Brothers

Oppression II

There were three of them. The tallest of the trio was leaning on his bent leg which rested on one of the old wooden crates at the end of the alleyway. The grey and white wool Irish cap that was atop his head covered his eyes somewhat, being a little too big for him. The apparent leader of the group wore a pair of denim overalls and a light blue collared shirt underneath it. The two slightly shorter boys to his left and in back of him wore stained white tee shirts and denim jeans, both had their arms crossed.

The leader raised the visor of his cap with his finger, smirking widely as he eyed nine year old Stevie. The boy’s brown eyes shifted upwards and to the left, now focusing on the older man beside him. They widened for a second, studying him before returning to their original state. “Oh, who’s this?” the boy asked, eyes glinting slightly under the visor of his hat. At the remark, Steve snapped his head up. Anger began to swim through his bloodstream.

“Leave him outta this, Tommy!” the blonde boy shouted. Startled, the four other sets of eyes in the alley dilated and Alfred’s blue eyes shifted to look down at the little boy.

“Steve…” the grown man’s voice came out in a soft whisper, barely heard by the boy beside him as Alfred looked at him through his spectacles. After a second of staring at Steve, his head snapped up to look at the group of three after hearing a low and sinister chuckle.

“Your Daddy has to come help you out? Is that it?” Tommy cackled. The two in back of him joined in. Steve’s eyes softened, tears quickly began to appear on the rim of his eyes as he bit his upper lip nervously before looking down, bowing his head in shame.

Tommy took his foot off of the wooden crate and began to walk towards the duo, the henchmen still continued to follow him. Their pace was slow, almost as if they were trying to intimidate the nine year old more and more with each passing second. They slowly walked forward, their stride being of a lion sneaking up on its prey.

Steve closed his eyes, hoping that this would end soon while trying to hold the tears back that were still dancing in his eyes. A small whimper escaped him, which didn’t go unnoticed by the three and Alfred.

The three stopped, and Tommy started to snicker again. “Awww,” he spoke loudly, voice dripping with sarcasm. He looked back at the two henchmen,Adam and Robert, who then started to laugh along with their “boss”. “He’s crying. How adorable.” Tommy made a vomiting noise, causing Adam and Robert’s laughing to escalate in volume. That was the breaking point for Steve. He couldn’t take it anymore. He cried, head looming over the handlebar of his red bike.

Alfred stared, blood boiling with the temperature rising by the second. His whole body shook with anger. His hands were tight fists, knuckles white and a drop of blood trickled out of his palm and past his fingers. Right now, he was comparable to a bull with the way his body shook as he was getting ready to charge at them, those little bastards. It was unforgivable; absolutely unforgivable.

Alfred quickly started to unbutton his suit jacket and discarded, throwing it onto the bike. He began walking forward, unbuttoning the cuffs for his sleeve with each step he took. Steve heard his footsteps, but he couldn’t look up, assuming that he was going to be left all alone by the only person that could help him right now, but he couldn’t blame him. He was a wimp, coward, chicken, weakling. All of the above.  

“Huh,” Tommy scoffed, his brown eyes giving Alfred a mocking look as he saw him approach them, and rather quickly at that. “What’re you gonna do, Old man?!” Alfred’s silence spoke for his anger all on its own. Robert and Adam then felt a stab of fear when he kept walking over and now was cracking his knuckles. Tommy, however, chose to remain foolish and continued to smirk as the said “Old man” was now fast approaching.