talk to or even look at her. She was beginning to learn that her family was different. She hated how secluded it made her feel. She had no friends and was becoming a very angry young woman.

The fights in the school yard were becoming more frequent and her behaviour in the classroom was getting worse. She was constantly getting in trouble, now for fighting, bad language or smoking. Although she hated when the nuns hit her, she felt a buzz from getting into trouble. This worried her.
Frances had plucked up the courage to finally ask her mother about what her father did for a living, one night after Tommy had left in Paul's car but the petrified look in her mother's eyes, made her instantly regret her question. "Your father is a very important man. A very busy man, Frances. His work keeps the roof over our head and the food on the table, that's all you need to know."

There had been several incidents that had led Frances to begin to believe that her father was a criminal. She had overheard a few of his phone conversations with Paul about shipments coming into the docklands and something about drugs and guns. Another conversation involved him mentioning the name of a man who was reported missing on the news and laughing, maliciously. But Frances knew better, now than to ask about it. 

It was in the last year, however, that Frances started to wonder if Tommy Ryan was some sort of gangster. The girls at school were now calling her "Frances Corleone" behind her back and the boys from St. Pat's had started to mock shoot each other when she walked by them on the street. Then her father had come home late one night and didn't realise Frances was lying on the couch, pretending to be asleep. She carefully opened one eye as her father removed his leather jacket from his broad shoulders in the hallway and noticed he had a gun in his right hand. His face and neck was splattered with blood. Panic and terror paralyzed Frances as she squeezed her eyes shut and prayed he didn't see her lying there.

As she lay in her bed, watching Michael softly smile and cling to his pillow she let her mind drift back to last Christmas. That's when her suspicions were finally confirmed.

***
Her father, very uncharacteristically, decided to throw a party for some of his friends, much to her mother's nervous protesting. Tommy had never had any of the fellas over to the house, except for Paul. Frances was dreading the party. She had just turned fourteen and her body had matured. She was a very pretty young woman but whenever she was in the company of any of her father's friends, she didn't like the attention she would get from them. She stood in front of the mirror, staring at her body. Her father had instructed her to wear a navy blue dress and a matching ribbon in her hair. He told her that some very important people were going to be in the house and he wanted his daughter to look like a nice young woman, for once and not a miserable bitch. She hated wearing dresses. She preferred jeans and trousers and baggy t-shirts with the name of rock bands on them. She hated showing her off her new well-proportioned and mature body.